Cinematography Reel
Flowers While We’re Living (2024) This is a portraiture project centering and celebrating 2S/ trans people from across Northern Turtle Island, focusing on joy and survival. Each drawing/ painting in the series features a mixed media approach to depicting trans people alongside their favourite flowers. This was shot during Syrus and Susan Ware’s residency at Fogo Island Arts on Fogo Island, Newfoundland and Labrador in 2024.
Creature Comforts: Passionate (2023) Repurposing unused footage from a previous project, this is a meditation on lost moments captured forever.
Ancestors Can You Read Us? Dispatches from the Future (2019) Syrus Marcus Ware’s multi-channel video work was on view at the Ryerson Image Centre in Toronto during the Toronto Biennial of Art. The video features performers Kyisha Williams, Rodney Diverlus, Raven Davis, Janine Carrington, Ravyn Wngz, Gloria Swain, and Jasmyn Fyfe. The work imagines and stages a dialogue with a future beyond the current epoch of Black social death and insecurity, marked by the ever-present capitalist forces of greed and the persistent script of police and state violence.
Creature Comforts: Unstrip (2023) Turning the average striptease on its head and running it in reverse, Kimora Koi has never been more enticing putting her clothes on. Created in tandem to With Love, From Dragon City this is a peek behind the burlesque boas and into the hearts and minds of the dancers themselves.
MBL: Freedom (2022) Installed at the 2022 Toronto Biennial of the Arts, Syrus Marcus Ware’s MBL: Freedom (2022) is an installation that includes a 3 channel video narrative. This is an amalgamation of the 3 screens that were installed around a campfire setting with tents and banners.
Kung Fu Reel
Excerpts from two of my early kung fu shorts.
Little Phoenix and the Reign of Fists (2007) shot on Mini-DV, starring Lyndie Greenwood and Dana Fradkin, Little Phoenix and the Reign of Fists still makes me laugh with its over-the-top campiness and kung fu magic. Choreographed by the very talented Muay Thai fighters in the scene, Little Phoenix will leave no trope untouched.
Shaolin Sisters (2004) shot on 16mm, this was created through the generous support of the Liaison of Independent Film Toronto. Starring Mai Cao, Donna Kim, and Raymond Lau (my dad), Shaolin Sisters is a riff on classic kung fu training as 2 kung fu sisters fight over a lipstick and make a mess of the laundry that they were supposed to be cleaning.
“Do what you love and love what you do” Ray Bradbury