This ghostly projection of Leonard Cohen's Suzanne is a reminder to slow down and breathe

This story is part of Absolutely Canadian's Into the Light, a documentary on Cité Memoire, a public art project where scenes from Quebec's history and mythology are projected onto Montreal's buildings. In this video, Cité Mémoire co-creator Michel Lemieux walks us through the underwater creation of part of this majestic work. Below, the documentary's director Janice Zolf writes about the film. Stream Into the Light now on CBC Gem.

"I think in the 21st century we need to slow down and breathe a bit." The opening sentence of the documentary film Into the Light has a profound resonance in the uncertainty of a world impacted by COVID-19. Michel Lemieux, the co-creator behind the magical Cité Mémoire projections that reimagine history on the stone walls of Old Montreal, is talking about his artistic goal of getting people to stop on the street, look up from their phones and immerse themselves in art that soars above the brightly lit city.

Lemieux and his co-director Victor Pilon chose characters from Montreal's past, tackling subjects like race issues, poverty and the orphan children of the Holocaust while creating giant visual poetry in the heart of Montreal. Each of their characters emerge nightly from the walls as if their spirit still lives beneath the stones. Some, like the people in Joe Beef's funeral procession, stare directly at us on the street, as if to say, "History looks just like you and me."

Meanwhile, backstage in a public swimming pool, Michel Lemieux exclaims, "She's a mermaid!" He is watching Iara Mandyn on a monitor, a San Francisco underwater performer creating an homage to Leonard Cohen's Suzanne. Lemieux and Pilon knew if they could shoot the dancer floating in a dark pool, when they projected her 150 feet above the St. Lawrence River on the clock tower, she would appear ghostlike, capturing the essence of Cohen's muse. But the mermaid is also free of gravity in the projection; she connects us to something bigger as she reaches for the stars.

Five blocks away, with a single whoosh, a 20-story courthouse is on fire in another installation called Homage to our Humanity. The courthouse becomes an immense eternal flame the directors created to honour the victims of COVID-19 as a nightly reminder that art touches us deeply. The flame inspires awe and wonder — a common emotion in each of the 26 projections. Into the Light takes us behind the magic, urging us to slow down and dive beneath the surface. 

Stream Absolutely Canadian's Into the Light now on CBC Gem.