Black Film & Fine Art: How to Pair Absurdism, Impressionism, and Afromodernism

Fine art is like a fine wine: it gets better with time. Plus, it’s best when paired with the perfect dish. Strawberries & champagne, grilled salmon & pinot noir, Stella Rosa & jerk chicken. But how would you pair a film with fine art for your collection?

Let’s explore three upcoming Black films and three works of fine art by Black creators who represent the vibes of these movies.

Absurdist – I Love Boosters (Release Date: 22 May 2026) / Mark Doox

If you’re into Boots Riley, then you’ll enjoy Mark Doox’s art. Mainstream absurdist fine art tends to lean more into nihilism through its assertions that things are meaningless or random. Black absurdism calls our very reality into question while offering a revolutionary alternative. Boots Riley’s “Sorry To Bother You” is an example of this. In the third act, there is an unexpected and jarring tone shift. Plus, the overall concept and pacing burn his unsettling images into your brain. Compare that to a non-Black absurdist film like “Trail of the Screaming Forehead”–it did not shift a national cultural discussion on power dynamics the way Boots Riley’s work has.

And let’s take it back even further to The Coup’s “Party Music” album. If you’ve never had the pleasure of listening, some of the track titles include “5 Million Ways to Kill a CEO”, “Ghetto Manifesto”, and “Wear Clean Draws”. Intellectually, politically, and culturally, Boots Riley is on a different level than his directoral peers. And Mark Doox’s “The Vita of Saint Sambo (Meditation of Whiteousness) and 16 Scene from His Life (2024) pairs so beautifully with Boots Riley’s upcoming feature film because of its Black universality.

This specific piece that pairs well with I Love Boosters due in large part to the content, but the details surrounding the bones’ testimony and black faced iconogrpahy are jarring in the same way that Boots Riley’s cinematic choices throw us off. Doox takes me exactly where I want fine art to take me.

Afromodernism – Is God Is (Release Date: 15 May 2026) / Alison Saar 

If you got excited for the Is God Is trailer, then you’ll love Alison Saar’s Black Snake Blues. We’re still a month away from the cinematic release, but I can already tell that director Aleshea Harris did her big one with this movie. Is God Is follows twin sisters on a cross country revenge mission. The cinematography is brilliantly reminiscent of a Blaxplopitation film or Robert Rodriguez flick. Alison Saar’s Black Snake Blues–an offset lithograph on paper–has that same attitude. Alison Saar is a printmaker, sculptor, and mixed-media artist from the West Coast. The eyes in this piece take the viewer everywhere and nowhere.

There are parallels between the nonchalance of the figure in the face of a potentially dangerous snake and the smooth demeanor with which the twins recite “it was born for burning”. And when we zoom out beyond the figure’s face, some could interpret that she is preparing to breastfeed the snake. Similarly, there is religious symbology in the Is God Is trailer that would suggest a serpent type character lurking, ready to prey on Black women. Saar’s fine art work first came across most people’s radar through Black Art In America. It will be interesting to see more ways that these two pieces resemble one another.

Impressionist – You, Me, and Tuscany (Release Date: 10 April 2026) / Yoyo Lander 

If you got excited seeing a new Black romcom, then check out Yoyo Lander’s art. Halle Bailey and Regé-Jean Page are sure to captivate us as silver screen love interests. When we think about impressionism, we first have to take it back to where the phrase originated. Impressionism was unpopular in the beginning. Black on screen love in the early stages of film was either absent or a joke. Nude Black bodies are depicted as delicate and beautiful without being sexual in Landers’ work. Black romance in film is a work of impressionist imagination. In the same ways that impressionist work longs to show off modern thoughts and concepts through unblended brushstrokes, so too do Lander and Will Packer (the film’s director).

Lander’s series entitled “No Place to Make Love” gifts us a romantic vulnerability. Yoyo Lander’s portraits present us with meticulously carved layers of textured brown paper in every shade imaginable. Her style is reminiscent of Van Gogh’s Starry Night, but with more depth. Her collage looks like photographs from afar. When you’re up close, you can appreciate the time and precision she lends to each composition. Impressionist art, Black artists, and on-screen romance featuring Black characters were all rejected by mainstream audiences when they were first introduced. Impressionism is the perfect pairing for this romantic comedy and Yoyo Lander’s collage work would fit in any Tuscany mansion.

And to further prove that this pairing is made in heaven, Mara Brock Akil commissioned Yoyo Lander for her cover art. Akil’s book The Revelation of Dionne Daphne features Lander’s signature style.

Fine Art is in the Eye of the Beholder

If the films Exhibiting Forgiveness and Love, Brooklyn have taught us anythimg, it’s that Black romance set against a backdrop of Black art can be beautiful. And it is infinitely more beautiful when these stories stray away from sterotypical Hollywood depictions of Black relationships and instead speak to the filmmaker’s experiences. Similarly, the story behind a memorable piece of fine art gives collectors more connection when they’re authentic. Movie goers are tired of all the remakes and reboots and sequels–Sinners proved that.

By now, most historians can concede that Pablo’s famous expressionist cubism was his version of Columbussing. Pablo’s art style was “borrowed” from ancient African artists. Pablo denied the talent of Black artists, while simultaneously plagiarizing it. White owned museums continue to hoard stolen African art while simultaneously dis-crediting and blocking Black artists. But we’re going to undo some of that work today.

A Final Note on Fine Art & AfroSurrealism

While this article did not cover AfroSurrealism, research for the piece was heavily informed by it. Black creators know that history has often excluded us from or failed to give us credit for fine art. For the sake of the archive, let’s end with an excerpt from an article by D. Scot Miller–author of the AfroSurreal Manifesto–titled “Afrosurrealism Is Dead (And it’s about damn time)”

“May 20th, 2024 marked the fifteenth anniversary of the Afrosurreal Manifesto, published in the San Francisco Bay Guardian. Before writing the manifesto, I checked in with Amiri Baraka and Google to see if the word had been used as an artistic framework. There was only one entry. Keziah Jones, in his album Black Orpheus (2003) had a song called ‘Afrosurrealismfortheladies’. Aside from that, the only other entries referred to Baraka’s essays on Henry Dumas written in the early 1970s.

The number of times my name and my manifesto aren’t mentioned far outweigh the times when they are, and the original intent and references of the document have been absolutely obscured, mostly so others can claim what they truly have no claim over and turn it into white-led, Black-only capitalist enterprises…they are being drowned out by bad-faith actors and erasure-oriented schemers. I find this situation analogous to De La Soul’s debut album, Three Feet High and Rising. They too changed the parameters of a genre through hybridization and expansion of vocabulary, only to be discredited and erased as the innovators. So much so that they titled their sophomore album, De La Soul is Dead.

Afrosurrealism may not be dead, but in its current perverted iteration, it’s certainly dead to me.”