Come Daylight is an experimental short film and installation that follows a river ancestor retracing the former path of a long-buried Bronx creek in search of the river from which it was severed. Through this act of reimagining, the forgotten waterway is daylighted—not restored to its original form, but “re-storied” through memory, movement, and collective attention. Rooted in the history of Cromwell Creek, a real stream buried during urban renewal that once fed the Harlem River, the work explores estrangement from the natural world while asking what it means to reconcile with a river.

 

The installation component presents the film within an immersive environment that incorporates sculptural elements, sound, sensory experience, and live performance to deepen the audience’s relationship to the work. The film is displayed on a monitor embedded within a soil-filled box, inviting audience members to move the soil across the surface and reveal fragments of the video beneath. This interaction mirrors the act of excavation, suggesting the impossibility of fully recovering what has been lost while offering the possibility of reconnecting with land through a tactile experience with soil.

 

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​Director | Alethea Pace

Cinematographer | Marquis Bradshaw

Editors | Alethea Pace and Marquis Bradshaw

Composer/ Arranger | Lucia della Paolera & Gobby, COTC NYC

Vocalist | Lucia della Paolera

Lyrics | Alethea Pace

Costume Designer | Mauricio Barrera and Kaori Onodera

Mask Construction | Katherine Miranda

Photographer | Whitney Browne

Performer | Alethea Pace​​

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Premiere

April 2026, Pregones/ PRTT 

 

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