March 2009

Director Tracey Deer (Mohawk) divides her time between Montreal and Kahnawake, her home reserve in Quebec. Deer began her professional career with CanWest Broadcasting in Montreal, and later joined the Native-owned production company Rezolution Pictures. She was co-director of One More River: The Deal that Split the Cree, with Neil Diamond (Cree), which won the Best Documentary Award at the 2005 Rendez-vous du cinema québécois in Montreal and was nominated for Best Social/Political Documentary at the Geminis.  She next wrote, directed and filmed Mohawk Girls, about the lives of three teenagers, and herself as a teen, growing up at Kahnawake, which won the Alanis Obomsawin Best Documentary Award at the 2005 imagineNATIVE Film & Media Arts Festival. Her recent documentary, Club Native, focuses on the issues of community membership and blood quantum, and was an official selection of Hot Docs, won the Colin Low Award for Best Canadian Documentary at DOXA/Documentary Film and Video Festival, and won additional awards at imagineNative and First Peoples’ Festival (Land InSights). She continues to produce documentaries, working most recently with Paul Rickard (Cree) to produce a documentary for the National Film Board of Canada about Mohawk language immersion schools at Akwesasne. Deer has formed Mohawk Princess Productions, to independently produce her own short fictions. She received a B.A. in film studies from Dartmouth College, graduating with two awards for excellence.

"All of my work to date has dealt with Native issues because that is what I feel passionate about. Our stories and our communities have so much vibrancy to offer and I'm very committed to expressing that on the big and small screen. With all of my work, my ultimate goal is to try to make a difference, even if it is just with one person. I think that film and video, whether it is documentary or fiction, are very powerful mediums, and it is important to respect that enormous influence. I aim to create films that engage and, hopefully, enlighten the audience in some way. It's not always possible, of course, but that's what I strive for whenever I get behind the camera."

Screened by NMAI

• Escape Hatch (2009) director
• Kanien'Keha:Ka/Living the Language (2008) director
• Club Native (2008) director
• Mohawk Girls (2005) director

Image credits: Tracey Deer - courtesy of the filmmaker; Tracey Deer - courtesy of the filmmaker