BLACK LIVES IN MOVIES

Film series accompanying the exhibition "Noah Davis"

Filmmuseum Potsdam © Filmmuseum Potsdam, Photo: Jörg Leopold

Parallel to the exhibition Noah Davis at DAS MINSK Kunsthaus in Potsdam, the Filmmuseum Potsdam will screen an accompanying film program.

Noah Davis' paintings illuminate various areas of Black life, elevating the everyday experiences of African Americans to the subject of art. Davis' works often make reference to film history. In his Underground Museum in Los Angeles, the artist regularly organized film events.

The feature and documentary films selected by the Film Museum provide further insights into the lives of Black people in the USA.

Upon presentation of a MINSK admission ticket, the Filmmuseum Potsdam grants reduced admission to the above films. On presentation of a ticket for the film screenings, DAS MINSK grants reduced admission to the Noah Davis exhibition.

In cooperation with the Filmmuseum Potsdam

Program details: www.filmmuseum-potsdam.de

September 21, 2024, 6 PM

I Am Not Your Negro
D: Raoul Peck, USA/F/Belgium/CH 2016, doc, OVR, 93'

Raoul Peck's film combines Baldwin's unfinished manuscript “Remember This House,” in which the author reflects on his personal memories of the three murdered civil rights activists Malcolm X, Medgar Evers, and Martin Luther King and racism in the USA, with a dense collage of archival footage, interviews, and Civil Rights Era photographs. A harrowing testimony to white supremacism with a strong contemporary relevance.

Peck presented his essayistic documentary in the Purple Garden, part of the Underground Museum opened by Noah Davis in 2012 in Arlington Heights, a predominantly Black and Latinx working-class neighborhood in Los Angeles.

I Am Not Your Negro, film still, source: Salzgeber & Co. Media Ltd.

She's Gotta Have It, film still, source: DFF - Deutsches Filminstitut & Filmmuseum, Frankfurt

October 20, 2024, 6 PM

She's Gotta Have It
D: Spike Lee, USA 1986, OVR, 84'

For Nola Darling, a self-confident young woman from Brooklyn who can't decide between three lovers, only one thing is clear: she won't conform to conventional expectations. She insists on radical self-determination. As a cinematic triptych of different phases of life, Spike Lee's low-budget film shows impressive sensitivity for its characters feelings and the world they live in. It became the initial spark of New Black Cinema.

November 24, 2024, 6 PM

Moonlight
R: Barry Jenkins, USA 2016, OVR, 111'

Director Barry Jenkins presented his Oscar-winning film in the Purple Garden of Noah Davis' Underground Museum the day after Donald Trump was elected President of the USA.

An African American boy named Chiron grows up in Liberty City in Miami where he is neglected by his crack-addicted mother and bullied by his classmates. Chiron is not yet aware of his homosexuality. A dealer takes care of him and becomes a surrogate father. In the final part of the cinematic triptych, the tender, taciturn boy has also become a dealer and muscleman.

Moonlight is both a personal tale of suffering and love and a social drama, depicting a harsh world filled with empathy.

Moonlight, film still, source: DCM Film Distribution

December 29, 2024, 6 PM

Imitation of Life
R: Douglas Sirk, USA 1958, OF, 124'

With his exhibition Imitation of Wealth, for which Noah Davis replicated iconic works of art in 2013 in order to exhibit them in his Underground Museum, he demonstrated the exclusionary power structures of the art world. Neither museums nor private collectors were willing to lend him their “valuable masterpieces.” The title of the series refers directly to Douglas Sirk's last film Imitation of Life.

The intricate mother-child melodrama tells the story of white actress Lora Meredith, who neglects her daughter for her career. In turn, the daughter of her black housekeeper disowns her mother because of her skin color.