Reredos (2025) Projections
Le bonheur est parfois caché dans l’inconnu (2025)
Le bonheur est parfois caché dans l’ inconnu (happiness is sometimes found in the unknown) is a meditative short film reflecting on my time in France. Sound bowls are used to anchor the poetic film through the thoughts of endurance and transformation. The poem is a visceral meditation on endurance, capturing the rhythm of breath, the ache of the body, and the transformation that comes from pushing past self-doubt. Blending physical struggle with spiritual renewal, it traces the journey from exhaustion to rebirth.
Basketball is My Ministry (2025)
Basketball is My Ministry, is an intimate look into her father’s extensive pre-game ritual. This work combines Parks interests in spirituality, identity, and sports. Her father has coached young athletes for over 20 years. His coaching extends beyond the game—it is about teaching mental strength, resilience, and faith in oneself. As a coach, one must learn to let go and trust that things will work out. These rituals, deeply personal and unique to each individual, this piece offers Parks a rare look into her father’s inner world. Basketball is my Ministry, uses the sounds of basketball to build a gospel motive to center the viewers as they go through her fathers ritual as they sit in moments of prayer and reflection. The process of creating this piece has been deeply personal—it bridges the gap between her and her father and affirms that rituals, whether in sports or in life, accumulate into something greater.
1 in 3 (2017; featured in the UCSD undergrad art show)
My most current short film, is called 1 in 3. This film in inspired by Ava duVernay’s documentary 13th filmed in 2016. I watched this film in my transnational film class, when watching the film it made me think of my dad. The statement in the film that stuck out to me was “1 in 3 Black men are in jail.” I wanted to counter argue this statistic by using my dad. The concept of the film came about after I wrote a poem about the statistic, in the film I speak about how in college much of the time when I am in a lecture hall I am the only black kid and how it makes me feel to be alone. It also questions the media’s idea that a black man is a threat to society. When I was starting to develop this poem into a bigger project, I started by storyboarding the concept. Also during this time I was showing the poem to my grandmother who has lived in the Jim Crow era and my dad’s brother both of which teared up after reading the poem, their reactions made me believe this is a relevant subject to address. Within the film I included family images and images of my dad coaching young high school student many of whom come from low-income families. I wanted to show him coaching because unlike what the media shows us when we think of a Black male, not only a father to me and my brother but he is a father figure to other students making him no threat to society. I hope this film is able to address the issue with this statistic and there needs to be a change in the system, whether that be the media stop labeling a group of Black Lives Matters protesters as rioters or thugs, or changing the neoslavery prison systems.
Breana Janae Photography 