((PKG)) BREONNA’S GARDEN
((TRT: 05:44))
((Topic Banner: Breonna’s Garden))
((Reporter/Camera: Genia Dulot))
((Adapted by: Philip Alexiou))
((Map: Los Angeles, California))
((Main character: 1 female))
((Sub characters: 1 female; 1 male))
((Text on screen:
Breonna Taylor, a 26-year-old African-American medical technician, was tragically killed during a police raid on her Louisville, Kentucky home in March 2020. Her death fueled nation-wide protests.))
((Ju’Niyah Palmer, Breonna Taylor’s Sister))
I think my favorite memory overall would probably be living together. She didn't want me to be her roommate because she told me I was too messy for her and she had real bad OCD [Obsessive Compulsive Disorder] but it's probably going to be living with her is the best memory.
((Lady PheOnix, Creator of “Breonna’s Garden”))
What would she cook? What was she good at?
((Ju’Niyah Palmer, Breonna Taylor’s Sister))
She can’t cook.
((Lady PheOnix, Creator of “Breonna’s Garden”))
Really?
((Ju’Niyah Palmer, Breonna Taylor’s Sister))
No.
((Lady PheOnix, Creator of “Breonna’s Garden”))
She looks like she…
((Ju’Niyah Palmer, Breonna Taylor’s Sister))
We had, we ate the same seven meals. Me, her and Kenny.
When she was an EMT [Emergency Medical Technician], she would go in at like seven at night and come home like 10, 11 in the morning.
((Lady PheOnix, Creator of “Breonna’s Garden”))
Wow.
((Ju’Niyah Palmer, Breonna Taylor’s Sister))
See, that’s what really made her quit. She was making like 13, I think she was making like 13 [dollars an hour], working 18 hours, four days a week. So, she was like, yeah. She had cried to Mom. It was like, “Mom, I can’t do this. I just can’t.” Some people used to be like, “Yeah, we get your sister passed. But you still don’t get to see the troubles that people go through every day.” I’m like, “No, I’m going through way more than you guys think.” So, I started posting like I’m getting threats every day, like different types of threats. It didn’t matter who, what, where, when, why. Just different ones.
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Lady PheOnix, Creator of “Breonna’s Garden”))
Breonna’s Garden, which is an augmented reality experience, and the idea behind it was sparked by Ju’Niyah getting death threats in her social media and saying like, okay, clearly if the online space isn't safe, right, for someone, then I'm going to create a container for her where she can be safe and never worry about anybody threatening her or saying some ugly thing or, you know, coming and lying to her about who her sister is and was.
So, when you go, you see flowers springing up all around you. As you, kind of like walk around, you'll see a lot of butterflies and orbs of light and Breonna’s there.
((Stuart “Sutu” Campbell, Producer of “Breonna’s Garden”))
People will be able to walk around in a real garden. And then from the real garden, these artificial flowers will also start growing.
We made a decision early on to create Breonna as a 3D model. We were deliberately, you know, creating a sculpture, a monument for Breonna. We will integrate the flowers into this augmented reality activation.
((Lady PheOnix, Creator of “Breonna’s Garden”))
Both of them are in the garden and we're going to volumetrically capture Ju’Niyah and place her in the garden next to Breonna.
((NATS))
((Stuart “Sutu” Campbell, Producer of “Breonna’s Garden”))
In order to recreate Ju’Niyah as a hologram, we had to go to the Metastage here in Los Angeles. They have a green screen room set up, with hundreds of cameras at different elevations, filming a subject in the center of the room. Microsoft are processing all that data and stitching it together. The outcome will be this 3D hologram.
((NATS))
((Ju’Niyah Palmer, Breonna Taylor’s Sister))
Okay, look. Don't talk about my hair because I already seen it coming. If you see it, it’s 3D. Mama, we're not talking about the hair.
The most part I think I'm excited about is the actual me being in the same 3D, being in the same scenery with my sister all over again. When they do the edit part, I'll be actually next to her.
((Lady PheOnix, Creator of “Breonna’s Garden”))
Not only as a gift for Ju’Niyah to be able to go into a safe container to be with her sister and hear all those memories from like her aunt and her mom and her uncle and her friends, but then also to have that as a capsule for 20 years, 25 years from now. If Ju’Niyah decides to have children one day, her children can actually look back on this capsule, it's a gift for the family, and understand who her aunt really was.
((Ju’Niyah Palmer, Breonna Taylor’s Sister))
We see Breonna. We see there's people leaving messages. And then there was a point where I was like, “But you're going to record. You're going to let these people hear and tell your side of the story about who your sister was.”
((NATS))
((Ju’Niyah Palmer, Breonna Taylor’s Sister))
When she first got on as an EMT, she was super excited. She invited almost the whole family to her graduation just to see her graduate from being an EMT. The Garden is important to me because it's my way of being able to show that Breonna is caring and loving and not what the media portrayed her as to be.
((NATS))
((Ju’Niyah Palmer, Breonna Taylor’s Sister))
People are still figuring, as they still feel like it's my sister's boyfriend’s fault, and it's absolutely not. So, they will say things like, “It's your sister's boyfriend’s fault she's dead. Your sister shouldn't be a drug dealer.” And then like when my mom had got this settlement from the city, a lot of people were like, “You are posting something about donations. Don't your mom got so much money? She should be able to help you help her.”
((Ju’Niyah Palmer, Breonna Taylor’s Sister))
The ones that bothered me the most was when people called my sister a drug dealer. She’s not. She didn’t do drugs.
((Stuart “Sutu” Campbell, Producer of “Breonna’s Garden”))
Breonna has become this enormous figure now and has come to represent a political movement. But before that, she was this girl's sister. And I think this brings us all down to earth as to what it actually feels like just to lose your sister, your best friend. In many cases, like you know, Breonna shared the role of bringing Ju’Niyah up with the mother. So, you know, there was a really close family there that's now been broken up. When you go into the garden, you can hear Ju’Niyah’s story. And then you have the opportunity, if you feel comfortable, you can record your message and it will grow as a flower in the garden. And it can be, you know, just a short message for someone that you miss. It could be a poem. It could be a message of support for Breonna Taylor’s family. I think the purpose of the garden in that sense is just to create a safe social space that's curated because we're going to listen to the messages and only post appropriate ones and make sure only appropriate ones grow in the garden. And by doing that, we're just creating an environment that reinforces the nurturing that's needed right now.
((NATS/MUSIC))
