“Pilgrim” and “Crow Requiem”: Screening and Talk with Cauleen Smith

Live transcription is available here.

Cauleen Smith in conversation with Tina Campt

Cauleen Smith’s short films “Pilgrim” (2016) and “Crow Requiem” (2015) offer two journeys through Black presence and history, provoking viewers into an experience of time and place that exceeds habitual borders.

In “Pilgrim,” viewers experience a live recording of an Alice Coltrane piano performance accompanied by a visual track that documents a pilgrimage across the U.S. taken by Cauleen Smith, tracing historic sites of creativity and generosity that were an inspiration to her: Alice Coltrane’s Sai Anantam Ashram; the Watts Towers; and the Watervliet Shaker Historic District.

“Crow Requiem” opens up a poetic narrative space to reckon with anti-Black violence through an homage to crows, commonly known as tricksters and harbingers of death, and less known for their remarkable intelligence and complex social lives. Cauleen Smith pays homage to a particular population of crows she encountered on their migration path between Syracuse and Auburn, New York, cities that were key stations on the Underground Railroad, and the birthplace of stereoscopic photography.

This conversation was part of the 46th annual Scholar & Feminist Conference: Art and Political Imagination,  held in spring 2021.