Nickel Boys - Screening and Q&A with Director RaMell Ross

This fall, award-winning photographer and Oscar-nominated director RaMell Ross will be in residence with the African and African Diaspora Studies Department (AADS) for two days of programming on campus and with off-campus partner, Austin Film Society. The programming kicks off October 9th with a screening of Ross’ Oscar-nominated film, Nickel Boys (2024), an adaptation of Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by the same title. Following the screening, Ross will be in conversation with UT-Austin faculty, moderated by Roger Reeves. The event is free, and RSVP is required.

Ross’ residency will continue October 10th, where he will join Dr. Bedour Alagraa (AADS) for a free afternoon seminar on the UT campus discussing the nexus of film, political theory, and aesthetics. That evening, events will move off campus to Austin Film Society Cinema for a screening of Ross’ film Hale County This Morning, This Evening (2018) followed by a conversation with Ross and AFS staff. There are a limited number of free tickets available for UT students and faculty. You can also purchase tickets at austinfilm.org. Full program details are listed below.

Ross’ Residency is the first event in the Rethinking Aesthetics series, a yearlong initiative organized by Drs. Bedour Alagraa and Rikki Byrd in the African and African Diaspora Studies Department, based on the insights offered by Sylvia Wynter in her seminal essay, “Rethinking Aesthetics: Notes Towards A Deciphering Practice." 

This program is sponsored by the John L. Warfield Center for African and African American Studies, the University of Texas at Austin’s Department of African and African Diaspora Studies, the Department of Radio-Television-Film, and the Austin Film Society.