The Boîte lumineuse outside La maison des artistes visuels francophones in St. Boniface is giving Winnipeggers a chance to interact with one of its most storied streets in a new way. The lightbox installation is currently displaying “Weaving Provencher’s Story”, a work that combines photography, sketching, animation and mixed media to explore Provencher Boulevard and St. Boniface through a simultaneously historical and imagined lens. “It’s so beautiful,” says Tree Tree, the artist who created the installation who came to Winnipeg from Hong Kong four years ago and only just visited St. Boniface for the first time last year. “The building of La maison is very impressive because it’s full of historical feelings and it’s just magnificent to me.” .embed-container { position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0; overflow: hidden; max-width: 100%; } .embed-container iframe, .embed-container object, .embed-container embed { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; } Inspired by the neighbourhood’s magnificence, Tree Tree set out to capture the culture experience and the people of St. Boniface alongside its historic architecture. She did this initially through photography, but also by interviewing longtime residents from a wide variety of cultural backgrounds. It is a very different approach than the one she took in her artistic practice back in Hong Kong. “I try to learn from people, try to learn from their story and then what they experience and all [of] the cultural background from different interviewees,” she says. “But in Hong Kong – because I lived there so I didn’t pay that much attention [to] people – instead, I paid attention to experience I had as a child a long time ago, or what did I learn from that.” View this post on Instagram A post shared by Tree Tree Tes (@treetreetes) The distinction between getting to know a place through people instead of its architecture was an important one for Tree Tree, and it meant that she also tried to capture the deeper layer of the stories and emotions that make up Provencher’s story. These stories are steadily growing to include more diverse perspectives as more immigrant communities make up a larger portion of St. Boniface’s population. “One interviewee... he told me, ‘Oh, it’s like the world is coming to St. Boniface,” Tree Tree recalls. As the world comes to St. Boniface, so too does a shared imagination of what the neighbourhood can be. Tree Tree reflects that with drawings and animations superimposed onto to the photographs that capture Provencher’s present and past. All of these perspectives are equally important in Tree Tree’s view. “In my art, I want people to see [that] people matter and their stories matter,” she explains, “and also, not only [to] learn history from books or news, but from people.” View this post on Instagram A post shared by Tree Tree Tes (@treetreetes) “Weaving Provencher’s Story” is on display at the Boîte lumineuse at La maison des artistes visuels francophone until October 15. More information can be found at the gallery’s website.