Bow’t Trail – ICI TOU.tv / Artv – Dir: Marie-Claude Fournier

The international BOW’T TRAIL project—part of UNESCO’s Slave Route Project—is an innovative choreographic, documentary and interactive experience exploring how African cultures and rhythms spread throughout the Americas alongside the resistance movements of displaced African peoples.

Initiated in January 2016 by executive producer, choreographer and entrepreneur Rhodnie Désir, the project has so far taken place in four countries: Martinique, Brazil, Haiti and Canada. At each stop, Désir spends one month in the host country recreating the work from BOW’T’s original framework, which explores the psychological dimensions of migration and forced displacement.

Rhodnie collaborates with a local drummer—the keeper of memory—as well as specialized artists and researchers, including musicians, dancers, anthropologists, historians and ethnomusicologists. After two weeks, director Marie-Claude Fournier and the film crew join them to document the process of creation and cultural transmission within the community.

Through the choreographer’s creative process, we discover a different and more positive perspective on the legacy of the triangular slave trade, as well as the histories behind elements that are now ever-present in our daily lives, including coffee, chocolate, reggae, blues and jazz.

By 2019, the project will have been presented in five countries across the Americas. The documented material will be shared both on stage and through digital platforms, making it accessible to the general public and the educational community.