What We Carry: A Collaboration

A long overdue post about a wonderfully powerful project in which we had the pleasure of participating.

Last year, a talented local watercolor artist named Tram Colwin reached out to me about a project she was embarking on. Funded by a grant from Artists360 and the Mid-America Arts Alliance as well as other donors, the project titled “What We Carry” is a visual narrative of displaced people searching for belonging. The idea: Tram would work with Canopy NWA, our local refugee resettlement agency, to find both migrants and immigrants, some being refugees, ask them to select an item they brought with them from their homeland, and then 1) paint a watercolor representation of the object and 2) record a video interview of their story to share alongside the paintings.

I felt right at home with Tram, and it helped that I’ve been working with Canopy NWA for a few years, even doing a similar small project involving refugees and objects they brought from home. It was a good fit.

Tram Colwin

Over the course of a few days, we recorded ten interviews in our studio to capture the stories of some beautiful humans, including Tram’s own. I hope you’ll take a look at Tram’s site here, where you can see images of her paintings and watch the corresponding video to learn about their significance.

And, if you’re around NWA on Wednesday, October 30th, 2024, the touring exhibit will be having its FINAL reception at the Fayetteville Public Library from 5:30-7:30pm, with remarks and Q&A at 6pm. Hope to see you there.

Here are some quick photo stills I took as part of the multi-day video interview process, along with a couple of the videos. You can view all of the videos here.

-S