In Washinton State there is a river that salmon once called home.

Return to Elwha is an interactive documentary that explores the largest dam removal in U.S. history. Through video, audio, and photography, meet conservationists, researchers, fishermen and more as a grand experiment in restoration unfolds. Will the salmon return and reclaim their home?
Follow the Journey at ReturnToElwha.com

Adjusting the Rhythm profiles four skiers who pursue turns despite being disabled. Through The Adaptive Ski Program, based at Ski Santa Fe in New Mexico, Amanda, Andy, Matt and Claire are relearning how to ski. Adjusting the Rhythm explores the liberation of skiing and, no matter the method, each skier’s love of the slopes.

The Reel Youth Stories Project empowers youth to tell their stories through “Tabletop Filmmaking,” an innovative approach that adapts the filmmaking process to fit the size of a table. Created by filmmakers and educators Jason Jaacks and Clare Rok, the Project combines technical filmmaking skills with developing a social conscience and an appreciation of the arts.

During the Spring Semester 2012, The Reel Youth Stories Project will partner with Citizen Schools at De Vargas Middle School. The Project will serve 18-20 7th and 8th grade students, who will work together to produce three short Tabletop films that explore issues that they feel are important to their communities. Throughout the process, students explore more than film production. They learn how to work together and connect to art. They also develop media literacy skills and learn how to enact positive change through art. The Project provides students with the opportunity to explore a variety of artistic mediums and career paths – from filmmakers and photographers to visual artists and creative writers – students can find a niche in which they feel successful. The Project will conclude with several screenings of the students’ films at local venues, which will include panel discussions with the filmmakers.

Experience the power of art integration—the blending of art and other subject areas—and see how learning comes to life. In Teaching through the Prism of Arts Integration: Teach with O’Keeffe, hear from teachers, students, and administrators from New York to New Mexico on the impact of art linked to learning in The Phillips Collection’s educational initiatives. © The Phillips Collection, 2011

Hobo Messiah: Takin’ Care of Business

What happens after the largest nuclear disaster in the history of the world? According to this group of boys, part of the O’Keeffe Art & Leadership Program, a stranger comes to save people from zombie pandas. Did I mention that the people have mutated into Tomato Heads and that they’re prone to exploding? A Tabletop Masterpiece!

The trailer for Adjusting the Rhythm -  a ski, snowboard, bi-ski, slider, mono-ski, drop knee film about students of The Adaptive Ski Program.

Working in conjunction with the Georgia O’Keeffe Art & Leadership Program, Cordillera Produtions led a day-long filmmaking workshop at Tohatchi High School in rural New Mexico. Over the course of the day, students learned filmmaking schools and explored personal storytelling through video. Their experimental short, Postcard from Tohatchi, expresses their triumphs, struggles, dreams and reflections on being a teenager in Tohatchi.

Dear Brendan,

San Diego is a nice place to winter. Sailing, grilling, surprise visits from Kiernan… We had such a blast coming to visit you!

Take care and be safe over there. Try not to get sand everywhere!

You’re the best!

J&C

British Columbia.

The Selkirk Mountains of Southern British Columbia contain some of the highest vertical relief in North America. Luckily for those of us carrying real planks – one guy in the lift line asked us where we moored the boat – The Selkirks also pull down hundreds of inches out of the sky…

Where I live, in the sun-drenched High Desert of Northern New Mexico, we’ve reported 53 cumulative inches of precipitation this winter. I believe it snowed that much in the three days we ripped mile-high vertical on single runs in the land where water must have been born. Many thanks to the Colorado State University Outdoor Club, who kindly allowed me to tag along!