Tributaries is a site-specific projection and augmented reality installation featured in Nuit Blanche Toronto in the fall of 2022. The multimedia work includes an animated projection on to a fog that rolls over the reflective pool outside of Vari Hall at York University. There is also an augmented reality app that features 3D animations of native and invasive fish species that swim about the pool and viewers’ feet. Tributaries draws upon and calls attention to the overbuilt watershed veins that coursed beneath the City of Toronto, particularly the watershed of the York University campus area, that were buried as a result of urban development.

The projection component of Tributaries consists of 3D-animated species that emerge and recede into the whirling ether. Here, we see native species of birds and fish, such as the Canada Goose, Blue Jay, ruby-throated hummingbird, minnow, bass, and the Chinook Salman, as well as invasive species, including the goldfish, muted swan, and koi in an ethereal flurry, as though existing in a shape-shifting fog, sharing matter in a unified spirit. The species intermingle through movements of swimming and flying, materializing and dematerializing in the fog. In addition to the progression in the animation where the creatures appear and disappear, the fog itself plays a formal role in the visibility of the content. A gust of wind creates a fade, and a shift in direction brings the creatures closer to the viewer or further away; the elements themselves were editing the projected content, compositionally and in pacing. This made the animated sequence unique in every cycle of the projected loop in an unpredictable, emergent collaboration between myself and the environment.