Films
i ran from it and was still in it
(short, 2021)
A gripping reflection on inheritance, familial loss and separation, and the love that endures against dispersion. Kae repurposes materials sourced online and pairs them with images from his personal archive in an effort to wade through the deep emotions surrounding his father's death and the sudden relocation of his children, collapsing time and memory in the process. Taking the autobiographical model as his departure point, Kae explores how an intimate account of one’s life can potentially extend beyond the realm of personal experience. I ran from it and was still in it screened at the Locarno Film Festival in 2020 where it won the prestigious Golden Leopard for Best International Short Film. And in 2021, I ran from it... was awarded Special Jury Recognition for Poetry at the 2021 SXSW Film Festival.
Keeping Time
(short, 2023)
A meditation on what it means to maintain continuity with the past — told through the kaleidoscopic journey of a young drummer who must learn how to guide a multi-generational band into the future after being named their new bandleader.
The Pan Afrikan Peoples Arkestra (The Ark) has been a legend in Los Angeles' avant-garde jazz community for over 60 years. But since the death of its founder, pianist and composer Horace Tapscott, the band has spent the last three decades ebbing with the tide of history. Keeping Time follows Mekala Session as he struggles to honor his musical forebears while establishing a new path forward.
Keeping Time is currently on view in Los Angeles, CA at the California African American Museum (CAAM) through January 2024.
The Spirit of a Thing
(single-channel video installation, 2023)
Equal parts reimagining, recreation, and new encounter, THE SPIRIT OF A THING speculatively explores the daily life of a musician who has been traveling on the road for decades in order to ruminate on the slippage between memory and time, truth and inner experience. Drawing inspiration from the East German leg of Louis Armstrong’s renowned 1965 European tour, TSOAT seeks to transmit the granular feelings from this moment into the present by attending to fleeting yet enduring scenes of intimacy, friendship, and ritual, while simultaneously blurring the line between fact and fiction, the contemporary and the archival.
The Spirit of a Thing will be on view at Das Minsk in Potsdam, Germany as part of the exhibition “I’ve Seen the Wall” curated by Paola Malavassi and Jason Moran from Sept. 2023 through Feb. 2024.
Without a Song
(narrative feature, TBA)
A sublime elegy for what is lost in the face of human frailty, alienation and the unrelenting passage of time.
Currently in development at SunHaus.
Currently in development at SunHaus.
Collaborative Works
Say Peace by Common feat. Black Thought
co-dir. Darol Olu Kae and A.G. Rojas
2020
BLKNWS
dir. Kahlil Joseph
2018-present
Play God by Sam Fender
dir. Vincent Haycock
2019
Godchild
dir. A.G. Rojas
2019
