Memory is Ritual
*Image of Cindy and Bibi on front porch by Damola Akintunde
During a season of unprecedented change, we are witnessing ourselves in new ways. This has been a time to mourn and lament. This has been a time to shed and let go. This has been a time to love and embrace. This has been a time to shout and fight. This has been a time to rest and remember.
Memory is Ritual: A Remembrance of Ourselves explores the memories we are recalling and relearning about our bodies, souls, and spirits. In three short acts, this film offers the experience of recalling and relearning ourselves through rituals of lament, release, and hope.
Memory is Ritual is a production of The Beautiful Project, an arts collective that uses image making, writing, and care to build and utilize voice and power to advance the representational justice and wellness of Black women and girls. Directed by Khayla Deans and Pasha Gray, featuring poetry by Aeran Baskin, and art design by Winnie Okwakol.
A Director’s Note
Memory is Ritual: A Remembrance of Ourselves began as a quiet whisper in my dream one night in December 2020. At that time, we were living through multiple crises on a global scale (that are still occurring) and grappling with the harsh realities of our exterior world. This project was born in year one of the pandemic, which was a season of solitude, shut downs, and survival. During my own quiet time, I had the opportunity to witness & observe how many of us were experiencing our own interior lives in a new way. I realized that this was a time to remember what our bodies and spirits already know, but may have forgotten in a busy and overstimulated world. This was a time to be attuned and to remember what has been passed down from previous generations–our mothers and their mothers. To remember the things that hurt, but yet also to release, to let go, and shed. To remember the rituals we need to survive and hopefully to thrive. The hope is that by remembering, we are able to reconcile, we are able to heal, and we are able to begin anew and imagine.
When the grief of the losses and changes of 2020 weighed me down, I started to ask myself, what do I do with all of this grief? How do I personally let go? How do we collectively mourn as a community? What does hope even look like in a time like this? What are the rituals? My own ritual to grieve & process what was happening all around us was to create. And so, I began to ask myself and my friends this question:
What are the rituals that have been passed down to you or new rituals that you practice that are grounded in lamenting, releasing, and hoping?
I asked Pasha, our co director, cinematographer, and editor this question first. And through a conversation, the seeds to Memory is Ritual began to take root in 2021. Shaped by the beautiful prose of Aeran Baskin, who is also featured on screen in Act 2, Memory is Ritual is a meditation and a balm. In a triptych style, the film consists of three chapters based on the themes of lament, release, and hope. It is intentionally designed to be an immersive experience, where the viewer is surrounded by the visuals & sound by three screens.
Majority of our cast & crew are Black women. This film is a collaborative project that holds personal elements & pieces of everyone involved, including our ancestors that came before us. In the film, you will see clothing, mementos, and pictures shared by cast & crew that represent their own rituals and lineage. It is our hope that audiences who experience Memory is Ritual will be able to sit in reflection & recall their own memories of rituals.
This film is the central production of The Beautiful Project’s exhibition in the NC Artist Connections show at the North Carolina Museum of Art. The exhibition also includes four self portraits that explores the same questions of the film, submitted by NC based photographers Damola Akintunde, Jamaica Gilmer, Damola Akintunde, Winnie Okwakol, and Kaci Kennedy.
