All educators are welcome to experience a rejuvenating yoga or mindfulness session in the historic Rivera Court. Art-making opportunities and a complimentary smoothie bar will be provided.

No experience necessary.

Happy Lunar New Year! The DIA welcomes back the Michigan Youth Lion Dance Team to perform a traditional Chinese Lion Dance, chase away evil spirits and bring good luck and longevity for the coming months. 2024 is the Year of the Dragon, an auspicious sign symbolizing known for its health, energy, bravery and trust.

This student team is based in southeastern Michigan and will also perform on drums and gongs in the DIA’s Great Hall. 

(USA/1932-directed by Oscar Micheaux)

Micheaux’s earliest surviving sound film is set in the Club Libya, a Harlem cabaret modeled on the iconic Cotton Club popular with Black artists in the late 1920s and early 1930s. Lawrence Chenault plays a movie producer who becomes a fixture at the club as he scouts for talent to cast in his newest picture but finds he can't choose between two singers, both named Ida. The story then shifts to another patron (Willor Lee Guilford) who gets a note saying she will receive a second note, then be killed ten minutes afterwards.

Based on three unpublished short stories by Micheaux, Ten Minutes to Live cast real-life Cotton Club musicians as extras and preserves on its soundtrack Micheaux shouting “cut!” a beat before a scene ended. (68 min.) Presented with a live piano score by Ian Finkelstein. 

This program is part of a companion series of film and music events presented in celebration of Regeneration: Black Cinema 1898–1971, on view at the Detroit Institute of Arts Feb. 4–June 23, 2024. Regeneration is organized by the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures.   

Use a variety of drawing and collage materials as well as stamps and stencils to design and make your own movie poster. Create something new for your favorite film, or invent a new movie!

Create a pencil drawing to take home while taking a closer look at the collection. No experience necessary. All supplies provided. For ages 6 and up (children ages 12 and younger should be accompanied by an adult).
 

(USA/1943—directed by Vincente Minnelli) 

Mortally wounded while gambling, Eddie “Rochester” Anderson gets a heavenly reprieve thanks to prayers from his wife Ethel Waters, but Rex Ingram’s “Lucifer Jr.” has a secret weapon in the battle for Anderson’s soul: Lena Horne’s sultry and sweet Georgia Brown. Despite the competition, Waters proves to have “everything you’ve got and a whole lot more.”

Director Vincente Minnelli’s first major movie musical cast of some of the top Black talent of the day, including Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington and his Orchestra, Butterfly McQueen, and Mantan Moreland—but above all Cabin in the Sky remains a stunning showcase for Waters’ legendary singing and comic genius. (98 min.)

This program is part of a companion series of film and music events presented in celebration of Regeneration: Black Cinema, 1898–1971, on view at the Detroit Institute of Arts Feb. 4–June 23, 2024. Regeneration is organized by the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures.   

(USA/1961—directed by Daniel Petrie)  

When Lorraine Hansberry’s play A Raisin in the Sun premiered on Broadway in 1959 it was the first written by a Black woman, and the first with a Black director and cast nominated for Best Play, Best Actor (Sidney Poitier), Best Actress (Claudia McNeil), and Best Director (Lloyd Roberts) at that year’s Tony Awards®.

A film adaptation followed quickly, with several key members of the original cast reprising their roles, including McNeil as the matriarch of the close-knit Younger family and Poitier as her married son. Combined with supporting performances from Ruby Dee, Lou Gossett, and Ivan Dixon, this brilliant ensemble captured the struggle of Black families to nurture dreams for the future at the same time they are being forced to the edges of American society. (128 min.)  

“There are times it seems as if every member of the cast is striving for an Oscar and coming near to copping it.” —Marjory Adams, The Boston Globe, 1961 

This program is part of a companion series of film and music events presented in celebration of Regeneration: Black Cinema, 1898–1971, on view at the Detroit Institute of Arts Feb. 4–June 23, 2024. Regeneration is organized by the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures.   

(Argentina/1951—directed by Pierre Chenal)  

One of the most controversial novels of its day, Richard Wright's Native Son (first published in 1940) exposed the relentless injustices of urban Black life, as seen through the eyes of the main character, the complicated, violent chauffeur-turned-murderer Bigger Thomas. In prison for murder and sentenced to death, Thomas reflects on the circumstances that led to his fate.

Wright himself stars in this new restoration of the 1951 film adaptation. Native Son is preceded by a filmed introduction by the historian Jacqueline Najima Stewart. (84 min.) 

This program is part of a companion series of film and music events presented in celebration of Regeneration: Black Cinema, 1898–1971, on view at the Detroit Institute of Arts Feb. 4–June 23, 2024. Regeneration is organized by the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures.   

(USA/1955—directed by Otto Preminger)  

Composer George Bizet's opera Carmen—the tragedy of an honorable soldier who is led to perdition by a passionate but reckless woman—has become standard repertoire in concert halls since its premiere in 1875. Its unique syncopated score was taken from Spanish and Cuban dance rhythms, the same source of inspiration for early Black jazz pioneers such as W. C. Handy.

It was adapted as the Broadway musical Carmen Jones in 1943, with the scenes reset to a WWII parachute factory. Preminger’s film version of this production has a powerful all-Black cast that includes Harry Belafonte as the soldier and Dorothy Dandridge in the title role, and pioneering cinematography using the new widescreen Cinemascope format.

Dandridge’s incandescent performance as a proud spirit who refuses to conform to social expectations earned her the first Academy Award® nomination for Best Actress given to a Black woman. (105 min.) 

This program is part of a companion series of film and music events presented in celebration of Regeneration: Black Cinema, 1898–1971, on view at the Detroit Institute of Arts Feb. 4–June 23, 2024. Regeneration is organized by the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures.   

(USA/1924-28—directed by Solomon Sir Jones)  

The Reverend Solomon Sir Jones was a successful Baptist minister and early documentary filmmaker in Oklahoma during the 1920s. He was a defender of the movement for all-Black Oklahoma towns that would be built and governed by Black inhabitants. Starting in 1924, Jones recorded life in the towns of Taft, Clearview, Melvin, and Boley with the then-new 16 mm film equipment.

The surviving footage preserves images of daily life — worship, sporting events, schools, parades, Masonic meetings, picnics, funerals, and Juneteenth celebrations. Jones’ 29 reels of silent black-and-white celluloid are now considered the definitive film record of the Great Migration of the 1920s. (60 min.)  

This program is a compilation of unedited footage from the films of Solomon Sir Jones, presented with a musical score by Alvin Waddles (piano), Marion Hayden (upright bass), and Leslie Deshazor (viola). 

This program is part of a companion series of film and music events presented in celebration of Regeneration: Black Cinema, 1898–1971, on view at the Detroit Institute of Arts Feb. 4–June 23, 2024. Regeneration is organized by the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures.