Allison Janae Hamilton on Landscape, Memory, and Black Spirituality in Film

In an interview with Melissa Lyde for Alfreda's Cinema, Allison Janae Hamilton discusses her film 'Venus of Ossabaw,' which screens in July 2025. The film follows a teenage girl navigating the wilderness of Ossabaw Island, Georgia, drawing on the lesser-known history of enslaved people escaping into Spanish Florida. Hamilton's work is rooted in the American South, shaped by her upbringing in Florida and her family's farm in Tennessee. She emphasizes landscape as an active, spiritual force and explores Black relationships to land through history. Hamilton is developing a feature-length version set in the 1920s and another feature, 'Floridaland,' through the Sundance Feature Film Program, set in early 2000s northern Florida. She collaborates with musician Candice Hoyes and cites influences including Zora Neale Hurston, Deb Willis, and Saidiya Hartman. Her practice spans contemporary art and cinema, with a focus on sustainability and carbon-neutral exhibitions.