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The Black Futures Ball

  • Bishop Museum 1525 Bernice Street Honolulu, HI, 96817 United States (map)

We’re back for our third Black Futures Ball, an evening of ‘ono food, music, art, and avant-garde African diaspora culture that’s always right on time. Together, we’ll honor a group of dynamic individuals who are invested in preparing a just and healthy world for those yet to come, rooted in love and respect for this ‘āina & its people.

This year’s theme, WE ROAM THE COSMOS, is inspired by avant garde musician and artist Sun Ra who insisted that space is the place as he created an Afro-futuristic universe of possibility though sound and image in his genre-bending oeuvre that melded ancient African spirituality with an out-of-this-world expansive imagination.

Touching down in Hawai’i, this year we take up Sun Ra’s invitation to “roam the cosmos” together and connect to intersecting histories of celestial navigation, community, creativity and resistance in the African diaspora and the Pacific.

Just as our ancestors looked to the skies and beyond as the vast blackness of possibility, we invite our community explore, imagine and create together as we celebrate Black futures.