Filmmaker Bobby Shepard and Poet Nikki Giovanni to Visit Chico for Black History Month
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
February 9, 2005
CONTACT: Kathleen McPartland
Tel: 530-898-4260
Filmmaker Bobby Shepard and Poet Nikki Giovanni to Visit Chico for Black History Month
Award-winning filmmaker Robert “Bobby” Shepard and Nikki Giovanni—poet, professor, and commentator—will visit California State University, Chico during February for Black History Month.
Shepard will be on campus showing his films and lecturing on Tuesday evening, Feb. 15 and Wednesday, Feb. 16. Giovanni will speak on Feb. 18 at 7 pm in Harlen Adams Theatre. Shepard will receive a key to the City from Mayor Scott Gruendl at a community event on Wednesday evening, Feb. 16 at the CARD Center.
Filmmaker Bobby Shepard
On Tuesday, Feb. 15 at 7:30 pm in Ayres 106, Shepard will host the University Film Series: “When the Spirits Dance Mambo” (Robert Shepard: producer and director of photography, Cuba, 2002) and “The Murder of Emmett Till” (Robert Shepard: director of photography, U.S.A., 2003). On Wednesday, Feb. 16, he will speak at the Conversation on Diversity series at noon in the Bell Memorial Union on “Filming Across the Racial Divide.”
Shepard will receive the key to the City of Chico from Mayor Scott Gruendl on Wednesday, Feb. 16, at a community celebration at the CARD Center, 7–9 pm. The celebration in honor of Black History Month—with music, drumming, and African and Caribbean dance troupes—is open to the public.
Shepard, an award-winning director of photography, has more than 200 production credits in documentary, dramatic, commercial and sports cinematography since 1975. His awards include IMPACT Repertory Theatre’s Dreamkeeper award (2003); International Black Panther Film Festival for Courage, Vision and Commitment (2000); National Black Programming Consortium’s Oscar Micheaux Award for his “passion, perseverance, vision and pioneering spirit” (1997); L.A.S.A. Award of Merit (Puerto Rico, 1997) for “Nicaragua: In the Absence of Peace”; an Emmy nomination for cinematography for “Beyond the Altar,” which won the best documentary Emmy (1985). His projects include work on “Brother Outside: The Life of Bayard Rustin”; “Ralph Ellison: An American Journey”; “Roots”; “Facing the Truth with Bill Moyers”; “Licensed to Kill”; “Black Is … Black Ain’t”; and “Eyes on the Prize I and II.”
Shepard earned his BA from the Leonard Davis Center for the Performing Arts at the City College of New York and was a graduate fellow at the New York
Institute of Technology. He served as a sergeant in the Marine Corps in Vietnam in the 1960s. He is a childhood friend of Chico photographer Rudy Giscombe, who was instrumental in bringing Shepard here.
Shepard is being hosted by the A.S. Committee on Arts and Lectures, the School of Graduate, International, and Sponsored Programs, the College of Humanities and Fine Arts and the Department of Communication Design.
Poet and Professor Nikki Giovanni
Giovanni is the author of more than two dozen books. She was a finalist for a 2003 Grammy for “The Nikki Giovanni Poetry Collection,” a spoken-word CD. Her most recent books, “Love Poems,” “Blues: For All the Changes,” and “Quilting the Black-Eyed Pea,” were winners of the NAACP Image Award in 1998, 2000 and 2003, respectively. She is also well known for her book, “Cotton Candy on a Rainy Day.” One of the most widely read American poets, Giovanni describes herself as “a Black American, a daughter, a mother, a professor of English.”
She has been a professor at Virginia Tech since 1987 and was named University Distinguished Professor in 1999. Giovanni has been honored across the country for her work, including the Langston Hughes Medal for Outstanding Poetry and the Rosa Parks Woman of Courage Award. She has been awarded more than 20 honorary degrees, and was presented a U.S. Senate Certificate of Commendation by California Senator Barbara Boxer.
Giovanni is the guest of Professor Tracy Butts of Chico’s English department. As a student at Virginia Tech, Butts took classes from Giovanni and recalls what an important influence Giovanni has had over the years.
“Nikki’s voice has long echoed in this country. Her work reflects issues across the spectrum—love, families, race, and a whole host of social issues,” said Butts. Giovanni had an influential role in Butts’s life as teacher and mentor. Butts believes that Giovanni provides a common thread among generations through her books and CDs.
Sponsors of Giovanni’s visit include the President’s Office, the Vice President of Academic Affairs and Provost’s Office, the Office of Student Affairs, the Committee on Arts and Lectures, the Associated Students, the California Faculty Association and the College of Humanities and Fine Arts. The reading is free and open to the public.