Reclaiming Culture

In celebration of Suzanne Jackson: What Is Love, this special evening brings together film and music to explore themes of memory, ancestry, and Black creative expression.

Organized by filmmaker and curator Auttrianna Ward, the evening begins with a screening of five moving-image works that consider the body, community, and space through personal and collective narratives. Featuring films by Zora Neale Hurston, Enam Gbewonyo, Aline Motta, Martine Syms, and Ward herself, the program moves fluidly between living archives, everyday labor, and embodied memory — holding space for both levity and history. A conversation between Ward and guest artist Enam Gbewonyo will follow the screenings.

The evening continues with a live performance by Hannah Mayree, joined by Kele Nitoto and Xanthia Van Ewijk. Through traditional African drumming, dance, song, and the music of the banjo, their performance offers a powerful act of storytelling rooted in diasporic traditions. Drawing from historical references while imagining Black futures, the trio highlights the richness of folk practices and their evolving role in shaping cultural expression.

Together, these programs invite audiences to reflect on repair, renewal, and the enduring power of love.

Event Schedule

6 p.m. | Screenings

Gardez L’Eau — Enam Gbewonyo | 3 min., 34 sec.
(Outros) Fundamentos/(Other) Foundations — Aline Motta | 15 min., 48 sec.
Meditation — Martine Syms | 4 min., 19 sec.
Too Much Like Right — Auttrianna Ward | 9 min., 10 sec.
Fieldwork Footage — Zora Neale Hurston | 6 min., 44 sec.; courtesy the Zora Neale Hurston Trust, Library of Congress.

7:15 p.m. | Performance

About the Speakers

Auttrianna Ward is an independent curator and filmmaker, and a multigenerational San Franciscan whose practice bridges exhibitions, publishing, and film with a focus on memory, reparations, and the archive. She is the founder of Auttrianna Projects, a platform centering artists of the African, Asian, and Indigenous diasporas through exhibitions, books, and public programs. Ward directed Too Much Like Right (2024), a short film and citywide public-art initiative first presented with the Museum of the African Diaspora’s Nexus: SF/Bay Area Black Art Week. Her curatorial work has engaged communities across the US, Brazil, London, and other international contexts, highlighting historically excluded voices and fostering dialogue across geographies. Ward holds an MFA in Curatorial Practice from the Maryland Institute College of Art.

Enam Gbewonyo is a British-Ghanaian textile and performance artist, curator, and founder of the BBFA (Black British Female Artist) Collective. She is represented by TAFETA gallery (London, UK) and is currently a 2026 MFA Art Practice candidate at Stanford University. Her work investigates identity, particularly Black womanhood, creating artworks and performances that incite healing and counter the oppressive systems of racism and sexism. Gbewonyo is the recipient of a Murphy & Cadogan Award (Cadogan, 2025) and a Henry Moore Foundation Artist Award (2022), as well as winner of the Dentons Art Prize and New Art Exchange Future Exhibition Prize (2022), respectively.

Hannah Mayree (they/them) is an artist and musician whose work as a banjoist, multi-instrumentalist, producer and vocalist has been a historic excavation of folk music as well as a window into the future of folk. Mayree has a body of work that highlights original and traditional banjo compositions as well as harmonies through acoustic live vocal looping and involves audiences in community singing. They founded and creatively direct the Black Banjo Reclamation Project, which is currently creating musical, cultural, craft, and land-based opportunities for Black, Afro-Diasporic communities around the world to work with the banjo as a tool for reclaiming ancestral wisdom and creating Afro-futures.

Accessibility Information

Accessibility accommodations such as American Sign Language (ASL) interpretation and assisted listening devices are available upon request 10 business days in advance.

Please email publicengagement@sfmoma.org, and we will do our best to fulfill your request.