South Side Home Movie Project invites you to tune into Facebook Live with Arts + Public Life every Thursday night at 7pm to experience a unique program of vintage home movie footage from the South Side Home Movie Project, sound-tracked by some of Chicago’s top DJs.

“Let’s Get Together,” this week’s set from Ayana Contreras, is inspired by scenes of inter-generational gatherings, Grandma clapping alongside young couples and kids, folks trying out the latest dances, birthday cakes. “We’ve had to put a lot of these sorts of gatherings on pause, but these celebratory moments mean so much to people. I wanted to honor that. My muse was the basement parties that so many of us grew up with.” Featured home movies include clips from the Pitts, Merrifield, Alsup-Smith, Patton, Buford, Reed, Roberson and Ellis Family Collections.

Host/producer of Reclaimed Soul, a weekly radio program on Vocalo and WBEZ in Chicago, Ayana Contreras is also a producer for nationally-distributed radio show Sound Opinions, and a columnist for DownBeat. In 2014-15, she was an Artist in Residence at Arts + Public Life at University of Chicago. Her book, Energy Never Dies, which documents the cultural contributions (via art, music, advertising, and media) that post-civil rights era Black Chicago gave to the world, is forthcoming from Northwestern University Press.