This partner film short program brings together selected works from Black Radical Imagination’s touring screening program with film works from local Chicago based artists. Curated in collaboration with EXPOSURE, this screening event bridges together Black media artists of the diaspora exploring notions of grief, memory, family, and home as re-imagined pathways to create new models of self-actualization and liberation pedagogies.

The program will feature works by: Dana Washington , Ireashia Monét, JENN NKIRU, Alima Lee, Amina Ross, Zakkiyyah Najeebah, and Ameila Umihire

Black Radical Imagination 2018 is a film showcase programmed by Jheanelle Brown and Darol Olu Kae and is originally co-founded by Erin Christovale and Amir George. Black Radical Imagination is an international touring program of experimental short films emphasizing new stories from within the African diaspora. The series builds on afrofuturist, afrosurrealist, and magical realist aesthetics to interrogate identity in the context of cinema.

EXPOSURE: For Concerned Black Photographers is a collective of concerned Black photographers who wish to exchange ideas and photo methods. Co-founded by G’Jordan Williams and Zakkiyyah Najeebah, EXPOSURE is a growing community of photographic artists and film artists who center the diversity of the Black experience. EXPOSURE is rooted in expanding critical thought and dialogue concerning the ethics and practice of Black identified photographic and film artists. We believe that the stories of black identified communities should be told by folks of the Black Diaspora with not only integrity, but continuous experimentations in new forms of expression.

Jheanelle Brown is a film curator, producer, and arts educator based in Los Angeles. Her curatorial practice is committed to honoring, expanding, and empowering Blackness in visual and filmic media. Her specific interests are oriented around experimental and non-fiction film and video, the relationship between musicality and cinema, political film and media, and West Indian film. She is currently co-curator for Black Radical Imagination and an associate programmer for Los Angeles Filmforum.

Darol Olu Kae is a filmmaker, film curator, and archival researcher from and based in Los Angeles. His artistic and curatorial interests are committed to exploring the complexities and possibilities of a black film aesthetic while redistributing film & filmmaking resources to underrepresented people and communities. He is currently the program coordinator for The Underground Museum’s Future Filmmakers Speaker Series at Dorsey High School in South Central, Los Angeles and serves as curriculum developer/teaching artist for Centennial High School’s Film Program in the city of Compton, CA.

G’Jordan Williams is a photographer, library scientist, and lover of all things beautiful. Seeing art as language, they’re compelled to use mediums to communicate with themselves and others, especially when creating work that is relevant to the Black Diaspora. Their work focuses on the sacredness of one’s own image, interrogation and validation of identity, surrealism, and the esoteric, all informed by high-powered perception and evolving social consciousness.

Specifically, G’Jordan holds impassioned interest in the intent, conceptualization, and dissemination of the Black image in art; constantly questioning the path and standards of Black images popularized today.

Zakkiyyah Najeebah is a Chicago based photographic artist, educator, and curator. She studied Art History and Black Studies at the University of Illinois at Chicago, which heavily informs her multidisciplinary practice. The aesthetic components and intersectional cultural advancements that are entirely unique to the black shared experience is a primary concern within her visual study and work.

Zakkiyyah uses photographic imagery to address the politics and aesthetic values of representation, inclusivity, black womanhood, family histories, and collective narratives. Often her work takes place in the realm of portraiture, documentation, image-making, programming, curating, and educating. She is currently building a catalog that articulates current and past social concerns regarding black visual language and is exploring new methods of visual presentation.

image: Ireashia Monet, “The Pearls You Gave Me.” 2018. Film still

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Tags: Alima Lee, Ameila Umihire, Amina Ross, Chicago, Dana Washington, Exposure x Black Radical Imagination: Future Enclaves, Heaven Gallery, Ireashia Monét, JENN NKIRU, West Town, Zakkiyyah Najeebah