Celebrated annually in the United States and Canada in February, Black History Month is a dedicated time to honor impactful people and events in the black diaspora. And while there have been countless contributions of African-descended people to world history, here at NYFA, we’re recognizing those who are blazing trails in the entertainment industry as they pursue their craft.

On the heels of the Screen Actor’s Guild Awards (SAG) and as we gear up for Oscar season, we’ve compiled a list of five history-makers to watch right now in 2017. So without further ado, drumroll please…

1. Mahershala Ali

An Oakland, California native, Ali was raised Christian by his mother, an ordained minister, before converting to Islam and changing his last name from Gilmore to Ali. While attending St. Mary’s College of California on a basketball scholarship, Ali decided to go into acting and landed an apprenticeship at the California Shakespeare Theater. He went on to enroll at NYU, where he earned a master’s degree in NYU’s graduate acting program.

Until this year, Ali was perhaps best known for his appearances in “House of Cards,” “Luke Cage,” “Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1,” “Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 2,” and “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.” Now, Ali’s performance as a supporting character in “Moonlight,” which follows the coming of age of an African-American gay youth, earned him the Critic’s Choice Award for Best Supporting Actor in December 2016. This was followed by the Screen Actors Guild Award for Best Supporting Actor and an Oscar nomination in 2017.

2. Issa Rae

This former NYFA student was born Jo-Issa Rae Diop in Los Angeles to a pediatric doctor from Senegal and a teacher from Louisiana. Eventually attending Stanford University, where she majored in African-American Studies, she wrote and directed plays, music videos, and even a mock reality series while still in school. Fellow Stanford classmate, Tracy Oliver, would eventually produce “Awkward Black Girl” and star on the show.

After accepting a fellowship with The Public Theater, Rae joined Oliver in taking classes at New York Film Academy, while they continued to develop and produce “Awkward Black Girl” for YouTube, raising $56,249 through a Kickstarter campaign to release the rest of the first season due to popular demand. Rae continued to write, produce, and edit original content on her YouTube channel, working on Ratchet Piece Theater, ”The ‘F’ Word,” ”Roomieloverfriends,” and ”The Choir.” Rae partnered up with Pharrell to premiere season two of the series on his YouTube channel, ”iamOTHER.” Rae also began releasing other content on her original channel, predominantly created by and starring people of color In 2013, she began writing a comedy series pilot with Larry Wilmore, which was eventually titled ”Insecure” and was picked up by HBO. This year, the show — which Rae also produces — earned her a Golden Globe nomination for Best Actress in a TV Comedy or Musical.

3. Ava DuVernay

https://youtu.be/V66F3WU2CKk

Hailing from Long Beach, California, Ava DuVernay attended UCLA, where she majored in African-American Studies and English. Pursuing journalism at the start of her career, she was assigned to cover the O.J. Simpson trial, eventually turning to public relations and opening up her own firm, The DuVernay Agency, while producing documentaries to learn and hone the craft.

Her feature films include “I Will Follow” and Martin Luther King Jr.-based “Selma.” She was the first African-American woman to win Best Director at the Sundance 2012 festival for her feature, “Middle of Nowhere.” In 2010 DuVernay began AFFRM (the African-American Film Festival Releasing Movement), her own company to distribute films made by or focusing on black people, after which she later rebranded the company under a new name, ARRAY, to include a focus on women filmmakers as well.

Most recently, DuVernay’s documentary “13th,” which explores the 13th amendment abolishing slavery and our nation’s disproportionate incarceration of African Americans in prisons, was met with critical acclaim, as it sheds light on America’s history of racial inequality.

4. Raoul Peck

Born in Haiti and fleeing the Duvalier dictatorship as a young boy with his family to Kinshasa, Congo, Peck studied electrical engineering and economics at Berlin’s Humboldt University before attaining a degree in film from the German Film and Television Academy in Berlin. With a focus on socio-political themes in his documentaries and narrative films, Peck is well known for his feature films “Man by The Shore,” about the Haitian Duvalieriste regime, and “Lumumba,” which covers Congolese independence from Belgium. Both of these, along with his other films, were produced through his production company, Velvet Films.

In 2016, amidst the political and racial strife in the U.S., Peck released his “I Am Not Your Negro,” based on 30 pages of an incomplete manuscript by renowned African-American writer James Baldwin, which examines race in America from the Civil Rights era to the Black Lives Matter movement. This documentary has already earned him an Oscar nomination for best documentary feature.

5. Viola Davis

Born in St. Mathews, North Carolina, Viola Davis attended Rhode Island College and The Juilliard School, where she studied drama. After years of playing supporting roles in both television and film, it was Davis’ one scene in the film adaptation of “Doubt,” starring Meryl Streep and Phillip Seymour Hoffman, that earned her Golden Globe and Academy Award nominations. Soon after, Davis was inducted into The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Davis’ role in “The Help” earned her two SAG awards, a second Academy Award nomination, a BAFTA nomination and a Golden Globe award. Currently starring in ABC’s “How to Get Away with Murder,” she is the first black woman of any nationality to earn a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series.  

While 2016 has been quite a busy year for Davis — she starred in and executive-produced the courtroom drama ”Custody” as well as performing in the DC Comics adaptation “Suicide Squad” — it was her role opposite Denzel Washington in “Fences” that won her the Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actress, yet another SAG Award, and her third Academy Award nomination. As she is continuing to expand her work behind the scenes through her production company JuVee Productions, Davis has just put a comedy series into development with ABC.

Stay tuned for a list of five more people to watch as we continue to honor Black History Month at NYFA.

As American cinema expands to tell stories from a wide variety of cultural experiences, we’re seeing more and more authentic African-American stories hit the big screen. This goes both for documentaries and features. While Hollywood still has a ways to go before it achieves racial equality, the industry has made many strides in recent years. Just look at some of the titles, plots, directors, and cast members that have come out and received recognition in the past decade. In fact, make that your unofficial homework: Since February is Black History Month, you have all the more reason to be extra conscious of films that portray what it’s really like to be black in America.

Here are five feature films released in the past five years to binge-watch this month:

“Fences” (2016): “Fences” follows the story of a black garbage man named Troy who lives in Pittsburgh during the 1950s. The Oscar-nominated film is based off of a Pulitzer Prize-winning August Wilson play that debuted in 1983 as part of the Pittsburgh Cycle. The Pittsburgh Cycle was Wilson’s series of 10 stage plays capturing the black experience in 20th century America, with a play representing each decade. Wilson, who was a prolific black playwright from Pittsburgh, wrote the play to shed light on the lives of working-class African-Americans.

With middle class America steadily declining and racial justice movements like Black Lives Matter gaining momentum, now could not be a more perfect time for “Fences.” Plus, just look at the cast: Denzel Washington (who also directed it), Viola Davis, Stephen Henderson, and recent NYFA Guest Speaker and Master Class Lecturer Russell Hornsby.

“Selma” (2015): You can’t have a Black History Month film list without including a biopic of Martin Luther King, Jr. This award-winning film, directed by Ava DuVernay, follows MLK’s efforts to achieve equal voting rights for African-Americans. The most visible part of that campaign involved marching from Selma to Montgomery, in Alabama, in 1965 … hence the inspiration for the movie’s title.

“Selma” will feel especially timely right after the 2016 presidential election and recent rallies and marches. In MLK’s day, marches were just business as usual. “Selma,” which was written by Paul Webb, stars David Oyelowo, Carmen Ejogo, and Tim Roth. There’s even an Oprah cameo, so keep your eyes peeled.

“Race” (2016): Once upon a time, black athletes faced overt racism off and on the field. “Race” shows how African-American runner Jesse Owens dealt with such discrimination. The year is 1936 and Owens has one goal: to become the world’s best track and field athlete in history. But when he heads to the Olympics, he’s suddenly up against not just homegrown American racism, but Adolf Hitler’s dictatorship.  

TheWrap critic Inkoo Kang praised the film. In her review of “Race,” she wrote, “The Jesse Owens to cheer on here is, sure, the fastest man in the world, but also the canny would-be celebrity who knew exactly how to bet on himself in a world that had little use for his dignity and intellect. If that’s not an inspirational story, I don’t know what is.”

“Dear White People” (2014): This satirical comedy-drama was written, directed, and co-produced by triple threat Justin Simien. It explores the lives of four African-American students at a fictional Ivy League college. There, undergraduate experience is less like “Animal House” than it is a battlefield for students of color. But the real controversy starts when a biracial student named Samantha White gets elected as the head of a traditionally all-black house on campus. Unlike the aforementioned films, which ground racial struggles in the past, “Dear White People” reminds us how race still affects Americans today.

https://youtu.be/ZF7i2n5NXLo

“Beasts of the Southern Wild” (2012): Now for a movie from a child’s perspective. “Beasts of the Southern Wild” is a coming-of-age story about a six-year-old black girl named Hushpuppy. Hushpuppy is just starting to understand her place in the world as she grapples with more than many children do at her age. For one thing, her father’s health is fading fast. Then there’s the health of her bayou community, which is falling prey to flooding caused by global warming. Young actress Quvenzhané Wallis gives a stunning performance in her challenging role as a little black girl who’s anything but a stereotype.

What films will you be watching during Black History Month? Let us know in the comments below!

Through social media and emerging technologies it’s become so easy to connect with friends from all over the world, offering the illusion that the world is small. When you travel, you realize that the world is actually quite vast and there is so much to explore. And like many other artistic disciplines, the visual arts are heavily influenced by environment and geography. But what’s included in the visual arts?

Visual arts encompass many fields, influence, and inspirations, and international education can feed a person’s work for years to come. In our own visual arts programs like cinematography, photography, illustration, and graphic design, studying in an international community or location will enrich your studies as you experience local architectural, environmental, and industrial arts, as well as the folk arts and culture — ceramics, jewelry, woodwork and paper (book arts anyone?).

So how can international travel play a role in your visual artistry? We’ve got some ideas listed below. International education:

1. Provides perspective.

Whether traveling domestically or internationally, travel forces us out of our comfort zones. And for visual artists, the world provides a diversity of landscapes from which we can be inspired. From the rolling hills in a California countryside, to a sprawling Brazilian metropolis, the world is a canvas. From it, we can draw inspiration and in turn contribute by making our own mark. Whether sculpting or painting, or even designing urban spaces, exposure to different countries and cultures — both the good and the uncomfortable of it — forces us to increase our knowledge and open up our perspective.

2. Builds courage.

Being thrown into unknown situations and learning how to come out on the other side takes courage! Not only have you survived, but you’ve become a little more independent, self-reliant, and perhaps more importantly, self-reflective. It takes courage to step into the unknown and even more to survive. This newfound courage can easily spill over into other areas of your life, where suddenly, playing around with that new idea — a new brush stroke, an additional sketch — doesn’t seem so scary. You’ll find that it becomes easier to stretch yourself, to dare yourself to take those experimental leaps that it seems none of the other artists are doing, and yet you are inspired and driven to do it. International education helps to build your courage to dig deeper into your authentic self.

3. Enhances Creativity

The more time spent immersed in foreign experiences, the more flexibility and depth you are able to bring to your art. But the key here is immersion. While you may not necessarily experience cultural immersion on a trip to a Cancun resort, going there and spending time with local schoolteachers may do the trick of offering you an authentic perspective of life in a different place and culture. Traveling exposes you to different experiences while forcing you to problem-solve in a foreign environment, and at times in a foreign language, while you build alliances with people who may be very different from you. Traveling teaches you how to develop creative solutions. Add this to your education, and you are learning on a whole other level. Creative problem solving is a skill built out of necessity, that has the potential to beautifully elevate your artistic palette as well as your understanding of the world around you.

4. Exposure to the interconnectedness of art.

There are connections everywhere, and the more you travel, the more you realize that the world is a patchwork of seemingly very different people who fundamentally want a lot of the same things. International education encourages the discovery of interconnectedness — in art, in knowledge, in people. And visually speaking, seeing some of the bastions of life translated in another culture expands your definition of them. Church might have a universal definition, but architecturally it is expressed a myriad of ways from Spain to Senegal. In Japan, animation has exploded with new forms being developed regularly that can be borrowed from and built upon. Like Monet and his seascapes, the relationship between artist and his or her environment can provide a fascinating artistic oeuvre.

How has international education, studying abroad, or studying in an international community helped you develop your visual art?