Artist

Cara Mumford

Cara Mumford (Métis / Chippewa Cree) is a filmmaker, writer and collaborative artist from Alberta, living in Peterborough, Ontario since 2010. Since becoming a filmmaker in 2006, Cara’s short films have screened regularly at the imagineNATIVE Film + Media Arts Festival in Toronto, and toured throughout Australia and internationally with the World of Women Film Festival. Her short film, “echoes,” won Best Underground Film at Chashama Film Festival in New York City in 2009. Her short screenplay, “Ask Alice,” won Best Short Script at the Los Angeles Women’s International Film Festival in 2011 and her spoken word dance film, “December 6,” continues to be screened every year at Montreal Massacre memorials across Canada. She has received industry training through Telefilm Canada (2010/11), Bell Media’s Diverse Screenwriters Program (2012), and the imagineNATIVE Film Festival’s Story Lab with Maori writer/diector Himiona Grace (2014) & Producer Mini-Lab with Heather Rae and Paula Devonshire (2015). In December 2016, Cara shadowed director Stephen Campanelli on the set of “Indian Horse,” a feature film adaptation based on a novel about residential school by Richard Wagamese, produced by Christine Haebler, Trish Dolman, and Paula Devonshire. 

In the summer of 2015, Cara founded the Bizaanbakweg Collective with core members Christine Friday and Heryka Miranda, and international choreographer Rulan Tangen, to collectively create a short narrative dance film, “Ecstasy.” The collective has now expanded to include dramaturge Yvette Nolan and cinematographer Elisa L. Iannacone. Last year, Cara received funding from the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council to complete “Ecstasy” (currently in post-production), which will also act as a proof of concept for a future feature film “rain. dance. road.” She also recently completed her second collaboration with Anishinaabe scholar and spoken word artist Leanne Simpson, “The Oldest Tree in the World,” which premiered at the Vancouver Indigenous Media Arts Festival at the end of May 2017. Their first collaboration, “Leaks (2013),” combined wild harvesting with healing from racism through dance, and has been highly sought after for screenings and school presentations. Cara recently won the NFB/ imagineNATIVE Interactive Prize to create a website for her Indigenous futuristic Red Card world, as well as a mid-career artist residency with Charles Street Video to create a short film set in that Red Card world. This film will premiere at the imagineNATIVE Film + Media Arts Festival in October 2017. 

Artist Code: 963

Videography

The Oldest Tree in the World

2017, 05:00 minutes, colour, english

Leaks

2013, 02:42 minutes, colour, English

December 6

2010, 09:59 minutes, colour, English

echoes

2009, 02:15 minutes, colour, English

Coda in G Minor

2008, 02:25 minutes, B&W

Critical Writing