footsteps on the frozen river, n.saskatchewan, edmonton, january 2009
I go to this site very often, just to watch this animation over & over again... I was introduced to the lovely artists of Tin Can Forest through their book Pohádky which was given to me as a Christmas gift by my dear friend Arwen. We spent an afternoon poring over the details of each illustration, & I was delighted to be able to recognize so many of the characters once mentioned to me by my baba & interpret the pysanka-inspired iconography. Tricksters, wise women, rusalky, the forest come alive... It was also a fitting introduction to showing Jason my most beloved film, Tini Zabutykh Predkiv (Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors)... as the pantheon of forest spirits figures prominently in that work as well.
I am currently particularly enchanted by this set of illustrations, called 'Domovoi' (house-spirit). Layered shelters, dark but warm, ancestral & hibernal. Certainly, some of it might be seen as sinister, especially by Western European sensibilities -- but I feel comfortable with this darkness, the ambiguity, the presence of death & the connection with ancestors tangled in the roots that brings forth life. These images evoke so many stories, feelings, songs, & I always feel this sense of wordless recognition when I look at them, wild & inchoate yet so deeply familiar; their work feels like such a home to me.
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