aemi, Temple Bar Gallery + Studios and Stereo Editions are thrilled to partner with IFI to present maɬni – towards the ocean, towards the shore by renowned artist and filmmaker Sky Hopinka whose video, photo and text work considers personal positions of Indigenous homeland and landscape. A Ho-Chunk Nation national and descendent of the Pechanga Band of Luiseño Indians, Hopinka is a teacher of chinuk wawa, a language indigenous to the Lower Columbia River Basin in which much of maɬni is spoken. Hopinka’s interest in language as a container of culture is much in evidence in this ethereal feature debut, a film which follows two young parents – Sweetwater Sahme and Jordan Mercier – as they hike across the mountains of the Pacific Northwest and reflect upon the environment around them, the spirit world and the Chinookan origin-of-death myth. Described by the New York Times as ‘an essential portrait of contemporary Indigenous life’, maɬni lends poetic expression to the urgent need to preserve as well as lament what has already been lost of Indigenous culture.

aemi is an Arts Council-funded organisation dedicated to the support and development of artist film in Ireland. For more details visit www.aemi.ie