Visions and Voices - an audio-visual exploration of the southwest quadrant neighborhood in Rochester, New York

The people’s history and the history of evolving communities is often an unwritten one. Throughout the engagement with personal life stories, I witnessed how in many ways - often hidden and unexpected - people contribute and build community. I learned about shared visions and shared challenges, about community resilience and how we can build alternatives by seemingly small acts just as well as widely recognized community initiatives. Both are equally important.

Over the last few months, I stepped towards a deeper understanding and insight of the people’s history of the community and neighborhood in which I have lived and worked in for ten months.

Geographically, I refer to the southwest quadrant of Rochester, encircling the Genesee River, South Plymouth Avenue, Samuel McCree Way, Genesee Street, and Ford Street.

This project has been a continuous process of active listening in which my audio-visual editing and my written words reflect the essence of what I heard.

I have gratitude for the spirit of generosity I met: people sharing their stories, dreams, hopes, fears, sorrows and joys of life and of their communities. Through this project, I am reminded of the richness of experience and of stories that live in each person and how these are interwoven in people’s physical environment and in their web of relationships.

I invite you to join me in a spirit of openess and curiosity to engage with these glimpses of the complexity of human experience and being-in-the-world.

 

Anna-Kristina Pfeifer

 

In collaboration with the M.K. Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence in Rochester, New York