Assembly

Assembly 💖, dir. Rashaad Newsome & Johnny Symons, 2025, USA, 98 min.
Friday, June 27, 2025, 5:45 pm, Herbst Theatre
available in the Digital Screening Room, June 23 to 30, 2025

Assembly

Black visual artist Rashaad Newsome created an immersive art installation called “Assembly,” staged in the Park Avenue Armory in midtown Manhattan. A central element was an artificial intelligence called Being, given a non-binary (gender) appearance as a binary (computer) digital historian, storyteller, and poet, a griot (or ߖߋ߬ߟߌ) in the tradition of Rashaad’s ancestors in Ghana. Being provides an interactive element to the experience, going so far as to offer classes in the space during its three-week run.

The documentary Assembly shows us the process of creating the art installation, assembling the artists to perform, and creating Being, whose amazing dance moves are motion captures of some quite impressive dancers. We also see into Rashaad’s personal journey, from childhood in Boutte (“boo-TEE”), Louisiana, the influence of his parents and reconnecting to his Ghanaian ancestry, even while acknowledging that Ghana still retains its colonial-era homophobia. [The British statute criminalizing male homosexuality is still on the books. Far from moving forwards, Ghana is moving to criminalize female homosexuality, not exactly the equality we’re looking for.] Rashaad is a computer programmer, Being was his own personal project from the overall concept down to the bits and bytes. He also assembled artists, musicians, and dancers, from the Black diaspora to present-day Africa to South America, Japan, and Ukraine, among others.

Assembly (both the art installation and the film) is a powerful testament, giving voice to marginalized (and in many cases doubly marginalized) people, speaking out for resistance to the while male capitalist patriarchy. It’s a must see.

• IMDb • trailer • official website: RashaadNewsome.com • website of the event (2022) • Instagram: @RashaadNewsome • Facebook: @RashaadNewsomeStudio •