The Other Side is a site specific installation performed and recorded through photo and video. Through this work, I reveal a message using the fence in my backyard and morse code. This work is temporary, it will leave no imprint on the land, which is something important to me as we journey through this current Anthropocene epoch.

 

The fence represents my relationship to this specific place and time. I set out to explore my understanding of the land and people in my new (temporary) community. The culture in Quebec is different from Ontario (where I grew up). Language politics, the separatist movement, and these black privacy fences remind me every day that I am navigating the unknown. In this work, the fence signifies the ownership of land, separation of people, and the identity of a working-class culture. It also represents my place and identity here. 

 

The message represents my desire to communicate past the barriers that exist within this community and beyond. I’ve chosen morse code as the tool for communicating, which you can see activated through the removal of the black plastic privacy slats in the chain link fence. The words have been excavated and withdrawn from something that was functioning perfectly fine until I arrived.

 

Morse code was a system my late grandfather would have known well from his time in the British Navy during WWII. Traditionally it is communicated through sound and light over distances. And women were known to be important code breakers during the war, in one instance saving nearly two years of time in battle for their code breaking skills. 

 

The absence of the plastic slats in the fence sends the message in an obscure way. The missing slates create a negative open space, inviting the passage of light and the wind to carry forth these words. 

What’s interesting about this specific site is the telephone and internet wires that run directly over the fence line. The metal fence is literally a barrier of communication, while the electric element of the wires connects us to everything. The materials themselves create tension and conflict within the work.

 

The message I have chosen is simple. And it’s directed to the community, the land, and the systems we live by. It reads, “Hello to the other side”.

The other side represents a multitude of messages embedded within the themes of capitalism and ecofeminism.