Black Public Media(BPM) selected an immersive science fiction project that merges AI, immersive dance, and Nigerian traditions for $50,000 in production and development funding at the PitchBLACK Awards on Thursday. The project, Rhythmic Wave II: Ancestral Waves in Motion, by Nigerian-American new media artist and Los Angeles resident Aya, was one of the winners of the $225,000 in funding raised at the event. These awards catapulted the total BPM has invested in Black projects through PitchBLACK since launching the program in 2015 to over $2 million.
Rhythmic Wave II: Ancestral Waves in Motion is a 30-minute live interactive performance set in the future year of 5054, blending Afrofuturism, immersive dance, and AI-generated movement (from AI dancers trained on the Nigerian Akwa Ibom dance archive) in a three-wall projected space.
The award show was preceded by BPM’s PitchBLACK Forum — the largest pitch competition in the United States for independent filmmakers and creative technologists who create Black content. A second immersive project also won funding: ‘Run,’ a sci-fi, third-person exploration game, was awarded $25,000. The project was created by Jeremy Kamal, a resident of Prince George’s County, Maryland. In the film category, “Finding Your Laughter” by Chicago residents Arlieta Hall and Brittany Alsot won $150,000. The documentary follows Hall, a comedian, as she learns to use her resources — stand-up comedy and improvisation — as tools for both her mental health and to be a caregiver for her father, who is fading from Alzheimer’s disease.
Hosted by comedian Jamie Roberts with a vocal performance by Yansa Fatima, the evening saw veteran film editor Lillian E. Benson, ACE (American Cinema Editors), awarded the prestigious BPM Trailblazer Award by the group’s Executive Director Leslie Fields-Cruz. Benson, who joins Orlando Bagwell, Joe Brewster, Yoruba Richen, Sam Pollard, Michèle Stephenson, and Marco Williams in having received the award, is known for her Emmy® nominated work on “Eyes on the Prize II”, Showtime’s “Soul Food”, NBC’s “Chicago Med”, and OWN’s “Greenleaf”. NPR host Brittany Luse (“It’s Been a Minute”) moderated a conversation with Benson, giving audience members further insight into the history-making editor’s career.
“Tonight, it’s impossible not to reflect on the path paved by giants like Lillian E. Benson, BPM Trailblazer. Her dedication to the artistry of editing carved out a space for editors from a mosaic of backgrounds,” said Fields-Cruz. “Her legacy as an editor and mentor continues to inspire every frame of the films she and her mentees have worked on. For that, I am grateful.”
In closing out the program, Fields-Cruz gave the crowd — which contained veteran filmmakers including Rachel Watanabe Batton, Lisa Cortes, Chris Metzler, Stanley Nelson, and Marco Williams — a call to action: “Let us carry forward the spirit of collaboration, the fire of innovation, and the unwavering commitment to telling our stories, our way.”
