Human bodies appear incomplete, divided and fractured by water and fabrics as a way to address the cementing, impoundment, and fragmenting of local streams and rivers. The body parts search for each other in an attempt to reconstitute as a collective body. Towards the end of the film a complete human body is revealed, suggesting that if we dismantle infrastructure that divides and splinter bodies of water, riparian ecosystems might stand a chance to become whole again. Filmed on location in the San Gabriel River and the Wanaawna (Santa Ana) river mouth, this inaugural and site specific activation of the Water Portraits series is the first step towards building a healing relationship with the land and the waters of the unceded Tongva and Acjachemen territories, known by many as Orange County. We are grateful to our human and natural indigenous hosts who have sustained us, despite being submitted to violent processes of colonization and extraction.

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