Rashaad Newsome’s feature-length documentary Assembly will make its San Francisco premiere at the 2025 Frameline Film Festival on June 27th, 2025 at 5:45pm!

Excited to announce that Assembly will be making its Bay Area premiere at Frameline49 — the world’s longest-running and largest LGBTQ+ film festival!

Join us in San Francisco June 7th for 11 days of powerful queer cinema from around the globe. With nearly 150 films from 40 countries, Frameline49 continues to be a vital platform for storytelling, community, and celebration — and I’m honored Assembly is part of it.

Stay tuned for screening details. Let’s turn out and show up for Black Queer brilliance!

Click here for more info!

Rashaad Newsome’s feature-length documentary Assembly will make its New York premiere at the 2025 NewFest Pride Film Festival on June 1st, 2025 at 4pm!

Join Us for the NYC Premiere of Assembly
Sunday, June 1st | 4 PM | SVA Theater

Be part of the homecoming celebration for Assembly—a film born from and inspired by the spirit of New York City.

Following the screening, we’ll continue the celebration at the iconic Boom Boom Room with an unforgettable night honoring the cast, crew, and the communities that shaped this work.

Expect:
— Immersive visuals
— DJ sets
— Live performances from an iconic lineup of Black Queer artists
— A special appearance by Being the Digital Griot
— And more surprises throughout the night

This isn’t just a screening—it’s a celebration of Black brilliance, Queer joy, and radical imagination. Come dance, witness, and revel with us.

For more info, click here!

Rashaad Newsome’s feature-length documentary Assembly will make its Australian premiere at the Sydney Film Festival on June 12th and 15th, 2025!

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The 72nd Sydney Film Festival has unveiled its full 2025 lineup, featuring 201 films from 70 countries—including the Australian premiere of Assembly, directed and produced by Rashaad Newsome and Johnny Symons.

At the heart of Assembly is Newsome’s most ambitious exhibition to date, originally staged at New York’s iconic Park Avenue Armory. The film offers a behind-the-scenes look at the monumental creative journey—from choreographing with international dancers who merge voguing with traditional movement, to a spiritual pilgrimage to Ghana to commune with ancestors. The result is an immersive Black queer utopia that brings together poets, musicians, dancers, and the exhibition’s striking centerpiece: a 30-foot-tall non-binary AI named Being.

Merging documentary, performance, art, and activism, Assembly defies easy categorization. It is a joyful, defiant tribute to Black trans women and to voguing as a global art form—an electrifying vision of liberation, collaboration, and radical imagination.

For more info, click here!

Rashaad Newsome, Chimera, January 16 – February 28, 2025, University of Michigan Institute for the Humanities Gallery

The University of Michigan Institute for the Humanities Gallery proudly presents Rashaad Newsome: Chimera, an immersive exhibition running from January 16 to February 28, 2025. At the heart of the exhibition is a newly commissioned film, also titled Chimera, which bridges the narratives of Newsome’s previous works, Hands Performance and Build or Destroy, through an interquel that delves into the origins and purpose of the searing, flame-engulfed figure who emerges from the spaceship where Hands Performance unfolds. This bold shift toward sci-fi filmmaking layers filmic architecture, movement, and world-building to explore identity, resistance, and creation.

Hands Performance fuses Black Queer ASL and vogue fem traditions, translating Newsome’s poetry into a celestial choreography of signing and dancing aboard a spaceship, while Build or Destroy follows a blazing figure igniting fires of transformation through voguing in a fictional cityscape. These films, alongside two new collage works and custom vinyl installations, immerse visitors in a speculative universe of liberation and renewal. Chimera offers a cinematic experience that redefines the structures of sci-fi filmmaking and positions art as a vehicle for boundless resistance and creation. Join us for this extraordinary exploration of speculative Black art and the mythic journeys it charts.

For more info on the exhibition and related events, click here!