MOTHER SPARROW (2020)

Mother Sparrow is a site-specific performance film by Eryka Dellenbach interpreting Sonya Belaya's song about her experience of unresolved loss following her mother's disappearance in 2014. Shot on the banks of Moodna Creek—a tributary of the Hudson River designated by the Daughters of the American Revolution, the film evokes the tensions between family and chosen family, prophecy and hallucination, agency and observance and cycles of haunting and return. 16mm celluloid film fragments shot and hand-processed over the course of a year at the site by Dellenbach are woven throughout activating latent circumstances. Created with an all-women cast and crew, the film features camera work by Carmen Hilbert, and performance by K.J. Holmes, Nola Sporn Smith and Dellenbach.

Directed, Edited & Choreographed by Eryka Dellenbach
Song by Sonya Belaya
Camera by Carmen Hilbert

Cast
Mother: K.J. Holmes
Past: Nola Sporn Smith
Present: Eryka Dellenbach

Vocals, Piano, Vibraphone, Compositions - Sonya Belaya
Trumpet - Davy Lazar
Bass - Brian Juarez
Drums - Stephen Boegehold
Cello - Wesley Hornpetrie
Violin - Janet Lyu
French Horn - Spencer Schaefer
Recorded by Sly Pup Productions
Mixed and Mastered by Chris Botta