French Acadia Artist Cajun Dead film now at two film festivals in Europe

Claude Edwin Theriault’s Debut Feature Film Enters International Festival Contention

Nova Scotia contemporary artist and multidisciplinary creator **Claude Edwin Theriault** has reached a significant new milestone with the submission and acceptance of his first feature-length film, *Cajun Dead et le Walking Stick — Volume One: Blomidon to Bayou Teche*, for consideration by the **London Director Awards** and **Paris Independent Film Festival**.

Running approximately **1 hour and 15 minutes**, the film marks Theriault’s expansion from painting and visual art into independent filmmaking, music and experimental storytelling.

The film connects the **1755 Acadian Grand Dérangement** with the **2025 refugee crisis**, creating a powerful dual-timeline narrative about displacement, memory, identity and survival. Created independently in Nova Scotia, the project combines visual art, music, multilingual storytelling and emerging AI-assisted creative technologies.

For Maritime art, this debut represents more than a move into filmmaking. It demonstrates how contemporary artists can use new technologies to transform regional history and cultural memory into stories capable of reaching international audiences.

Theriault’s journey from Nova Scotia to film-festival consideration in **London and Paris** reflects a larger shift in contemporary creativity, where the boundaries between painting, cinema, music, digital art and artificial intelligence are increasingly disappearing.