‘Still We Rise’ to celebrate joy, light & community resilience

October 7, 2026  |  By Lee Kahrs  |  Correspondent

Erin Chase and Liz Harris with pieces of their art ahead of the Still We Rise event, Oct. 16-18, at The Big Picture. Courtesy photo

In motherhood, grief and gratitude, two lifelong friends this month are marking in a special, creative way the 10th anniversary of the tragedy that took their daughters’ lives.

Liz Harris of Moretown and longtime friend Erin Chase, of Fayston, have created an event titled “Still We Rise,” planned for Oct. 16-18 at The Big Picture in Waitsfield.

The immersive experience looks to not only mark the 10-year anniversary of the highway crash that killed their daughters and three of their schoolmates, but also to celebrate the community at large for its resilience, love, and support of its own through challenges such as Tropical Storm Irene and other individual tragedies over the years.

“The problem isn’t right now,” Harris said. “It’s in a couple of months when Thanksgiving hits, or Christmas hits, or Mother’s Day, or a birthday hits. That’s why we’re doing this.”

Harris and Chase’s daughters, Mary Harris and Janie Chase Cozzi, tragically lost their lives on Oct. 8, 2016, in an intentional wrong-way crash. With them were their friends Eli Brookens, Liam Hale and Cyrus Zschau. The five teens were headed home from a concert in South Burlington. Four were Harwood Union High School juniors; Cozzi was a sophomore at Kimball Union Academy in New Hampshire, home for a weekend visit.

The driver who caused the crash, Steven D. Bourgoin, is now serving a prison sentence of 30 years to life.

The impact of the teens’ tragic deaths hit hard across the Harwood community from Warren to Waterbury, given many close connections among families.

In the years since, Harris and Chase say their road to coping with their grief has been through remembering their children and their friends and the joyful lives they had.

“What Liz and I have been doing is finding ways to give back and keep (Mary and Janie’s) light going,” Chase said.

Still We Rise is Harris and Chase’s response to that journey. It’s named for author Maya Angelou’s most famous poem, one of Janie’s favorites.

“It is an expression of gratitude to the communities that have carried its members through unimaginable circumstances and a reminder that, even after profound loss, there can still be beauty, connection, creativity, and light,” they said in announcing the project.

Over the past decade, the Mad River Valley community has continued to experience additional inevitable losses while repeatedly demonstrating the capacity to come together, support one another, and carry each other through difficult times, explained Ramsey Brown, event coordinator at The Big Picture.

“Rather than creating an event centered solely on loss, they have chosen to celebrate the people, relationships, creativity, and acts of kindness that help communities heal. Brown said. “The experience is an invitation to remember those who are no longer here while also embracing the joy that remains.”

The event will take place over three consecutive nights, Friday-Sunday, outside at The Big Picture from 6:30 to 9 p.m.

Harris and Chase say visitors will enter an environment of multimedia art installations, color, and abstract light. The experience is designed to encourage exploration, connection, and above all, joy.

“We want to honor the people who carried us through some of the hardest moments of our lives. Our communities have shown us again and again what resilience looks like,” they explain in announcing the event. “We want to encourage people to seek joy, even in the midst of difficult times, and to remember that joy and grief can exist together.”

To that end, they are lending their own creativity to the project. Harris is an accomplished painter whose colorful abstracts, animals, and trademark heart paintings are familiar in galleries in the community. Chase creates colorful, multi-media, three-dimensional pieces. 

Together they have marshalled other contributing artists, community volunteers and friends to assemble an installation that illustrates the arc of grief as an immersive work of art. Entering a mystical, larger-than-life environment filled with luminescence, multimedia art, color, and abstract light, visitors of all ages are invited to pause, explore and reflect.

For the two best friends leading the project, Still We Rise has already sparked reflection and solace.

“Everybody dies,” Harris said. “It’s just the way it is. We can only live for so long. Nobody knows why. It’s just the way it is; it’s part of life.”

Harris said the timing feels right to intentionally turn outward and connect with the people who have sustained them and others who have had to bear struggles.

“The process of creating this event has just filled me up with so much joy,” Chase said. “I want people to know, no matter what happens, don’t ever stop seeking joy. Life is really hard for people right now. Let’s remind people about seeking joy.”

See more about Still We Rise at bigpicturetheater.info/event.