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(lively music)

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(bass plays)

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- I've always resisted the idea

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that somehow my practice is archival.

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It's about using the material
that's available to me,

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and that material is
incredibly rich material.

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(upbeat music)

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It's not archival to me any
more than the fact that,

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you know, when a composer
sits down to make a new piece,

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the notes are there.

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(upbeat music)

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Beethoven, Bach, Cecil
Taylor, Duke Ellington,

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they're not creating new notes,

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you know what I mean?

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They're sequencing the notes.

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(upbeat music continues)

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Do they just amplify the same frequency?

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It just got louder.
(upbeat music)

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You know, is it a counterpoint
to that frequency?

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At its core,

21
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it's just about how do you
make a thing of beauty?

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(upbeat music)

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And a thing of beauty to me is a thing

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that you wanna look at.

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And then in conjunction with that,

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maybe you do other things like say,

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"Hey, Black people are human beings too."

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(upbeat music continues)

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(birds chirp)
(traffic passes)

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A lot of what I do is just

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a kinda structured free association.

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"Mickey Mouse was a Scorpio",

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it's Mickey Mouse and Damballah

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and even though they
couldn't be more different

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on a certain material
level, one is an animation,

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the other is a photograph
of a witch doctor.

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But when you see those two,

38
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it's very clear you're looking at

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the same entity in two
different iterations.

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That's a fundamental
thing I'm interested in.

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Like, that's sort of very specific

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and local big bang that
happens when you put one,

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I would argue, Black being
next to another Black being.

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Like, what is engendered by that?

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(intense music)
(background chatter)

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Even the films or the videos
are just extensions of that.

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It's like, what happens when you do that?

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- I know that every person
walking this planet.

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- [Arthur] And then you do it again.

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- Came from a womb and
because I have one of those.

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- [Arthur] You know,
you have one big bang,

52
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you put it next to another big bang

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and then another big bang,

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then another big bang.

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- Bitch, I'm a mother, no drama.

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The fact that y'all
think that being a woman

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is about cosmetics lets me know

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that y'all don't know the
hell y'all talking to.

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(tranquil music)

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- And the picture unit is just another way

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to sequence images.
(tranquil music)

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You know, I call it a maze,

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but it's less of a maze
than a kind of guided tour.

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You know, with a certain possibility of

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insights into relationships

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that wouldn't necessarily
be available to you.

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(intense music)

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As you physically move through it,

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you know, if you go forward a step,

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you're gonna see another thing

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and people just say like,
they saw this gruesome image,

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and they just like put their head down

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and just moved forward,

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but only to be confronted
with another gruesome image,

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you know what I mean?

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And the thing about it is like,

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they are quote unquote gruesome
images in it, for sure.

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You see this gruesome scene,

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then you see an image with a Black woman

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with a piece of wood in her hand.

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Like, what's the relationship?

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(intense music)

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What's the nature of,

84
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you know, absorbing or
being subjected to violence?

85
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(intense music)

86
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Every time I open this shit up,

87
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it's just like that is a thing.

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So now I'm trying to figure
out what to do with it.

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I think it's in here.

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It may not be in here, but let me see.

91
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I think I put it in here.

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That's "Apex".

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Now I just basically had a
file that had stuff in it,

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and then at some point I
started putting it in order

95
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and I would just do this
while I was talking about it.

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And then at some point like,

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oh, let's just put it on a timeline

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so you don't have to click,

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you know what I mean?

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(electric music)

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"Apex" is about a rock band in the future.

102
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The story happens during
the course of the world

103
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as we know it coming to an end.

104
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(electric music)

105
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The so-called fine art space,

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it's mostly interesting
because it's so flexible,

107
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like in terms of what it
is, you know what I mean?

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I can't imagine another space

109
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that's better in terms of playing
with these sorts of ideas.

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(soft music)

111
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I studied architecture
at Howard University.

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Realized pretty much two years in

113
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that I was ambivalent about that

114
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because it was hard for me to imagine

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what it was gonna look
like on a day to day.

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But my interests very quickly

117
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were consolidated around the idea

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that I think initially I understood

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as being related to architecture.

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You know, and it would be something like,

121
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if Kind of Blue was a house,
what would it look like?

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Or if Electro Ladyland was a house,

123
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what would it look like?

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Using Black music as a preeminent example,

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of Black aesthetics in action.

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What I've come to understand is that

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that impulse to demonstrate the breadth

128
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and complexity of transposing

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Black aesthetics to anything you do

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is what I was kind of interested in.

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If you look at where
Afro-American culture is strong,

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it is in the spaces of
immaterial expressivity.

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You know, music, dance, things like that,

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things that you could do on your body.

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♪ This is a God dream ♪

136
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♪ This is a God dream ♪

137
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♪ We on an ultra light beam ♪

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♪ We on an ultra light beam ♪

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- Black people wore raw materials

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so the whole notion of making things,

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meaning being able to utilize material

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wasn't so straightforward.

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Black people remake things
by using them differently

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than they were intended.

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The appropriation thing

146
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allowed me to maneuver
in a way that made sense

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for me as a Black person, given my,

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as I pointed out,

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relationship to material.

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Taking this and putting it next to that

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it is like saying I don't
have to have material.

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I don't have to make material.

153
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I don't have to make
anything to make something.

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- Yeah, no, I got you, bro.
- I'm about to break away.

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- No, no, no, I just wanted
to come get some love.

156
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That looks great.

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- Yeah, it's a, again,

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it's a artifact for my alternate universe

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because she never had a record, you know.

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It's just a still from a video, man.

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- [Officer] Turn away.

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Walk backwards, keep
your hands up in the air.

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Keep going.

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- [Officer 2] Come on back, come on back.

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Keep walking backwards.

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Keep walking backwards.

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- As I like to say,

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we are the canaries in the mine shaft

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of Western civilization.

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Nobody wants to be where we are.

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Nobody wants to be Black.

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But at the same time,

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when they see Black people,
almost paradoxically,

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we also exist as a kind of
emblem of the possibility

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of transcending profound constraints.

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You know what I mean?

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Like everybody has their foot on our neck,

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but we constantly stand.

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(electric music)

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So given we've come through it

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and it's generated this
thing we call Blackness,

182
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Black music, Black
dance, Black life force,

183
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all these kinds of things,

184
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how do we mine that?
(electronic music)

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It's less that the playing field
is uneven for Black people.

186
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It's more like the playing field

187
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is just more complex for Black people.

188
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You know what I mean?

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That's an opportunity to
contend with a landscape

190
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that's more interesting
than a flat landscape.

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(mid tempo music)

192
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(piano music)

193
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It is not about, it's a handicap.

194
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It's not a handicap.

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It's an opportunity to,

196
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it's so funny, it's like
opportunity to levitate.

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(slow piano music)

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♪ Oh (indistinct) ♪

199
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♪ When you hit that fog ♪

200
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♪ And it'll start for y'all ♪

201
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♪ You say that I know we'll all do well ♪

202
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(slow music)