We recently connected with James Picard and have shared our conversation below.

James, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Risk taking is a huge part of most people’s story but too often society overlooks those risks and only focuses on where you are today. Can you talk to us about a risk you’ve taken – it could be a big risk or a small one – but walk us through the backstory.

When I started shooting my first documentary film, “The Dark and The Wounded”, it seemed a daunting task. Especially as I wanted to shoot at Alcatraz Penitentiary in San Francisco as an ending to my film. It felt like I started my journey as a novice hiker and was standing at the base of Mount Everest beginning my ascent to the impossible summit. I recall an inspirational quote I had read around this time by T.S. Eliot, “Only those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go.” So I began the start of my journey with that in mind and ended up on an incredible adventure that led me to heights and destinations I could never have imagined at the time.

I’m of the mind set that life is a risk. Every time you leave your house is a risk, so if you have a dream or an idea that beckons, you might as well go for it.

So I began my journey out of my comfort zone and followed my dream, come what may.

Fast forward three years … all the hard work, risk taking, meetings and hundreds of writing and rewriting proposals I secured my film date at Alcatraz. I was, as I found out afterwards, the only artist ever to exhibit and film their work in the main prison and it became a huge historical ground breaking event. It was certainly everything I had hoped it would be and more and what I thought was the summit ended up being merely a plateau with much higher summits to come. All because I stepped out of my comfort zone and took a risk, my first documentary film ended up winning top awards across the North American Film Festival circuit culminating with a screening at the 71st Cannes Film Festival in France in 2018.

James, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I began drawing at an early age which led to a love of painting and then to all types of creativity, from music to photography to film. I went to college and university where I studied art, art history, photography, film and philosophy. After I went as far as I felt I could go academically, I began apprenticing with a number of well known artists both in my hometown of Toronto, Canada and in New York City. After exhibiting my art in galleries around the world in over two hundred exhibitions I ended up moving west and my love for creativity turned to filmmaking in Hollywood, California. My unique advantage as a director and filmmaker comes from my visual abilities as an artist. My understanding of light, texture and perspective along with my lifelong journey of bringing countless ideas to fruition gives me an incredible problem solving ability that is crucial to whatever project or medium I work in.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

When I began what I thought was a three year journey creating a travelling art exhibit and documentary film ended up being double that. Though I had budgeted my money wisely, during the third year I had almost completely run out of funds. At this point I had very few believers on my side that thought I could finish what I’d set out to accomplish. Having tried and exhausted all avenues of potential funding, I decided to put the project on hold for approximately six months while I took on commissions for paintings, worked two full-time jobs and sold whatever I could in order to get the money needed to continue the project. But as they say, “where there’s a will there’s a way” and in the end of my push, the project picked up where it left off.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

I always remember that old saying,“too many cooks spoil the broth.” Truer words were never said. When I started the project and my documentary film I had a lot of supporters and people that wanted to get behind what I was doing. As things progressed however, I found some people had their own agendas and ideas which they wanted to see come to fruition at the expense of the project. I understood that doing something of the magnitude that I had set out to accomplish does require teamwork, but it also requires steadfast direction and a true commitment to the integrity of the project. I found there were people who wanted to derail the project into a direction they wanted to take it for their own personal gain. I had to dismiss these people from the project as they were causing more disruption and definitely slowing the momentum of everything and everyone involved. When you decide to do something that is outside the box and has the potential of being something profound, many people wanna be there for the celebration but they don’t necessarily want to put the work in. It’s important to decipher who is who and what exactly are they contributing if one wants to risk fulfilling a dream.

Contact Info:

• Website: jamespicard.com & thedarkandthewoundedofficial.com
• Other: James Picard IMDB

Image Credits
James Picard, Simon Picard, Melissa June Daniels