Celebrated artist-filmmaker Christopher Harris will be in London this May for a series of screenings at Tate Modern and the Barbican Centre. The programme, spanning both venues, includes the UK premiere of his latest film, Speaking in Tongues Take One—an experimental interpretation of Ishmael Reed’s 1972 novel Mumbo Jumbo—as well as a work-in-progress screening of God Bless the Child, an autobiographical exploration of the artist’s experiences as a foster child.

Christopher Harris’s films often examine geographic space as a locus for competing layers of representation and perception. still/here (2000) is a meditation on the vast landscape of ruins and vacant lots that constitute the north side of St. Louis, Missouri, an area populated almost exclusively by working-class and working poor African Americans. The film explores the vestiges of a once-thriving community through evocative imagery of derelict cinemas, fading billboards, and abandoned domestic spaces, asking the viewer to reflect on the causes of this decay.

This program of works from San Francisco experimental-film distributor Canyon Cinema, one of DIM’s favourite partners, is curated by David Dinnell, visiting faculty at CalArts and former program director at the Ann Arbor Film Festival.

The program Avant-Noir surveys contemporary work by African and African Diaspora film and video artists, along with work that explores African cultures from other perspectives. Avant-Noir offers unique visions of the black experience while celebrating the presence of artists who are often excluded from elite institutions and the dominant discourses on experimental film and video.