Activity

FOCUS #2 Outfest UCLA Legacy Project

Curated by Cheryl Dunye

FOCUS#2: Outfest UCLA Legacy Project

Race, sexual dissidence and identity are key themes in Cheryl Dunye’s filmmaking, rooted in the New Queer Cinema of the 1990s. Her signature films, which she terms ‘Dunyementaries’, are hybrid creations incorporating documentary, comedy and autobiography – a kind of ongoing experimental sitcom of black lesbian life that seeks to question the invisibility of African American women artists.

In addition to directing films, she also teaches film at San Francisco State University and plays a very active role in queer cinema. For FOCUS, Cheryl delves into the Outfest UCLA Legacy Project archives to select a series of representative films, including Juliet Bashore’s Kamikaze Hearts and Tom Kalim’s Swoon, as well as her own short Black Is Blue and her acclaimed feature The Watermelon Woman, which was restored and digitally remastered on the 20th anniversary of its release, thanks to the support of the Outfest UCLA Legacy Project, among others.

The Outfest UCLA Legacy Project is an archive of LGTBQ moving images. It dates back to 2005, when the UCLA Film and Television Archive partnered with Outfest, set up by UCLA students in 1982 to promote, produce and raise the visibility of LGTBQ stories on the big screen. The archive includes experimental work, TV programmes, commercials and music videos, among others. With over 35,000 holdings in the collection, the Legacy Project has established itself as one of the leading public archives for LGTBQ media preservation.