Expedition Reclamation - Chelsea Murphy

Currently screening EXPEDITION RECLAMATION

Cinematographer Sanjana Sekhar captures a scene of Kaja Ralston on the ancestral homelands of the Coast Salish, Stillaguamish, Skagit, and Tulalip.

“When are we going to be worthy of outdoor films? I’m tired of seeing stories told from a similar lens and place of privilege. Let’s shake it up!”
– Chelsea Murphy

This is not your typical outdoor film

Outdoor films predominantly depict cisgendered, white males bagging peaks, taking leaps, and being “hard core outdoorsy.” Those films are rad. But what about the rest of us?

We know there’s a huge audience aching to connect with stories about people like them: Black, brown, Indigenous, people of color who feel deeply connected to nature.

This film is for them.

Expedition Reclamation highlights BIWOC (Black, Indigenous, and women of color) as they celebrate resilience, reciprocity, belonging, and a connection to Mother Nature. Whether “forest bathing” in a local park or deconstructing stereotypes around who can be a climber, the women in this story show up boldly to reclaim what it means to be “outdoorsy.”

The women behind the lens

With an interracial, co-creative, all-female leadership team, we’re challenging the mainstream dynamic of a competitive, hierarchical storytelling process and working at the intersections of feminism, antiracism, and environmental justice. We share roles: we are co-directors, co-producers, co-directors of photography. We continually have conversations about taking the ego out of the work, actively supporting one another, and building a Brave Space together as creators.

Co-Producer, Co-Director, Film Character : I, Chelsea Murphy, am an advocate for social and environmental justice with an incredible love for the outdoors. I rarely see anyone who looks like me in outdoor films or outdoor marketing. I know that having diverse representation in our media matters. It has the power to inspire more people like me to get out and love nature and showcase those of us who are in this space.

Co-Producer, Co-Director, Co-DP, Co-Editor: Erin Joy Nash is a visual storyteller working to incite change and foster connection through filmmaking and photography. Her work focuses on elevating voices of womxn and BIPOC around issues of intersectional feminism, antiracism, environmental justice, and compassionate living. She aspires to bring empathy, brave vulnerability, and intention to every aspect of the storytelling process and is now the founder of Brave Space Media.

Co-Director, Co-DP, Co-Editor: Sanjana Sekhar is an Indian-American filmmaker and regenerative communicator engaging in the intersections of nature and culture. Her work seeks to amplify character driven stories that heal our human relationships to each other and to our planet, with a specific interest in environmental justice, biocultural diversity, ancestral knowledge, and regeneration.

Project Intern: Rebekah Graham is pursuing a Bachelor of Science from The Evergreen State College. She is currently exploring the intersections between Euro-American ecology and Indigenous knowledge, and ways to increase accessibility to the outdoors while redefining what it means to be outdoorsy. Rebekah is a birdwatcher, rock climber, hiker, and tea drinker based along the Salish Sea.