March 8-10, Harvard Film Archive will present a series of films and conversation with British/Ghanaian experimental filmmaker John Akomfrah and and his partner and producer, Lina Gopaul.

HFA will screen five films over the three-day event, including The Last Angel of History, Memory 451, his 1986 debut film Handsworth Songs, Peripeteia, and his 2013 Sundance documentary on intellectual Stuart Hall, The Stuart Hall Project. 

Says HFA, “Akomfrah has become a cinematic counterpart to such commentators of and contributors to the culture of the Black diaspora as Stuart Hall, Paul Gilroy, Greg Tate and Henry Louis Gates. In doing so, he has continued to mine the audiovisual archive of the 20th century, recontextualizing these images not only by selecting and juxtaposing them but also through the addition of eloquent and allusive text… In similar fashion, his films use found footage to create cinematic poetry and then use this poetry to tell history afresh.

Akomfrah’s method is both to mark the achievements of leading cultural and political figures while capturing fragments of ordinary Black lives that would otherwise be lost to the winds of history. It is from this interweaving that his work achieves its sense of urgency and its complex emotional impact.”

Akomfrah and Gopaul be there in person for screenings on Sunday and Monday. 

Screenings are open to the public. Find details and tickets HERE.