Sculpture commemorates creation of Okanagan documentary film

The Quails Gate Estate Winery is celebrating the release of a documentary filmed on the property and it unveiled a new sculpture to commemorate it.

The Lake / n’-ha-a-itk is a documentary film that was years in the making.

It depicts the story of the original European settlers at the Quails’ Gate Estate Winery property and the Syilx / Okanagan peoples.

The film recently made its B.C. premiere at the DOXA documentary film festival. It was created by Heather Pawsey and Delphine Derickson, as they wanted to share a story from the past.

“When that first contact happened, some people really did try and build a bridge,” said producer and film subject Pawsey.

“Something that Delphine Derickson and I really wanted to create in the opera was two women who maybe reached out, two women who maybe tried to build a bridge.”

The film is a collaboration between the Astrolabe Musik Theatre, Westbank First Nation and Opus59 films.

Filming spanned across the Quails’ Gate property and one major location was the historic Allison house, which was home to the first settlers.

The opera was written in the 1950s, but was not discovered until the late 1990s by Pawsey.