RaMell Ross
RaMell Ross | |
|---|---|
 Ross at the 2018 Montclair Film Festival. | |
| Born | 1982 (age 41–42) |
| Education | |
| Occupation(s) | Film director, photographer, professor |
RaMell Ross is an American filmmaker, photographer, academic, and writer best known for his 2018 documentary Hale County This Morning, This Evening.[1]
Early life and education
[edit]Ross was born in Frankfurt, Germany and raised in Fairfax, Virginia, where he attended Lake Braddock Secondary School.[2][3]
In 2005, Ross graduated from Georgetown University, where he majored in English and sociology and played on the Georgetown Hoyas men's basketball team.[1][3] He later earned a Master of Fine Arts degree in photography from the Rhode Island School of Design.[3]
Career
[edit]In 2009, Ross moved to Greensboro, Alabama for a position as a basketball coach and photography teacher.[4] These experiences inspired multiple collections of photographs and art installments inspired by Black life in the American South.[5]
Filmmaker Magazine named Ross among "25 New Faces of Independent Film" in 2015. That year, he was a Sundance Institute New Frontier Artist in Residence at the MIT Media Lab.[6] He joined faculty of the Brown Arts Initiative at Brown University in 2016, where he currently serves as an assistant professor of visual art.[7] Soon after, he was awarded a two-year Mellon Gateway Fellowship.[8]
Ross' directorial debut, Hale County This Morning, This Evening, an experimental documentary about Black life in Hale County, Alabama, premiered at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival.[9] He was awarded the Special Jury Award for Creative Vision at the festival. The film went on to win a Peabody Award and in 2019 was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature and the Primetime Emmy Award for Exceptional Merit in Documentary Filmmaking.[10]
Easter Snap, Ross' documentary short depicting five men preparing a hog to be butchered in a ritualistic fashion, debuted at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival.[11][1]
The Ogden Museum of Southern Art presented a retrospective of Ross' artwork, titled Spell, Time, Practice, American, Body: The Work of RaMell Ross from October 2021 to March 2022. A book of Ross' work titled Spell Time, Practice, American, Body was released in 2023.[5]
Nickel Boys, Ross' film adaptation of the Colson Whitehead novel The Nickel Boys, is scheduled to open the 2024 New York Film Festival.[12]
Filmography
[edit]| † | Denotes films that have not yet been released |
| Year | Title | Notes | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2018 | Hale County This Morning, This Evening | — | [1] |
| 2019 | Easter Snap | Documentary short | [11] |
| 2024 | Nickel Boys † | Completed | [12] |
Awards and nominations
[edit]| Year | Award | Category | Nominated work | Result | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2018 | Sundance Film Festival | Special Jury Award for Creative Vision | Hale County This Morning, This Evening | Won | [1] |
| Gotham Awards | Best Documentary | Won[a] | [9] | ||
| 2019 | Academy Awards | Best Documentary Feature Film | Nominated[a] | [1] | |
| Primetime Emmy Awards | Exceptional Merit in Documentary Filmmaking | Nominated[b] | [1] | ||
| Peabody Awards | Documentary Category | Won[c] | [10] | ||
| Chicago International Film Festival | Best Documentary Short | Easter Snap | Won | [1] |
Notes
[edit]- ^ a b Shared with Joslyn Barnes and Su Kim.
- ^ Shared with Joslyn Barnes, Su Kim, and Lois Vossen.
- ^ Recognized as one of ten honorees.
References
[edit]- ^ a b c d e f g h "RaMell Ross". United States Artists. Retrieved 9 August 2024.
- ^ "Spell, Time, Practice, American, Body: The Work of Ramell Ross at the Ogden Museum". Lenscratch. Retrieved 9 August 2024.
- ^ a b c "RaMell Ross". Hoya Basketball. Retrieved 9 August 2024.
- ^ "A Symphony of Moments". Brown Alumni Magazine. Retrieved 9 August 2024.
- ^ a b Orr, Niela. "The Literary Lexicon of RaMell Ross". Oxford American. Retrieved 9 August 2024.
- ^ "RaMell Ross". Ogden Museum of Southern Art. Retrieved 9 August 2024.
- ^ "Artist, scholar RaMell Ross heads to the Oscars with 'Hale County' up for best documentary". Brown University. Retrieved 9 August 2024.
- ^ "Brown Arts Institute FY18" (PDF). Brown University. Retrieved 9 August 2024.
- ^ a b "RaMell Ross - Hale County This Morning, This Evening". New York University. Retrieved 9 August 2024.
- ^ a b "Peabody 30 Winners". Peabody Awards. Retrieved 9 August 2024.
- ^ a b "Easter Snap". Field of Vision. Retrieved 9 August 2024.
- ^ a b "RaMell Ross's Nickel Boys Will Open the 62nd New York Film Festival". Film at Lincoln Center. Retrieved 9 August 2024.
External links
[edit]- RaMell Ross at IMDb