University of Chicago: The Fight For Black Lives

The Fight for Black Lives is a feature-length documentary film that chronicles the ways that racial stress and the American healthcare system disadvantages the health of Black Americans.

Director Micere Keels focuses the story on the experiences that pregnant Black women have had in U.S. maternal healthcare.

I was tasked with concepting, designing, and animating twenty-five minutes of animation for the film. The film weaves its narrative on two fundamental levels; the individual and the systemic.

To animate the highly personal stories of the individual Black women featured in the documentary, we opted for an expressive hand-painted style. For the more systemic graphic data examples, we were inspired by W.E.B. Du Bois' acclaimed work in similar fields. 

The Fight For Black Lives had its world premiere at the 2024 Santa Barbara International Film Festival and is currently touring festivals.