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Colored: The Unknown Life of Claudette Colvin

  • Augmented Reality
  • Past Event
  • Immersion
  • Society
  • Storytelling
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PHI Centre Galerie 2, 
407 Saint-Pierre St, Montreal, Quebec, H2Y 2M3

Monday and Tuesday:
Closed

Wednesday, Thursday & Sunday:
11 AM to 8:20 PM

Friday & Saturday:
11 AM to 9 PM

Duration: 40 minutes
Last entry: 40 min. before closing

13 years old +

Weekdays:
13 to 30 years old: $28
31 years old +: $30

Weekends:

13 to 30 years old: $30
31 years old +: $32

Price including service fees, excluding taxes

Reawaken the forgotten history.

Watch the trailer

About the experience


Claudette Colvin made it all possible, but she is the one who has been forgotten. Colored is a powerful story that uses the HoloLens 2, an augmented reality headset, to bring her story to life. A pioneer and icon of the civil rights movement in the United States, Claudette Colvin takes us with her to segregated Alabama.

Colored: The Unknown Life of Claudette Colvin is directed by Stéphane Foenkinos and Pierre-Alain Giraud, based on the work by Tania de Montaigne, Black, the Unknown Life of Claudette Colvin. Immersive installation produced by Novaya in partnership with the Centre Pompidou, co-produced with Flash Forward Entertainment (Taiwan).

Learn more about the experience ↓

What people are saying...

"Simply stunning and moving. Breathtaking!"

—Malika Bauwens (translated by PHI)
Beaux Arts Magazine

"Colored is a shock, with powerful civic virtues. [...] An essential exhibition..."

—Valérie Lehoux (translated by PHI)
Télérama

"Impressive sensory experience."

—Mohamed Berkani (translated by PHI)
France Info

"A poignant experience to live now..."

—Cécile D. (translated by PHI)
Sortir à Paris

"An unprecedented and powerful way of conveying history."

—Eva Bester (translated by PHI)
Totémic - France Inter
PHI Event Centre Noire IMG1
Photo: Image from Colored

Reawaken the past

We're in Montgomery, Alabama, in the heart of the segregated southern United States, on the 2:30 PM bus, March 2, 1955. Claudette Colvin, a 15-year-old Black teenager, refuses to give up her seat to a White passenger. Despite threats, she remains seated. After being thrown in jail, she decides to sue the city and plead not guilty. No one ever dared to do such a thing at the time. And yet, no one remembers her name.

Colored: The Unknown Life of Claudette Colvin is an immersive experience adapted from a biographical essay, written by Tania de Montaigne, that traces the story of Claudette Colvin and her journey from struggle to abandonment.

When, 9 months later, Rosa Parks repeated the same act, everything changed. With the support of a young pastor who had recently arrived in Montgomery, Martin Luther King Jr., Rosa Parks became a hero, the spark that launched the civil rights movement. History was in the making. Claudette Colvin made it all possible, but she is the one who has been forgotten. She still lives in the United States today, and is 83 years old.

Colored allows the audience to enter a setting that will soon be haunted by the ghosts of 1950s Alabama. Thanks to augmented reality, which like no other technology allows our present to meet the past, Claudette's story can become our story, entering our memories as a 'lived' moment in our own experience where we can each become witnesses to this heroic act.

In a set specially designed for the experience, iconic scenes from Claudette Colvin's life during her fight for civil rights are replayed before your very eyes. Whether you're alone or accompanied, you'll be able to join your peers in a collective experience.

FAQ

Official programming

Mois de l'histoire des noirs


Read about it on the Antenna blog

  • Created and produced by

    Novaya
  • Novaya is a company specializing in the creation of artistic immersive experiences using augmented reality. Their strength lies in the fact that they bring together artists, engineers and film producers, enabling them to write projects, visually create real and virtual worlds, and manufacture all the innovative technologies needed to bring them to life.

  • Presented
    by

    PHI

With the support of



  • Canada Council for the Arts

  • Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec
  • Hydro-Québec


  • Tourisme Montréal

  • Conseil des arts de Montréal

  • Consulat général de France à Québec

Credits

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