BLACK TO THE FUTURE

Who Knew? Seattle’s Black Science Fiction Festival

By T. LaBee

Sun Ra in Space is the Place

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On June 12th and 13th in 2004 Seattle’s Central District Forum for Arts and Ideas held the city’s first black sci-fi film festival as part of their weekend long event, Black to the Future: A Black Science Fiction Festival. The bulk of the festival was held at the Seattle Center but the film festival was shown at the Langston Hughes Performing Arts Center.

“The audience was small probably due to the logistics of having the film festival in a different location,” said program director and curator for the festival, Denee McCloud. “It was our first time so there were a lot of lessons learned”.

When it comes to the history of science fiction in Seattle’s black community, McCloud confirms, “I think there is a history and a fan base because [the late] Octavia Butler lived here and Nisi Shawl, another sci-fi writer, also lives here.” Fueled by that sentiment, McCloud brought to the festival a list of films that showed the breadth of the genre and exposed the contradictions to any thought that black people and science fiction do not mix.

“It ran the gamut from action to animation. We showed everything from [iconic jazz musician] Sun Ra’s Space is the Place to Kicking Chicken. ” (The latter is a metaphorical, satirical short about a woman trying to kick her addiction to fried chicken). The line-up also included a concert film starring George Clinton and Parliament-Funkadelic, along with a couple of documentaries, and also showcased a series of animation films. One of the animated films, Understanding Chaos, is a 9-minute short where every part of the film, including the script, the animation, and the voices of all the characters was done by the film’s director Terrence Walker.

Overall the festival was a success. When asked if the Central District Forum plans on doing the festival again, McCloud responds that, “it is something we are definitely considering.”