When You Left Me

Inspired by the trans-Atlantic slave trade and other large-scale traumatic events, When You Left Me examines our relationship to the land as a symptom of collective trauma. This videopoem uses the model of a romantic relationship to illustrate a larger trauma response within a society. Borrowing elements of an African American Vernacular English visual lexicon from previous projects and the widespread indigenous belief that the land is an extension of our collective selves, the film correlates how trauma would manifest in this larger context.