Anurima

Presenting the 2026 Prashant Bhargava Memorial Scholars. On Friday, May 15, the anniversary of Prashant’s passing, my parents and I returned to the place that grew us up - Kenwood Academy - to present the 2026 Prashant Bhargava Memorial Scholarship. Well, scholarships cause once again we could not decide on just one. We took a walk to find the three winners: Kristin Dowell, Maya Hunter and Ella Rabb. We found Kristin first - in the hallway outside Ms Stein’s old classroom. Kristin exudes joy and momentum - she jumped and hugged us all. She is attending Middlebury College and is a Posse scholar: “her anthem is to share the light and love of stories.” We pulled Ella Rabb out of class only to have her ask if we could wait a few minutes so she could finish her last final. Calm, focused, expansive. A curator. She is going to Spelman: “Visual arts allow stories to be told without words and for individuals to engage with creations through a boundless perspective.” And then we found Maya. Sketchbook in hand, opened to magnificent dress designs that are - as she expects them to be - art. She is going to the Maranghoni Fashion Institute in Milan. Better yet, she’s our neighbor(!) and came to help out at a neighborhood gathering my parents hosted! Her “goal in life is to create art that provokes thought, emotion, and conversation. Dig deeper, think harder.” All three embody multitudes. We are sure to say, likely not long from now, that we knew them when. And maybe we’ll one day get to work on a film with Kristin, curate a space with Ella or wear art made by Maya. Huge gratitude to the marvelous leadership at Kenwood, including AP Phyllis Singleton and Principal Karen Calloway. Lastly, to the selection committee - Meta Smith, Marisa Parham, Chi-hui Yang, and Sridhar Reddy who have all been anchors, elements, and champions of Prashant and longstanding members of our family. They can feel and find and reflect Prashant in some manifest destiny kinda way - I’m still marveling at how expansive and ranging their sense of him and this time is . For the second year in a row, thank you. 🙏🏽

Today, it’s been a year since Koyo passed. The measure of her mark and the depth of her impression isn’t time spent. For with a whisper, a smile, an invitation, she made me - and so many in each island, garden, courtyard, dance floor, pavilion she inhabited and stretched - feel like the chosen one. And that feeling of being the chosen one was not diminished in the realization that so many others had been chosen too. Instead you became part of her chosen family . . . and the feeling only amplifies. With a whisper and an invitation, she widened our aperture and deepened and exploded our sense of self, family and home. Spaces unfamiliar and seemingly uninhabitable beckoned and asked us to stay and hang for awhile. She - and in turn the chosen we - became central and the default, the anchors to which the rest had to find a way to be moored. That chosen and centered feeling she imparted is embodied in the fibers of the Venice Biennale, from her curatorial vision, to the artists and schools who got the call, to how the spaces and pieces stand, speak, play, listen and resonate with one another. We no longer wandered and witnessed a Biennale in compartments. She reminded us that the energies and the work and the collective flow through, ever expansive and yet deeply intertwined. At the Biennale, I felt like I was walking among acquaintances and friends. And thanks to her, I was. Sid. Rory. Berni. Thania. Otobang. Cauleen. Johannes. Kambui, and the entire Zeitz MOCAA family to start. Am forever marked, lifted, seen, and honored by you, Koyo. Chosen. [For my friends being first introduced to Koyo, she was named curator of the 61st Venice Biennale in December 2024. She died suddenly on May 10, 2025. Her vision for the Biennale, entitled In Minor Keys - I included an excerpt in the photos - was realized through a five person curatorial team and all those she whispered to, invited and called in.] 🙏🏽 (Pics of last years gala, the Biennale, and the Zeitz MOCAA honoring of her at the Biennale; also includes Derrick Adams and Maria Magdalena Campos” artistic tributes to Koyo ]

My mother travels with me. And I travel with her. To places we are celebrated and we celebrate one another. To places where we can see and feel our throughlines and our anchors and our devotions and our joys. To places where we together remember the powers of wonder and awe and community over process and perfection. And increasingly, to places unknown and unfamiliar where we seek and struggle and the fears and anger and grief lay. And the revelations and reckonings too. These days - of loss and far too many transitions of loved ones - are a daily reminder of the blessing. To be held these many years by the buoyancy of my mom’s tireless and unconditional love. And all it builds. Mom - It’s been a long time since we have not been (physically) in the same space on Mother’s Day. Today I’m here in the place where we took our first mother daughter trip. Don’t fret. I will eat. And in your honor gelato and tiramisu will be had. 🙏🏽

April brought so many blessings - including screenings of Teaching America - in every corner of the country, from San Diego to Indianapolis and Chicago to New York. But the magic of having screenings with these folks was something else. Jemina Bernard and I worked together at the New York City Department of Education *#+ years ago, and she’s gone on lead many educational spaces, including Teach for America. It has been years since we’ve seen each other, so can’t describe how excited it was to have her lead the discussion about the film at the @asugsvsummit . And then to run into my dear friend, Jermall Wright, the Superintendent of the Little Rock School District - where much of the film takes place - and he got in on the screening too. Joyful tears were shed. . .with so many dear friends and revered educators in the audience. I made a last minute call to Maggie Bowman in the fall of 2023 because I’d never directed a film before and needed someone to come down and make sure the initial shoot of Teaching America didn’t go off the rails. And then to have Maggie, beloved friend and Doc Society colleague Naomi Walker, and dear Alice Quinlan join together to present Teaching America as part of the Films for a Changing World Series with Haymarket Books and the students of the Chicago Freedom School (!!) - am beyond grateful. Course these screenings were on the same day so my parents and our dear friend Connie represented the film in Chi. And then to be invited by the Robin Hood Foundation to screen the film and talk about it with Rich Buery . . . The last time Rich and I were up on screen/stage together was in a film about school discipline that Deborah Archer put together. We’ve been walking together in this work a long time, and it was much fun to share another step. And for some reason I don’t have all the photos of the folks who came through but so many did: @aprilrmontgomery @rosaflores @drmarjoriehass @alicequasar @henryhipps @msmithdc @cotntail @mkleinnyc @dr.thomasfisher @phyllislockett2025 @arun_saigal @jeminarose @richardbuery @naomi_walker @magstockb @chikeaguh @dquazzo @alexanderelson @emmajeantony

What a night. Our Kenwood classmate and forever coach Brendan Hunt unearthed our high school yearbooks and VHS tapes in a tale (never) told to Paul McCartney, through the tattooed lyrics of Hey Jude. Around 50 Kenwood alums and fam reunited after years from across the country. A revelation. That kid Brendan was so damn good. @brendanhunting Go see it this week! 10 shows left. At the Steppenwolf Theater. The Movement You Need. Huge thanks to beloveds Heather, Tawa, Fritz and many others for bringing us all together. @themovementyouneed @broncosociety @brendanhunting @falloffreedom

Last night was something special. @robinhoodnyc held a screening of Teaching America — a film following the teachers and families in one of the very first AP African-American Studies classes nationwide. Afterwards, I got to sit down with director @anurima1 for a conversation about the teachers and students at the center of film, as policymakers around the country make decisions about what our kids deserve to know about our country and its history. Thank you to Anurima for the conversation, and for making this impactful film. 🎬

Applications are open!! The 2026 Prashant Bhargava Memorial Scholarship supports seniors graduating from Kenwood Academy pursuing film or the visual arts. Deadline to Apply: May 10 🔗 in bio and here: https://bit.ly/2026PrashantBhargavaMemorialScholarshipApply Prashant Bhargava graduated from Kenwood Academy High School in 1990. He was a visual artist and acclaimed filmmaker, who grounded his work in the rhythms and energies of the south side of Chicago. He passed away on May 15, 2015. The $2,500 Scholarship will support a graduating senior at Kenwood who either plans to focus on film or visual arts as their field of study in college or plans to work on a film or visual arts project in the next year.

No Kings. Chicago.

The incandescently beautiful people of Cuba are facing escalating blackouts and cuts to basic services due to the U.S. blockade of fuel, with the NYT reporting that children are being gravely harmed in hospitals. I have had the blessing of visiting Cuba a few times over the past twenty plus years. Including when the U.S. opened up the airways and encouraged exchange and exploration. Struck by so much during my time - from the prevention-focused small and mighty health care system to the openness of richness of public arts and cultural spaces, to the stillness and gentleness of streets without signs at every turn trying to sell you something. Thinking of the friends and acquaintances whose generosity - even in the hardest of times - knew no bounds. It is from them, and their experiences during the special period - when the country was strapped and stripped of basic necessities - that we understood how deep and lasting are the wounds of scarcity and deprivation. Wounds that are being newly struck and deepened further now. Intentionally. Without any clear goal or purpose or - yet again - any sense of how letting children die could ever serve that purpose. Photos from 2017-18 when the U.S. had opened, rather than closed and locked, doors.

Blessed to be at the Oscars to celebrate the beauty, wisdom, and unflinching strength of our documentary family. And to hang with some of my fav celebs too. It was a night of much magic, and many disappointments too. 1. Geeta Gandbhir is the reason for. For my being at the Oscars, as she made history being twice nominated for both a doc feature/doc short. For us having the space and the expanse to share stories of justice, the wounds of racial and gender violence and the journeys to heal, and the conditions widening the breaks around us. For us witnessing and learning how to share stories with care and community, integrity, grace, joy, and purpose. For us having a moral core and North Star. For us not feeling alone and unmoored. She is how it should be done. I could not have more gratitude and love for my big sis, festival wife, and always compass. 2. Joy is having a glam day, 🙏🏽 @melchaires 3. As if I needed more fuel for the HR obsession. Def not boring. @hudsonwilliamsofficial 4. Met @sterlingkbrown a few years ago. Got so excited I uttered complete nonsense. Did a little better this time around. He and his wife Ryan- even more Paradise/magnificent/compelling in person. 5. The Ryan Coogler (with his wife Zinzi) and the Michael B. Jordan (sister hug) getting their Oscars engraved. What Pride. 6. Simply joyful: Jessie Buckley/hubs. 7/8/9. The Alisa Payne, Nikon Kwantu, and Sam Pollard - producers/EPs of The Perfect Neighbor, and the anchors and embodiers of my description of Geeta, as her beloved partners - and mine. Plus they fly, right? 10. Ran into absolute college happiness. Sean and Jen left us for 🇨🇦. . . but brought us Heated Rivalry. @scohan02 11-16. Doc Family. Come see me in the good light, cutting through rocks, our Governors, the Amy Goodman, the Oscar winning Two People Exchanging Saliva - Alexandre Singh and Natalia Musteata. 17-18. My stunning goddaughters Continuing the tradition of giving me the gossip while we glam. Couldn’t love them more. @zia.simone_ 19. We made it on TV! The Devil is Busy crew. @cwdivadance 20. Goodbye Oscar . . Can’t believe the luminous @meganfalley knows my name :).

Had to pause and do a proper post for this. Homegrown - the incisive, intimate, brutal, sweeping documentary about the very men we are once again watching violently crack our democracy - won the duPont-Columbia Award tonight. Director/Cinematographer Michael Premo, Producer Rachel Falcone, and the entire Homegrown team have gifted us an inside map to those who were on the front line of Jan 6th and the blueprint for the lawless violence we are witnessing in Minneapolis and across America. You can watch the film for a short time - for free - on the film’s website. https://homegrown.film And for all the funders out there - you want to take on authoritarianism and the threats to democracy - support and invest in this film getting out right now. It’s a portrait of how the ordinary turns ugly. America and the world needs to see it. @michaelspremo @storylinemedia @jimurquhartpics Photo credit to @jongenius

What do all these beauties have in common? Their documentaries and films are all shortlisted for the Academy Award!!! 1. Geeta Gandbhir with TWO films!: Perfect Neighbor and The Devil is Busy @geetagandbhir And Laura Poitras, Director, Cover-Up 2. Amber Fares, Director. CoExistence My Ass @ambermfares Laura Nix, EP, Yanuni @nixlaura 3. Sabrina Gordon, Producer. Seeds @sabbygnyc 4. Geeta and Nikon Kwantu, Producer. Perfect Neighbor 5. Geeta! 6. Alisa Payne and Sam Bisbee, Producers, Perfect Neighbor. @al_is_a_payne @sambisbee 7. Charlotte Cooley, Dir. Last Days of Lake Trinity @charcoolerie 8. Joanna Natasegara, EP Yunani @joanna_film 9. Ondi Timoner, Dir. All the Walls Came Down @onditimoner 10. Megan Falley, Anchor/Light, Come See me in the Good Light @meganfalley 11. Ryan White and Jessica Hargrave, Dirs. Come See Me in the Good Light, w/ @beadiefinzi @white815 @jessicalhargrave 12. Cherien Dabis, Dir. All That’s Left Of You @cheriendabis 13. Neeraj Ghaywan, Dir. Homebound @neeraj.ghaywan 14. Ishaan Khatta, Actor Homebound @ishaankhatter 15. Flavia de Souza, Editor Rovina’s Choice @howflaviaseesit 16. Atul Gawande, Anchor/Cast, Rovina’s Choice @atul.gawande 17. Tom Jennings, Annie Wong, Dir/Prod, Rovina’s Choice @wongissima @tmjennings Not pictured: @judith.helfand (Cutting from Rocks) @heidiewing @rachelgrady (Folktales) @petracostal (Apocalypse from the Tropics). Congrats All!