Millie Chen: A Forest Near the North Shore of Lake Erie

Celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Canadian Cultural Centre in Paris, this production gathers together over a hundred unseen-before photographs by major artists of the contemporary Canadian scene as well as a citizens’section presenting fifty images sent from Canada and from France.

Created during the lockdown, this exhibition was elaborated from requests made to artists to send three images representing a current and personal vision of their world, a symbolic project specifically designed for France and consciously addressed to the French. Mostly comprising photographs made with the technology and in the spirit of the smartphone, Image... Sent also underlines the Canada-France relationship through the reciprocity of the citizens’ panel.

Living in a forest on the Niagara Peninsula, I am humbled by the realization that this land does not belong to us. It was inhabited long before we got there, continues to be deeply occupied with non-human life, and will continue to be so after our demise. In my effort to capture this impressive environment, I photographed three vertical landscapes depicting oaks, including the oldest of this tongue of land that we call home. I planted my feet in the dirt and documented my surroundings, arching my perspective from the forest floor to the treetops. Each vertical is anchored to the shoe of women who have crossed this region, me included. A glimpse of the ephemeral human history that permeates this geography changes our reading of the landscape.