About this Performance

As part of the Rock My Soul festival, curator Julia Bullock presents two films by legendary L.A. Rebellion filmmaker Barbara McCullough, Water Ritual #1: An Urban Rite of Purification (1979) and Shopping Bag Spirits and Freeway Fetishes: Reflections on Ritual Space (1981). In Water Ritual #1, McCullough, in collaboration with performer Yolanda Vidato, examines Black women’s ongoing struggle for spiritual and psychological space through improvisational, symbolic acts. The film was made in an area in Watts that had been cleared to make way for the I-105 freeway, but ultimately abandoned. For Shopping Bag Spirits and Freeway Fetishes: Reflections on Ritual Space, McCullough conversed with other L.A.-based Black artists about the role of ritual in Black life and creative practice.

This event is presented in collaboration with the California African American Museum.

The LA Phil’s Humanities programs are generously supported by Linda and David Shaheen.

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