New Perennials Project and Town Hall Theater Present YEMANJA: Wisdom from the African Heart of Brazil

On Tuesday, April 4 at 7pm, Town Hall Theater will be presenting the award winning film Yemanja: Wisdom from the African Heart of Brazil.

Narrated by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Alice Walker, a film by Donna C. Roberts and Donna Read will be screened at THT. The film has won six best documentary awards and will be shown in conjunction with the Earth Materials Exhibit by the New Perennials Project of Middlebury College currently in the Jackson Gallery.

The film is about the Afro-indigenous Candomblé spiritual culture in Bahia, Brazil and its connections to art and the environment. According to Emory University Associate Professor of Religion and African American Studies, Dr. Dianne M. Stewart, "The film is so overwhelmingly powerful! Not since watching the film Daughters of the Dust have I seen such compelling visual images of Black women as institution builders, knowledge experts, and authoritative leaders (meaning not solely figureheads) in an African or African Diasporic context."

After the screening, there will be a talk-back with producer/director, Donna C. Roberts. Roberts who has an M.S. in Environmental Science. She has also directed the award-winning documentary Sea of Uncertainty about the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

Admission for the event is free but THT is accepting donations of $5 to go toward the Candomblé community in Brazil.