Join us at the South Side Community Art Center who will be hosting a special screening showcasing select cinema reels of Ramon Williams. Ramon Williams, Black IBEW electrician and film hobbyist, was an early adopter of amateur filmmaking and invested in documenting the Bronzeville community in which he lived -- filming major Bronzeville social and civic events between the 1940s and 1960s.We're honored to show a selection of these films during Black History Month, to highlight Ramon Williams's commitment to documenting Black life on the South Side, and the lasting legacy of Black cinema's power to visualize Black life in real time.

We will be joined at SSCAC by UChicago PhD candidate and longtime SSHMP graduate fellow Avery LaFlamme and Bronzeville Historical Society president Sherry Williams, who will help us to contextualize and understand the weight of Ramon’s contribution to Black film history.

Donated to South Side Home Movie Project in 2020, the Ramon Williams Collection encompasses 302 film reels, our largest donation yet, representing never-before-seen visual records of Bronzeville authored by one of its few citizens with a movie camera! What was Black social life like during that time? How did Black folks present and fashion themselves? What were significant events that took place in the Bronzeville community? We hope you'll join us to find out!

*Complimentary refreshements will be provided for attendees.

This program is generously supported by Arts and Public Life at the University of Chicago, UChicago Women's Board and the Gaylord and Dorothy Donnelly Foundation.