We are all essential

Shell and rice paper
Installation
Montreal Commerce Center
Festival Art Souterrain
2022

We are all essential brings together testimonials from healthcare professionals, Covid19 survivors, bereaved family members and social justice activists. The health crisis has highlighted our need for mutual aid and connection, as well as our interdependence with each other. The crisis has indeed called into question what we define as essential, and the notion of community and mutual aid within our system. For this project, the public was invited to write a word, a sentence, a text, and/or a poem reflecting their emotional states and thoughts on these themes. People then hung their writing on the installation, activating the work through their participation. By gathering these testimonies, the artist hopes to create a collective memory by pooling individual memories linked to the events of the pandemic. Her intention is thus to highlight the urgent need to rethink our structure in order to reinforce the idea of collectivity and inclusivity by putting forward the stories of these people.

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