Films by director Sylvia Johnson

New Mexico-based filmmaker Sylvia Johnson uses visual storytelling to increase understanding of our shared humanity and connection to the natural world. Working with organizations, scientists, artists, and small businesses, Johnson creates films that drive positive change, foster human connection, and support environmental sustainability.

Seeking Refuge highlights four of Johnson’s documentary films created since 2014. Refuge(e), Luz’s Story, Mermaids Against Plastic, and Roaming Wild. These films raise awareness about conditions asylum seekers face in private prisons (including transgender women who face additional discrimination), plastic pollution in the oceans, and the ongoing controversy over wild horses on public lands in the American West.

About Refuge(e), The Santa Fe Reporter writes:

The film successfully mixes traditional documentary style with illustrated watercolor animations that lend emotional depth to the depiction of personal memories such as the men’s nightmarish accounts of trekking through the Central American jungle and their experiences in the Cibola County Correctional Center. The result is a touching exposé of the horrors that might cause a person to leave everything behind, the relief of arriving at the border, and the treatment refugees face in the US immigration system. (Leah Cantor)

Seeking Refuge is on view in SITElab October 5, 2019- January 5, 2020.

Click here to more about Sylvia’s work.

SITE Mutual Aid

As the creative director of the Santa Fe Dreamers Project, Sylvia Johnson filmed Refuge(e) and Luz’s Story as part of a successful campaign advocating divestment from private prisons.

Contact us to learn more about the Santa Fe Dreamers Project, and some of the other humanitarian organizations SITE’s artists and artworks have engaged with.