Program Series

The Black Book

A collaborative project of author and California Institute of the Arts professor Tisa Bryant and celebrated writer Ernest Hardy, The Black Book chronicles black life and thought through literature, cinema, and other media. Each chapter is a living archive: a photo album, mixtape, and love letter to the past, present, and future of black aesthetics.

Behind the Groove: From Soul Power & the Black Arts Movement to Post Hip-hop Aesthetics

Through film clips, TV snippets, and music samples, Ernest Hardy and Tisa Bryant explore the evolution of Black representation in popular culture.

Tue Aug 18 2015 7:30 PM

Friday

Friday features Ice Cube and Chris Tucker as buddies trying to come up with $200 they owe a local bully.

Wed Aug 26 2015 7:30 PM

Trouble in Mind

Trouble in Mind... But I Won’t Be Blue Always

Writers Ernest Hardy and Tisa Bryant sift through film, television, music, social media, and news to explore black life and culture.

Thu Aug 24 2017 7:30 PM

Pariah

Pariah tells the story of Alike, a 17-year-old African-American woman who is beginning to explore her identity as a lesbian.

Tue Aug 29 2017 7:30 PM

Tisa Bryant and Ernest Hardy

The Black Book, Volume IV: Black Love in the Hour of Chaos

Using film clips, music videos, excerpts from literature, and samples from social media, Tisa Bryant and Ernest Hardy celebrate black love in all its forms.

Sun Feb 4 2018 3:00 PM

Mahogany

Mahogany

Diana Ross plays a Chicago shopgirl who ends up in the glamorous world of modeling and caught in a romantic quadrangle.

Wed Feb 14 2018 7:30 PM

Still from Chocolate Babies. Courtesy of Stephen Winter.

Chocolate Babies

A band of HIV-positive queer urban activists of color stage a series of surprise attacks to expose political corruption surrounding the AIDS epidemic.

Sun Feb 25 2018 7:30 PM

Set It Off

Conversations Screenings

The Black Book Vol. V: Hustle & Flow: A Visual Anthology of Black Labor, Work, and Life

Ernest Hardy and Tisa Bryant assemble a post-hip-hop visual anthology of film, TV clips, and diasporic black music examining the singular history of black labor, work, and life in America.

Tue May 1 2018 7:30 PM

Chameleon Street

Chameleon Street

This film tells the story of Doug Street, a Detroit man who becomes a chameleon, successfully posing as an attorney, a Yale student, a Time magazine correspondent, and a surgeon.

Tue May 8 2018 7:30 PM

Set It Off

Set It Off

A screening of director F. Gary Gray’s classic 1996 film about four young black Los Angeles friends who turn to bank robbing out of financial desperation.

Thu May 31 2018 7:30 PM