Francesca Ekwuyasi

Originally posted: 2/4/2021, 1:30 PM

Heya!
My name is Francesca Ekwuyasi, I'm a writer and multidisciplinary artist living in Kjipuktuk and I'll be taking over the CFAT Instagram this week. I'm very excited to share the ways i tap into my imagination for art making and storytelling🌸

Originally posted: 2/4/2021, 1:30 PM

experiment 1 (video + dialogue + score) on the purpose of art

i shot this video on a car ride in Bedford. my friend Wren Tian-Morris (@wren_indoubt ) and i went to pick up our other friend Dumpling (she's a dog friend)

i really love the ways the roads and streetlights look at night. the light stayed red for far too long, it was hilarious - do you ever feel like you're being personally slighted by traffic lights or elevators or slow walking pedestrians who don't know you're behind them on a sidewalk?
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anyway, i wanted to see how it would turn out to layer some sounds over the footage - dialougue from a conversation i had with Wren about the purpose of art right now, and some cello sounds.
i just started learning to play the cello and i really don't know anything about it, but i love the sounds and vibrations. i think it lends an eerie vibe to a not at all eerie conversation.

Originally posted: 2/4/2021, 1:30 PM

experiment 2 (video + dialogue + score) on depression and love

bits of my morning and some thoughts on shame, depression, and love.

i’m very grateful for how much outdoor space we have here, and how this can lend to a small sense of ‘normalcy’ in the middle of a global pandemic. we’ve been very lucky (privileged) in this corner of the world. i’m from a very different corner, many people i love are in many corners all over, some of which are much less privileged - it’s scary times, i’m scared.

my imagination is often a dope companion, a space to brew stories, to make meaning of things that seem meaningless. i don’t think that ‘meaningless’ is the correct word for what i mean, especially because i believe we exist as a constellation of connections. I’m not saying this isn a whimsical way, i mean it as a matter of fact; everything is a consequence of everything.

anyway, what i’m trying to say is that i’m relying on my imagination to help me see connections, meaning, and purpose right now. because i need them right now.

Originally posted: 2/4/2021, 1:32 PM

reading Mary Oliver’s Wild Geese

i’m reading Wild Geese by Mary Oliver. It’s such a sweet and humbling poem about self and imagination and existing in a vaster, freer, more fascinating universe than any petty personal foibles and failings (foibles is a funny word ☺️).

What poems are you reading?

Wild Geese by Mary Oliver
You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting -
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

Originally posted: 2/4/2021, 1:30 PM

experiment 3 (video + dialogue + text)
excerpt from conversation with friends about wildest dreams and beautiful places.

video: walking down Robie street with Wren Tian-Morris (@wren_indoubt ) and dumpling last night.
audio: Darcie Bernhardt (@ouiyaghasiak ) telling us about the most beautiful place she’s been.
text: YOU WILL FIND A WAY THROUGH

Originally posted: 2/4/2021, 1:30 PM

experiment 4 (video + poem + music)

it’s been so much fun doing this Instagram takeover! thank you for hanging out and watching my video + imagination + dialogue experiments. i dreamed this poem and wrote a short story around it; here I’ve enlisted the gorgeous voices of my sweethearts @wren_indoubt @carjillionaire @subtle.sparkles
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I hope you like it.
✌🏿🖤