Earthseed

Channeling Black joy and pain through the spiritual imagination of Octavia E. Butler.

In the final chapter of a series exploring the black aesthetic in cinema, Justice Nnanna directs and edits a video poem inspired by Octavia E. Butler’s fictional religion, Earthseed. Founded in the groundbreaking belief that God is change, Earthseed is a way of life that embraces our intangible and fluid universe. As believers of Butler’s faith system, we’re invited to “shape God” and, consequently, recognize the power we have to shape reality.

Edited together as a mood board of salient messaging bound with the director’s film archive, Earthseed pays tribute to the black individuals who have fought to change their realities. Name checks include Sojourner Truth, Gabriel Prosser, Steve Biko, Rosa Parks, Cicely Tyson, and more, as part of a community of alchemists who transmuted subjugation and injustice into hope.

Alongside collaborations with artists in Los Angeles, Lagos, Brooklyn, and São Paulo, Nnanna interviews his grandmother, Kengerte Thornton, who provides a moral line that runs throughout this film. As a Nigerian-American multidisciplinary artist and non-fiction director, Nnanna’s work crosses continental divides and assesses the effects of climate change, economic disadvantage, and race relations in diaspora communities.