SEASON I: Black Women in Film
A collective investigation into the multiplicity of Black identities, through the lens of Black indie films.
In Black Aesthetic Season One, a new generation of Black artists responds to the deeply influential and often forgotten legacy of 20th century Black film. It is at once a critical companion to independent Black film—and a collection of personal journeys to unlocking essential questions about cinema and the Black aesthetic.
Films in the series Drylongso by Cauleen Smith, Short Films by Cecilia Emeke, Bush Mama by Heile Gerima, Ganja and Hess by Bill Gunn, All My Babies: A Midwife’s Own Story by George C. Stone, Daughters of the Dust by Julie Dash, Just Another Girl on the I.R.T. by Leslie Harris, She’s Gotta Have It by Spike Lee.
Contributors: Leila Weefur, Ryanaustin Dennis, Christian Johnson, Anaiis Cisco, Yetunde Olagbaju, Jamal Batts, Malika Imhotep, Jordan Brown.
Cover By: Soleil Summer
SEASON II
Responding to the films of season two, films made by independent Black filmmakers, The Black Aesthetic Season II contains works that contribute to a larger conversation that attempts to define and demarcate boundaries around “Black” aesthetics while also positioning the diasporic diversity of Black cultural production and aesthetics as a self-contained and self-referential global body of work.
Editor: Zoé Samudzi
Contributors: Zoé Samudzi, Christian Johnson, Leila Weefur, Lukaza Branfman-Verissimo, Ismail Muhammad, Ra Malika Imhotep, Jamal Batts, Shah Noor Hussein, Ryanaustin Dennis, Ed Ntiri (photographs)
Cover by: Ed Nitri
SEASON III: Black Interiors
Black Aesthetic Season III: Black Interiors is a book exploring the collective depths and singular nuances of Black experience through cinema and visual representation. Edited by nan collymore and The Black Aesthetic Curatorial Collective (Jamal Batts, Ra Malika Imhotep, and Leila Weefur), the final publication in the series, Black Aesthetic Season III includes personal essay, film criticism, poetry, conceptual and theoretical artwriting, photography and more.
It is a book of remembrance and (re)configuration: “Black Lives. Black Aesthetics. Black Troubles. Black Stillness. Black Joy. Black Study. Black Silence. Black Movement. Black Matter. Black Sounds. Black Woes. Black Noise. Black-ography. Welcome to Black Interiors.”
Editor: nan collymore
Contributors: Jamal Batts, Leila Weefur, Ra Malika Imhotep, nan collymore, Arisa White, Michael Boyce Gillespie, Leigh Raiford, Michele May Curry & Ricky Weaver, Renee Royale, See Black Women, Sasha Kelley and Andrew Wilson.
Cover by: Andrew Wilson