Trailer of An Ecstatic Experience by Ja'Tovia Gary
The Evidence of Things Not Seen
Ja’Tovia Gary is an artist and filmmaker based in Dallas whose work seeks to liberate the distorted histories through which Black life is often viewed while fleshing out a nuanced Black interiority.
Artist BioIntimate family interviews, animation, and archival footage of the African-American experience blend in this reimagining of the documentary form. A quest into artist Ja’Tovia Gary’s family lineage, The Evidence of Things Not Seen delves deep into ancestral inheritance, trans-generational trauma, and mental illness.
Ja’Tovia Gary
Dallas, TX
Ja’Tovia Gary is an artist and filmmaker currently living and working in Dallas, Texas. Gary’s work seeks to liberate the distorted histories through which Black life is often viewed while fleshing out a nuanced and multivalent Black interiority. Through documentary film and experimental video art, Gary charts the ways structures of power shape our perceptions around representation, race, gender, sexuality, and violence.
Gary earned her MFA in Social Documentary Filmmaking from the School of Visual Arts in New York City. She is a 2018-2019 Radcliffe Fellow at Harvard University. Her work has screened at festivals including Frameline LGBTQ Film Festival, Edinburgh International Film Festival, New Orleans, Toronto Inside Out, and Ann Arbor Film Festivals. Her work is part of The Whitney Museum’s permanent collection and has exhibited at cultural institutions worldwide including the Schomburg Center, NYU Florence, Goldsmiths University, MoCA LA, MoMA, The Hammer Museum, Brooklyn Museum, ICA Boston, and MoMA PS1. Her work has received support from the Sundance Institute and The Jerome Foundation, and she was recently named one of Filmmaker Magazine 25 New Faces of Independent Filmmaking of 2017.