It’s absurd to expect every piece of black art to reflect everyone’s black experience, but that’s exactly what many black artists are expected to do. This discourages black artists from taking the kind of risks that make what they’re creating worth consuming, because unless you want to draw someone’s ire for “making black people look [...]
[16 Dec 2009]
From the Los Angeles Times piece Black viewers are divided on film’s ‘Precious’-ness by Erin Aubry Kaplan. Verdicts about high-pitched movies from black viewers and public figures are usually swift and decisive — “Do the Right Thing,” “The Color Purple,” and the recent Robert Downey Jr. performance in “Tropic Thunder” come to mind. But that’s [...]
[30 Nov 2009]