Santos: Skin to Skin

The Southern Circuit Tour of Independent Filmmakers connects US-based documentary filmmakers with communities throughout the South for screenings and conversations around important stories and the art of filmmaking. This special screening of SANTOS: SKIN TO SKIN will be followed by a post-film discussion with Producer/Director/Editor Kathryn Golden, Producer/Director of Photography Ashley James & O Cinema's Head of Programming Matt Walter.

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THE FILM

SANTOS: SKIN TO SKIN is a film portrait of community activist and seven-time Grammy nominee John Santos, a “keeper of the Afro-Caribbean flame.” In this illuminating documentary, Santos links the rhythms of his ancestors to contemporary struggles against urban gentrification, social inequality, and racial injustice. His fingers and palms on the skin of the conga peel back the legacy of colonialism while navigating the politics of culture and global migration. One of the world’s foremost exponents of Afro-Latin music, Santos, through his mixed Puerto Rican and Cape Verdean heritage, musical storytelling in performance, and legendary percussion classes, strives to unite and expand his kaleidoscopic audience. The filmmakers follow Santos from rehearsals in his garage studio in Oakland, California, to performances at local community centers, gigs with congueros in Peñuelas, San Germán, Guánica, Puerto Rico, and concert stages around the United States. Rich in unforgettable musical performances, SANTOS: SKIN TO SKIN captures Santos playing alongside a stellar cast of international jazz musicians, including Eddie Palmieri, Raul Rekow and Orestes Vilató of Santana, Omar Sosa, Rico Pabón, Ernesto Oviedo, and Jerry Medina.

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SPECIAL GUESTS

Kathryn Golden, Producer/Director/Editor holds a Master of Fine Arts degree in filmmaking from the San Francisco Art Institute and is a founding partner of Searchlight Films.  Ms. Golden has written, directed and edited many award-winning films including: has produced award-winning films including:

Producer/Director Zenju’s Path (BOS/PBS, Netherlands) commissioned documentary about the first female African-American Buddhist priests calling others to Zen with her drum; Producer/Director Moments of Illumination – Lawrence Jordan (BOS/PBS, Netherlands) commissioned documentary of the Bay Area animator/founder of avant-garde cinema in America; Producer/Director/Editor, Across Time and Space German co-production broadcast documentary about the Bondy family surviving Nazi Germany to preserve their pioneering educational ideas in America; Producer/Editor And Still We Dance, (PBS) a one hour portrait of the San Francisco Ethnic Dance Festival; Producer/Editor, Kitka & Davka in Concert (PBS); Producer/Director/Editor, American Treasure – The Folk Art of Joaquim Miguel Almeida New England regional PBS. Awards include, National Endowment For The Arts production grants, National Black Programming Consortium; the Polaroid Foundation; Massachusetts and Connecticut State Humanities grants, San Francisco Grants for The Arts, the San Francisco Advertising Club’s Awards of Excellence and an Isadora Duncan Award (IZZY).

Kathryn Golden is currently Director/Producer/Editor of Santos – Skin to Skin a film portrait of seven-time Grammy nominee, master Latin Jazz percussionist and art activist, John Santos. An urban legend, acknowledged as “keeper of the Afro-Caribbean flame” Santos creates and uses music to navigate the politics of culture, migration, and his Puerto Rican heritage. Featuring appearances with a cadre of international jazz artists.

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Ashley James, Producer/Director of Photography holds Bachelor and Master of Fine Arts degrees in Filmmaking and has national television credits.  He is the co-founder (with Kathryn Golden) of Searchlight Films. Former newspaper journalist, The Hartford Times, (Gannett News Service) Hartford, CT; instructor of graduate studies in Department of Cinema, San Francisco State University and station manager of KTOP/Channel 10, Oakland, CA. which won 32 national awards for excellence in television programming during his 12 year tenure.

Recent documentaries include: Director/Cinematographer, KIRK, portrait of artist/sculptor, Jerome Kirk; Director (with Kathryn Golden)/Cinematographer, Ann Petry and the James Family Letters; Director (with Kathryn Golden)/Cinematographer, John Santos ~ Musica Cosmica; Kitka and Davka in Concert-Old and New World Jewish Music (PBS); Producer/Director Gordon Parks—The Man and His Music a 90-minute television special featuring Issac Hayes, Danny Glover and the Oakland (CA) Symphony Orchestra; Director/Cinematographer, Bomba – Dancing the Drum, (PBS), a one-hour portrait of the legendary Cepeda Family of Puerto Rico; Producer/Director Home and Almost Free, a one-hour film about ex-convicts in the San Francisco Bay Area; Director of photography for Zen Brush Mind & Kazuaki Tanahashi – Painting Peace and Dharma Rebel for the Buddhist Broadcasting System (Netherlands)

Other films include: DP/Cinematographer for And Then They Came for Us; Agents of Change and Barbara Lee: Truth to Power; Director of Photography for the 2012 Academy Award nomination for Best Short Documentary, The Barber from Birmingham;Producer/Director, We Love You Like A Rock – The Dixie Hummingbirds, the feature-length film about the legendary gospel quartet; And Still We Dance, a one hour portrait of the San Francisco Ethnic Dance Festival and the premiere program for KQED’s From San Francisco series; Producer/DP for Zenju’s Path & Moments of Illumination for the Buddhist Broadcasting Network (Netherlands); Producer/Director American Treasure, and Tchuba Means Rain, two ethnographic films about the Cape Verdean-American community of New England. Other Director of Photography credits include: The Nine Lives of Barbara Dane by Maureen Gosling; Blacks & Jews by Snitow Kaufman Productions; Street Soldiers by Avon Kirkland; Crumb, a portrait of cartoonist Robert Crumb; Isadora Duncan – Movement From The Soul; I Can’t Believe You’re Forty, Charlie Brown; The Color Of Honor; Booker; Ethnic Notions; Cut Loose; and Ancestors In America, among many other programs for international broadcast, and cable television.

Mr. James’ awards include the Prix Bartok Award for the best music film at the Bilan du Film Ethnographique (France); an Isadora Duncan “Izzy” Dance Award for special achievement in film; the American Film Institute Independent Filmmaker award; three CINE Golden Eagles; two Telly statues and three Pegasus awards for excellence in television programming; screenings at the Kennedy Center; eight National Endowment for the Arts production grants; grants from the PBS Latino Public Broadcasting Consortium, National Black Programming Consortium, and National Initiative to Preserve American Dance (NIPAD); the Newark Museum, Paul Robeson Award for best feature documentary of the decade, the San Francisco Black Film Festival and Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame,

James has been a panelist and consultant for the National Endowment for the Humanities (American Studies program), Pennsylvania and Illinois Humanities Councils, the Independent Television Service, and the KQED/Channel 9 Independent Initiative Advisory Board. James also served as three-term president and 15-year board member of the Film Arts Foundation and is a past governor at the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, Northern California chapter.

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