Concerned Citizen

Artist Statement

            For our, we interviewed Bryan Bartel, who volunteers his time at hospitals up in Salt Lake City, helping out patients and doctors with whatever they need.  Throughout the assignment, we were reminded of the "I'm a Mormon" campaign.  The formula for their campaign, which includes interviewing the subject as well as capture footage of their everyday life, seemed similar to the approach that we took with our documentary.  We weren't able to capture any footage of his volunteer work, but while filming, we felt that the entire purpose of our interview was to highlight someone.  While the "I'm a Mormon" campaign strove to portray as not only interesting, but normal as well, we also felt that the videos involved in their campaign also wished to inspire others and spread goodwill.  Our interview with Bryan also strove to reveal his generosity and kindness, and even though his service to the community seemed simple, we still felt that it was a good example of someone reaching out to help the less fortunate in his community.

            In Goldbard's article "Human Rights and Culture: From Datastan to Storyland", he discusses the importance of storytelling in our culture by stating that, "In Storyland, we understand that the resilience that sustains communities in times of crisis is rooted in culture, in the stories of survival and social imagination that inspire people to a sense of hope and possibility even in dark times. Sharing our stories as song, drama, dance, in word or image supports resilience by showing people how others met similar challenges, survived and prospered."  What Goldbard means is that all cultures use stories of survival, imagination, and hope in order to unite the community and survive times of hardship and crisis.  In many ways, what we did for this assignment falls under this category.  Our story is simple.  It describes the actions of a single man who used his free time to volunteer at hospitals and help patients.  But stories like this are important because they show that people still care about others in the community.  Kindness is still present, and it becomes a symbol that we don't have to succumb to cynicism and fear.  We need more examples of people helping others and being kind because just hearing these stories can restore our faith and hope and influence us to be better people and help our communities.
By Jessica Cahill and Steven Olson