Ania Freer, former Artist-in-Residence, opens up about her storytelling practice with Ox-Bow’s own Storyteller, Shanley Poole.
SP: I’m really excited to talk to you about storytelling in particular. As someone who really cares about that, it’s cool to be able to interview someone who shares that same mentality. I wanted to start by going way back and asking what role stories played in your childhood.
AF: Mmmm… My mum has a good friend, Chardi, who’s a storyteller. I was actually just reminded of her the other day because I was talking to mum about this friend because she’s not in great health at the moment. I just remember vividly spending time with her. She’s a professional storyteller and artist. She makes these mandalas and runs these workshops that help people tap into their own personal stories.
I’m a visual person and I see everything as pictures in my mind. I wasn’t interested in reading as a child. It was just a solitary experience. For me, the biggest joy was listening to stories, hearing stories, and having them be read to me. There was a personal connection in hearing someone else’s voice. The way that they speak informed the pictures that were built in my mind. It wasn’t as exciting to hear my own voice in my head. I’m actually just making that connection now as I’m saying that to you. I hadn’t really related the fact that I hated reading as a kid, but I loved hearing stories.
I noticed more and more how if I needed to talk about something, or if I’m having a conversation with someone, I see the narrative in pictures. It’s kind of how I make sense of the world. It’s how I communicate. It’s how I comprehend and how information stays. Often I think I don’t have a very good memory, but if I’ve made a story that’s how I recall the interaction.
Ania Freer kneels behind a camera while a woman gathers berries in a basket.
SP: That makes sense too with you so often telling your stories through film. Because if you're seeing these stories in a visual way, then that's the most intimate way you could portray that and share with others.
AF: Absolutely. Because that’s a way of bringing people into an experience, which is ultimately what I’m trying to do. I’m trying to recreate these moments: sitting down on a riverbank and hearing a particular story; staring down at the water and noticing a leaf floating on the surface. Film is a way to sort of recreate that experience and bring someone into that world that’s happening in my mind.
SP: That reminds me of one of your films “Working with Water” where there’s a man’s voice and you don’t see his face. You just see the river.
AF: Exactly. It’s also the meditative moments like when you’re listening to someone, but you’re looking off at the environment and letting your mind wander. It’s almost like watching clouds or watching shapes in nature. Things change and shift, and you’re kind of filling in the gaps.
SP: Yeah, those associative jumps.
AF: Yeah, so there’s the reeds, which are moving and flowing, and they’re just underneath the water surface. He’s talking about these spirits that live in the water, and at moments the reeds are sucked down and pop back up again. It just felt like a presence. My mind is taking from what’s around and creating these types of pictures and images.
Jamaica’s Roaring River.
SP: I liked what you said earlier too about your mom’s friend who is a storyteller. That idea of reminding people of their own stories.
AF: Mmm that’s an interesting one. Often when I say to someone, “I want to record some stories with you,” people might be like, “Well, I don’t really have any stories.”
SP: (laughs) The number of times I’ve heard that!
AF: Even if I’ve already identified “Okay, this is a really incredible story.” They’ll still say, “I don’t have any stories!” It’s definitely a very empowering experience to be guided to talk and think about your life and your history and start forming a story that you don’t even realize was a story. It’s a sort of accessing, or being guided into accessing, that information.
Ania sets up a camera in front of a storyteller.
SP: When did you start to think of yourself as a storyteller? And from there, when did you start to formulate what type of stories you wanted to be telling and collecting and sharing?
AF: The label of storyteller came to me and at first it made me a little uncomfortable. With my mum’s friend Chardi, she allowed people to access stories, but she also tells a lot of stories. I’m doing more of allowing that access. I work very hard to make my presence feel very invisible, so that it’s their voice.
The films that I’m making feel very much like you’re in the world of this person. But of course, it’s shot and edited and highly crafted by me. I’m really chiseling away and making it exactly how I see that story coming together. It took a minute to feel comfortable inserting myself and recognizing that part of the craft. I approached it with this need of empowering someone else and allowing them the space to share part of their history. Initially I was trying to give them as much space as possible. Overtime, I’m reflecting that really I’m making big decisions about which parts of the story are being kept and what isn’t. That shaping and editing is the storytelling, the crafting, the molding.
You know, I come from a background of editing. I was drawn to editing, specifically documentary editing, because that is really where a story takes shape. In the cutting room. More so than in fiction films where you have a script that you’re following, things are happening in the raw footage. The pacing and what you’re choosing to keep in and keep out is really informing the audience’s journey. When I discovered editing I was so excited because it felt very powerful. It was like, “Wow, you can really shift and change and play and create moods and tension.” But again, I resisted taking that title storyteller because I felt like I was representing storytellers. I was giving space to storytellers and was a conduit or providing the platform for the storytellers. And then accepting that by doing the work that I’m doing, I am a storyteller.
SP: Yeah, there’s multiple storytellers at play.
AF: And that was an interesting shift that happened.
SP: Would you say you now feel comfortable with that term storyteller?
AF: Absolutely. It was probably just a moment in time and in my journey where I was wanting to be quite invisible and having a lot of very incredible experiences and wanting to share those without me. Share them so an audience can experience them themselves. I’m not making it about myself at all. Especially because I’d come into a new culture: my father is British Jamaican, my grandparents immigrated to the UK in the 50s and I didn’t grow up with my father or any of that side of the family.
I grew up with my mother in Australia, so when I went to Jamaica I had this cultural connection and heritage, but I don’t have any sort of lived experience of that. I felt very self conscious of that. I felt wary about how to negotiate making that personal connection. I felt more comfortable representing the sort of experiences I’m having through recreating the images that felt of the environment that spoke to the experience that I was having. But without it being about me because it was the people, the landscape, the culture, the food, the smells. All of these things was what I wanted to show and represent and allow an audience to experience.
Cecil “Bingy” Smith weaves a basket.
SP: I feel that sensitivity really shows in your work. I think where that aspect could’ve turned into a sense of distance, in your hands it creates this closeness. We step right into where you were standing and are able to have that same face-to-face interaction.
AF: Good. Thank you! That’s what I want.
SP: When did you start telling the stories of what has become Goat Curry Gallery?
AF: From the moment I arrived in Jamaica. I think it was the 30th of October, 2016. I landed in Jamaica, in Montego Bay, and went straight up to a community called Shrewsbury Logwood, which is right next to Roaring River. I had started a new Instagram account and the first post I made on it was me at a transfer in the Texas airport just before I got on the plane. First I had this intention of documenting stories around food and culture. And then I arrived in Jamaica only to realize its called curried goat. And I was like, “Goat Curry is going to have to stay because that’s a part of my story.” Because in Australia it is called goat curry. It’s the upside-down, other-side-of-the-world experience of a disconnected, diasporic woman who’s trying to connect.
SP: I love that you honored that and didn’t try to cover it up.
AF: Well, yeah, (laughs) I was like “Oh, okay that’s what it’s called.” I also started so quickly. I realized it wasn’t about food. It was about people, and very quickly there were stories. I made my first one, which was the one on the cotton tree, in the first week or two of being there. But then as I started sharing stories and people started following my journey, I couldn’t change the name. Once you have a nickname, people know you and associate you with it.
To begin with, my intention was to spend a month or two [in Jamaica] and I was just going to travel the island and recce characters for this series about food and culture. Instead, I spent two full months in Roaring River. I got there and I didn’t leave. My ticket was coming up and I was like, “No, I can’t go anywhere. I’m here and the work has just begun.” I just canceled my ticket and went to Kingston to apply for my citizenship. And then I didn’t leave. I was there for almost seven years.
SP: When you went to apply for your citizenship, did you have any idea you were going to stay that long?
AF: Yeah. I decided very quickly that this was where I need to be.
When I came through New York to get to Jamaica, I also had this very strong sensation that I was going to live in New York. So when I first got to Jamaica, I thought, “I’m going to spend a little here, go back to New York, figure out a way of getting a VISA to be able to live in New York, but when I got to Jamaica I was like, “No, no, no. I’m living here for the rest of my life. This is it.”
It’s just so interesting, all of these moments. I don’t discredit any kind of strong sensation I get. Even if it changes, I know that it happened for a reason. I knew that being in New York was going to be a part of my journey, I just didn’t know when. I also know that Jamaica is now a huge part of my life and I’m not sure if I’m ever going to live there again full time, but I now live three and a half hours away. I am continuously going back and continuing the work that I’m doing. Maybe there will be another period of time when I’m on the ground and I live there… But I love when that happens, when there’s very strong impulses and knowings.
SP: When you can just feel it in your bones.
AF: When you feel it in your bones and you just know. I love when that happens. I find it very scary when I can’t access that.
Another view of Roaring River.
SP: When was it that you started to feel the pull to New York again?
AF: It was when I started to feel that I wasn’t able to give as much as I once was. When I started to feel depleted and I always said to myself I’m in such a privileged position to have a choice of where I want to be. I have Australian, British, and Jamaican citizenship. I’m very privileged to be able to move around. Instead of feeling guilty about that, I thought, “Well, there’s a reason.” With the storytelling that I’m doing, I’m in a position to build bridges and allow stories to access the diaspora in a much more powerful way.
I was also very clear that if I started to feel tired and depleted and frustrated, that I would do what I needed to feed myself, so that when I am in Jamaica, when I am on the ground I am there with good energy. I saw ex-pats who didn’t need to be there and were complaining about bureaucracy and how things weren’t moving how they wanted. They didn’t have to be here and by perpetuating this frustration, you’re generating or contributing to a vibration that isn’t needed.
The majority of the population don’t have the choice, so it felt like a responsibility. I felt a responsibility to be in a place to have positive conversations, be in a good mental space, and be looking after myself spiritually and emotionally. You know, there is a lot of violence in Jamaica and a lot of crime. You end up having to move and operate in a way where there’s a heightened sense of vigilance. That can be exhausting. I was definitely at a place where I was feeling very depleted and wasn’t in a good mental space. I had arrived in an open place, and I had to learn how to build my own protection. And then you can go too far with that and completely box yourself in. I definitely had long stretches of time when I shut myself off from getting support and community that I needed.
I had a strong pull in 2019 that something had to change. I had an impulse and thought I needed to go back to Australia. So I packed my stuff, book a ticket, and I go back to Australia. I had just finished a Curatural Art Writing Fellowship at New Local Space (NLS) Kingston and put on an exhibition. Things were really happening in an exciting way, but I just felt I had to go.
The week before I got on the plane, someone reached out with this really exciting job opportunity. They were doing a feasibility report across the Caribbean and they needed help collecting stories from different countries for this funding program through the arts. And as soon as they approached me I was like, “Absolutely! Yes!” So I went to Australia for Christmas and then came straight back again. And then, of course, the pandemic hit and the job didn’t happen. It’s like, you never really know what’s right or wrong. I just had to make a movement, and by making that movement something else came and pulled me back. That something was like, “Okay, good you made a movement. That’s not the right movement. You actually want to be here, but you’re not doing what you think.”
So I was back in Kingston and I was there for the whole pandemic. It was actually a really generative time. I built an incredible community and it was a really important transformational time for me in Jamaica. I love that not-always-knowing, in terms of the way life works. You just have to get up and do something. The wind pulls you. The universe. God. Whatever it is. The universe redirects you and you are exactly where you need to be.
SP: There’s a poet that I really like that has a line, “be like the fox who makes many tracks, some in the wrong direction.”*
AF: Absolutely. Wrong direction as in, that’s not the direction you end up.
SP: Yeah, wrong is relative.
AF: It’s like a detour. But I really believe you cannot go in the wrong direction. You’re always on the path you need to be on. As long as you are being an active participant. As long as you are getting up and making decisions, and you’re sort of responding to the environment. Being active to what’s coming in and coming out. Then you absolutely cannot make the wrong decision.
The silk cotton tree.
SP: I’m curious about being in New York now, how has that ended up affecting your practice? Has that created space for that rejuvenation and bringing a better energy when you do visit Jamaica?
AF: Absolutely it has. I feel like my energy levels are up. It’s also been good for me to have space to sit with the material that I have. I’m so inspired when I’m in Jamaica, to the point where I could keep on making, making, making. What’s interesting now is because I’m not particularly inspired by making films in New York, but it means I’m now going back through my archives and looking at interviews and films and sitting with them.
There’s an interview that I went back to that I recorded with a woman in the first week or so of arriving in Jamaica. Her patois is so strong. I had no idea of half the things she was saying at the time. It’s so nice now to revisit. There’s layers of the story that are now coming through. It’s a big part of knowing that I needed to take my time. You know, things come to you as they are meant to. And I didn’t want to be extractive in any of the ways that I’m working. So even the fact that with certain stories there’s an opacity or they’re not completely clear until years later, I love that. And I love that what I’m doing right now, how I’m sharing my work, and how I’m being invited to talk about my work. This is work that I made between 2016 and 2022. It’s work that people haven’t really seen and I haven’t shared. It’s old, but it’s not old.
SP: Yeah, it hasn’t gone stale.
AF: No, that was the moment to be making it, and this is the moment now to be sharing it and contextualizing it. Being in New York now has given me time to do more research in different archives about these water mythologies, and now I’ve started to look more at revivalism, which is an Afro-Jamaican folk religion that has allowed these stories to continue and has provided a space for them to be passed down. So even though I was in such close proximity to a lot of these things that were happening on the ground, I’m also receiving and learning and making it in a way that can only go as fast as I can.
The way that I conduct research is to be a participant on the ground and to be receiving in a natural way. It’s qualitative research. It’s through conversations. Instead of informing myself by reading a lot of history or researching in different ways, I’m enjoying learning in a day-to-day way as a child would learn as they are living and being somewhere. I think it’s really good for me now to begin contextualizing some of these stories and these histories. That’s really exciting because I’m now looking at ways to expand that research.
As I go back to Jamaica and record more and unearth and collect and build that archive of stories, I’m informed in ways, but it’s still important to me to operate in a way that feels… I don’t know… I just don’t want to fill my head with too much and come in with certain projections.
I’m learning on the ground, and I just much prefer that way of learning because I make different types of associations and connections. They’re informed more by people’s own lived experiences. Both inform each other and both are good. Both are helpful and both are interesting. But I had a moment where I was having a conversation about a cotton tree, and I had read some things about this particular tree. As we were talking, as this man was telling me about the tree, I also joined in. I said a few things I had read about this tree and he shut down very quickly. He was telling me about how the tree looked like a woman selling fruit at the market and was describing it in this very poetic way that was really exciting. When I regurgitated some facts about these trees that I’d read in a book, it just changed the dynamic. It made me very aware of different knowledge systems.
SP: It sounds like the difference between trying to make meaning of something or letting that meaning arrive to you.
AF: Yeah, it’s that patience of letting something arrive. For me there’s no rush. I have so far allowed very long periods of time for these short moments and vignettes to come to life. It’s in those long stretches where I’m not physically making a film, but I’m sitting in rivers or spending time in different parts of the country. I’m learning to move very slowly and operate in different ways and learning the codes of life. That feels like a very important but invisible part of the work.
Ania perches on a rock to take a photo.
AF: Even coming here to New York, I’m negotiating this resistance to be sucked into the speed of things. There’s so many things going on, but I know that I can only do so much. And it is what it is. I’m just trying to remind myself of my pace because I know what it is now. When I was younger I struggled because I was working in production and I wasn’t owning my pace. I was comparing myself to peers or the industry. I would get so stressed. And the difference is now, I’m working on my own as opposed to other people’s projects.
It’s so lovely now to know that some of my days don’t really start until 3:00 p.m. Because I’m not ready until about then! It also may involve, you know, I have to go lay in a park for a little bit of time. And that can still be a long big day, they just look different. And obviously, there’s times where it is what it is and you have to get through. But it always has to be a balance. Knowing that, appreciating that, leaning into that and prioritizing is something that this time in Jamaica has informed and has allowed me to really feel comfortable.
SP: It’s hard to carve out those margin spaces. Especially in a place like New York, where culturally that can feel so contrary. I empathize strongly with the walks in the park. When I’m stuck on a piece, I hop in the shower to create that space for generative thoughts. But in the moment, it can feel like the last logical thing to do.
AF: Exactly. Taking breaks and having different conditions… and movement! I’ve just started running in the mornings. It gives me so much energy. And that’s something I really missed when living in Jamaica, especially in Kingston. Where I lived, there’s no pavements. It just ends up feeling vulnerable and it doesn’t feel as easy to do. But actually, during the pandemic there was this mountain that a friend and I would run up. There was this area, I guess it was a golf course, but it was full of mango trees. We would walk it in the morning and pick and eat them as we were walking. It was very special.
SP: You’re bringing back so many memories for me. I haven’t been back since 2019.
AF: Oh wow, you’re due a visit! Have you ever been to Portland or do you mostly go to Montego Bay?
SP: Mostly Montego Bay. I’ve been up to Knockpatrick and Mandeville in the mountains. It’s totally different than where I spent most of my time. The coolness of the mountains and the mist in the mornings… even just a totally different smell from Montego Bay, which is that mix of ocean and salt and city smell.
How often do you try to get yourself there?
AF: For most of last year I was waiting on my green card, so I wasn’t able to travel. It came at the start of this year and as soon as it arrived in the post, I booked a ticket. (laughs) Literally within fifteen minutes of opening it.
This year has been really busy. I had some time now, but I also haven’t seen my family in the UK for seven years. So next week, we’re going to London for two weeks. I needed to do that.
SP: That’s hard when you have your heart and your roots in so many different places.
AF: Yeah. Both of my Jamaican grandparents are in London and they’re both getting older and having different health issues. So I really need to go and spend some time with them. But the dream is to visit Jamaica three times a year. That’s what I’m working towards because it’s only three and a half hours away.
SP: That’s such a quick trip!
AF: Such a quick trip! The dream is to generate the support I need through different avenues here in New York. To be able to go [to Jamaica] and do dedicated recording of stories and making work. Then come back here and edit and stuff. Also the Real Talk series, I plan to turn that into a slightly longer episodic series that focus on different themes and people’s stories in twelve minute pieces instead of one minute pieces. So have two stories per episode, but then this also exists as an episodic series. This national treasure of archives. You know, these current moments and stories of people across the country in different communities, experiences, oral histories.
SP: I love the scope of that.
AF: I want it to be ongoing. So that’s the plan. I see that happening. And once I see something then it normally happens.
SP: Yeah, that’s kind of the story that I’m getting from this conversation. It’s going to happen. Well, I’m excited to see it continue to evolve and unfold. I’ll also have to tell you when I get that trip on the books. Maybe we’ll overlap.
AF: Yeah, that would be amazing. I can definitely give you some tips on what to do, where to go.
SP: That’d be beautiful. I’d love to see some new places. This has been really lovely. Thanks so much for taking the time to connect. And thanks for being willing to be on the other side of the interview scene too.
AF: Oh absolutely.
SP: I’ll talk to you soon.
AF: Thank you. Have a great rest of your day.
Ania Freer is an Australian-Jamaican artist, filmmaker, cultural researcher, and curator living and working between Jamaica and New York. Through installation, film and curating, Ania uses oral histories to explore identity through themes of class, race, resistance, labor, craft traditions and folklore. Her intimate archive of films work to disrupt imperialist narratives and recenter marginalized voices. Ania is the founder of Goat Curry Gallery, a platform which features artworks from Jamaican craft producers along with her documentary series Real Talk, an intimate collection of oral histories. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Anthropology and Film Theory from the University of Sydney.
Ania’s work has been exhibited at the National Gallery of Jamaica and her film, Strictly Two Wheel, won Best Documentary Short at Trinidad and Tobago Film Festival in 2022. Ania is a Curatorial and Art Writing Fellow at New Local Space Kingston and has attended residences such as Art Omi and AIRIE (Artist in Residence in Everglades). Her practice has been supported by Something Special Studios Black Creative Endeavours Grant, Caribbean Film Academy, American Australian Association and DVCAI.
This interview is a modified transcript of a conversation shared between Ania Freer and Shanley Poole on August 13, 2024. It was published using Ethical Storytelling Practices modeled after the principles created by Voice of Witness.
*Poem excerpt from Wendell Berry’s “Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front.”
All photos courtesy of Ania Freer.