The Will of the Father (2019)
Video by Jade Wilson
Images by Caroline Crockell
Dorothea Dix Park
Raleigh, NC
The Will of the Father was the first short film in which Proxemic Media collaborated with the Black on Black Project, spoken word artist Johnny Lee Chapman, III, choreographer Anthony “Ay-Jaye” Otto Nelson, Jr, and videographer Jade Wilson. Weise worked with the crew as the performance coordinator, scheduling both logistical details for the crew and assisting the choreographic vision of Ay-Jaye.
We knew development of the work would be heavy given the subject matter of highlighting some of the history of the enslaved people at Dorothea Dix property, formerly the Spring Hill Plantation owned by Theophiles Hunter, Sr. in the late 1700s. However another element to the immense power of this work was the efficiency in which the production crew and artists worked together to realize this piece. In addition to the short film (rehearsed & shot in the same day), about one week later the artists performed the work consecutively four times within two hours during the City of Raleigh’s SEEK festival at Dix Park.