Kelly O’Brien
Toronto, Ontario
Film and Arts Residency @ the Annex studio

July 25, 2019

Kelly 0’Brien is a mother of three and an independent filmmaker living in Toronto. Her short diary films have screened internationally. She co-founded the super 8 film festival Splice This! in Toronto and received a MFA in film production at York University.

CBC Arts May 2016:

"I wanted the posts to be more than cute kid pictures. I wanted to share something meaningful that was bigger than me and my kids," she says, an approach that might come naturally because of her background making documentaries. 

"I never referred to it as an art project. It was more of a daily experiment, a way to make sense of what was happening around me, share a little beauty, some poignant bits of conversation."

I guess by then she understood something she didn't before ― that not everyone in the world was just like her. (Facebook/Kelly O'Brien)

thoughts she's developing daily on Facebook  — a project she describes as "a sketchbook of my life" — will evolve into a film.

“This Facebook project has had some interesting side effects," she says. "I notice the world around me more. I pay more attention to things my kids, friends and strangers say. I look for nature in the city in ways that I didn't before. Facebook has given me a creative life that I never could've anticipated. It's been like my art school. I'm sure there's a group of people out there who are doing exactly the same thing as I am, I just haven't met them yet."

https://www.nytimes.com/video/players/offsite/index.html?videoId=100000004976604