Uprooted
(2min 56, stop motion animation film, 2012)
What happens when you take your heartroots to another place?
The “small” details that haunt the exprience of migration: leaving, packing, farewells, arrivals and the feeling of otherness are visually expressed on Uprooted, a wordless animation film.
Uprooted retraces some moments of the process of uprooting oneself from a place-culture to Canada: from the awareness of the inminence of leaving to the experience of the landing and the encounter with the feeling of otherness (demands of integration-assimilation, regards, invisibilization).
This short animation film was created thanks to the MAI mentorship program.
Story, drawings, mix-media collages, animation and editing by Coco Riot
Music by Elisha Lim
Animation consultant: Sves
Editing consultant: Remy Huberdeau
Los Sentidos.
Elisha Lim and Coco Riot, 2010
Elisha Lim and Coco Riot put together their writing and visual talents for this video-poem based on Coco Riot’s text “Los Sentidos”. This video was premiered during the New York Armory Art Week 2011.
CUT
Short video performance related to subjects of belonging and liberation. I like to explore how danger and beauty create powerful images that do not need further explanation. For me, this is a metaphore of our daily social and individual struggles against oppression. This video has been screened in festivals, galleries, art events around Europe and North America. It was filmed during summer 2006 on the roof of my hometown house in southern Spain, and yes, it’s me with my childhood matress behind 
This video may be a little bit intense for some people when screened on big screen.
Genderpoo
Animation (flash) short film visibilizing (some) of the identities and communities that western society oppresses because of their gender, colour, religion, ideology, ability, age, family situation, class, features, size, etc. This short film is a small part of a larger installation project called Genderpoo, that have been exhibited in festival, events, galleries and even museums in Europe and North America. Using bathroom signs forms, this project aim to question the public who adn how we belong to society standards and to pay a hommage to every one and each of these identities, communities and people who fight for social justice and anti-oppression values. As long as there will be organizers and social fighters, the project will be growing, happy not to be ever done.
Buttercup (3min. 57sec., video performance, 2010)
Inspired by “Buttercup” poem by spoken word artist Luna Allison (featuring in the video) and created in collaboration with her, this video is a reflection about belonging, a subject that i’ve been working on for a long time. Belonging in the space, there is the contradiction between the lanscape (the melted and rocky ice pool of Parc Lafontaine, Montréal) and the tools we have to move through this landscape (ice skates). As in the poem, gender is an important as
pect of how we belong or not to the landscape. White ice skates as a symbol of what society considers to be “real girliness” can be seen here as a difficulty to move freely. At the same time, ice skates, seen as blades, are powerful weapons. Those two meanings are explored in this video poem, specially on the moments where Luna tries again and again ice skating figures on the rocks. There’s never a fall but there’s never perfection, but the trying goes on.
This poem has been screened on interaction with Luna Allison spoken word performance of the poem “Buttercup” at Women with Voices, video poem festival in Montréal, 2010.
The quality of the video has been reduced for web and streaming purposes. A higher quality video is available.
