Pamela in the '00s.
ABOUT EARLY WRITINGS
"I'm delighted with [Pamela's] clarity and determination to affirm what is true. Langston [Hughes] would have loved [her] for it."
Alice Walker, Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award winner
"a strong, sharp writer"
Alicia Ostriker, two-time National Book Award finalist
Scroll past each photo grouping for specific quotes about Pamela Woolford's projects Antoine and Me, Disrupt/ed, Interrupted, Generation, Truth & Story, and more.
ABOUT HER WORK
"Powerful stories"
Baltimore Sun Media
"Pamela’s artistry opens a window to allow us to view ourselves, our loved ones, our neighbors...." iT's "precious...and deserves a wide audience.”
Edward P. Jones, Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist
"an absolutely wonderful voice"
Mollie Glick, CAA literary agent for Vice President Kamala Harris and Pulitzer Prize winning journalists
"I'm a huge fan"
Stephanie Land, New York Times bestselling author of Maid: Hard Work, Low Pay, and a Mother's Will to Survive, on which the Netflix series is based
“If ever I have met anyone who was willing to change the world by her own vision it is Pamela Woolford. ... It is holy work [she's] doing"
Grace Cavalieri, host of the Library of Congress podcast The Poet and the Poem
"Her community spirit is infectious and admirable. .... Her creative work is innovative and dynamic, often transcending genre and advancing form. .... She is propulsive in her willingness to experiment with form, to innovate, and to realize works that incorporate (among other forms) dance, choreography, filmmaking, literary art, spoken word, and visual art. It takes courage, vision, and unique, vulnerable grace to embrace artistic possibility so openly and with such abiding curiosity and nuance."
Melissa Wyse, art writer and cultural critic
"Beautiful and sensuous and intimate and open.... I was totally entranced."
ellen cherry, Emmy nominated musician and performer
“a gifted writer…doing what [she was] born to do—mine a good story.”
Dawn Davis, publisher of The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl by Issa Rae, The Butler by Wil Haygood, The Pursuit of Happyness by Chris Gardner, and more
"a beautiful force! So full of spirit and kindness. I could listen to [Pamela] tell stories for days!"
Laura Amussen, interdisciplinary-arts Baker Artist Award winner
“... The intricate nature of this [work] is in line with what a documentarian would do—the details—and [for her] to do that on creative fiction or creative nonfiction even is stunning. ... exquisite work”
literary artist Catrice Greer
"a really powerful presentation...extraordinary... breathtaking"
Andrew Simonet, writer, choreographer, and founder of Artist U
"THERE'S SO MUCH EXCITING EXPERIMENTATION HAPPENING HERE." PAMELA'S "WORK IS SO GOOD AND SO NECESSARY"
intermedia artist Rahne Alexander
"The messages [Pamela] shares [are] evocative .... offer[ing] acknowledgement to silent traumas… it was meaty, and it was unforgettable. "
author and journalist Yvonne Medley
Image from Antoine and Me
Image from Antoine and Me
Image from Antoine and Me.
Image from Antoine and Me.
Image from Antoine and Me.
ABOUT HER MULTIMEDIA PROJECT ANTOINE AND ME
"REVOLUTIONARY." THIS "exhibit of past, present, Afrofuture
Black love is a needed loving insurgencY."
Black love is a needed loving insurgencY."
Truth Thomas, NAACP Image Award-winning poet
“...there’s a nonspecificity to the anachronistic setting that could place its protagonists in various time frames. …there’s a tenderness to the personal scale of Woolford’s work that feels healing and optimistic...”
arts critic Michael Anthony Farley
The "multi-media installation by Pamela Woolford is immersive and inviting. ...Woolford’s strength lies in her ability to marry historical research, personal narrative, and fiction in such a way that the viewer learns so much about the subjects she investigates, but through a personal lens that makes each story intimate.... Woolford is a powerful performer and...offers us a story that feels familiar and compelling..."
Cara Ober, arts writer and founding publisher of BmoreArt
"Beautiful and rich on multiple levels."
author Tracy Chiles McGhee
Pamela Wooford's Baltimore Museum of Art exhibit, Antoine and Me, is glorious. She has expertly melded words, voice, ambient sounds, and images into a stunning celebration of a loving partnership that fills the museum space. Not only does her craft as a writer shine, but also her masterful feel for the rhythm of spoken word performance. And in a glass display case, photographs of her family elders reveal a lineage of romantic, devoted, lasting love, which is the artist's history, an inheritance we see alive in her today.
journalist Laura Sturza
"Give yourself 12 minutes of exquisiteness--the quiet cadence of her voice, the ambient sound circling around, the gorgeous photography--each element becomes part of the whole experience."
artist Sanzi Kermes
ABOUT HER UPCOMING BOOK
DISRUPT/ED (A MEM-NOIR)
"I am awed by its delicate beauty and power and fierce honoring of our truth!
"...This is an extraordinary book. The young heroine is rendered with such tenderness for who she was then, such deep understanding of the complexities of her internal and external worlds that I immediately fell in love with her. She is just the kind of heroine readers will love, smart and tough and curious and brave and wondering. Although this is a memoir of coming of age against the backdrop of a racist society it has much that will feed and nurture all readers, any reader who has been a child. There are so many lovely lines of lyricism and stark reality,...."
Marita Golden, NPR Best Book Author and Two-Time NAACP Image Award Nominee
“…A BLACK STORY ABOUT NOT JUST SURVIVING BUT THRIVING. It is wonderfully written, detailing the nuances of histories as they unfold—both the violence of slavery and the constant insidious injustices and micro- and macro-aggressions of being black (and brown!) and this parallel plane of existence of a purportedly and earnestly post-racial world…." She traces her “genesis with sharp, gorgeous detail about the discrepancy between people's words and actions…." She “deftly explicate[s] [her] child self's belonging almost as code-switching, making sense of the larger outside world and its events, its sensibility, on the one hand, and [her] internal, private, burgeoning sense of self, on the other hand…." Her "memoir is deeply personal, intimate, and generous, throughout; it felt to this reader not so much like being ‘invited in’ as being instantly transported in—into [her] specific experience of being Black in America; like [she was] removing the walls between [herself] and [her] reader, no matter who they were or what skin they were in…." "…this is a book about belonging, sources of power, and identity."
Mayumi Shimose Poe, author of Alice on the Island: A Pearl Harbor Survival Story
“Disrupt/ed presents as fractured and is a really interesting approach. It's almost an installation...of what memory and fractured memory look like. For me as a disabled woman, I can relate to that, ... there is an intersection where other people can relate in a communal way.... ...it’s very clever work. It’s more than clever. It’s very inspirational work, very edgy, and a beautiful documentation.
literary artist Catrice Greer
ABOUT HER FILM INTERRUPTED:
PROLOGUE TO A MEM-NOIR
A “brave and powerful (and necessary) work of art.”
Jazz great Bob James, composer of the film's soundtrack
Dr. Arica Coleman, ethnic studies scholar and Time Magazine contributor
"...incredibly powerful.... I felt that full range of emotions.... I'm enraged. I'm sad. I'm inspired. There's just an incredible range of emotion [Pamela] take[s] us through on a really short trip."
Dr. Marguerite Rippy, Associate Dean, George Mason University, specialty in gender and race in American performance history
"a powerful work"
Dr. Charles Chavis, Director for the John Mitchell, Jr. Program for History, Justice, and Race at George Mason University
A "powerful, consciously historical testimony"
historian Dr. Cheryl Renee Gooch
“Her artwork is honest and vulnerable, and in this film in particular she gives us raw access to the overwhelming trauma Black Americans have faced throughout this country’s history. The script definitively lays out a catalog and history that has been largely overlooked by white America, not only in narrative but in fact. We watch as Pamela laments on the personal and collective pain of racism, anti-Black policies in America, and violence against Black bodies, and what we’re left with is the pain of knowing that it is only the tip of the iceberg."
Lindsey Yancich, curator, Joan Hisaoka Healing Arts Gallery
"a masterpiece"
singer songwriter DeLila Black
the "film moved and fascinated me. It is incredibly powerful and poignant... i love the way [Pamela Woolford] weave[s] together individual and collective memory."
Françoise Bouffault, director, New York African Film Festival
"[W]hen I watched, I had no doubt in my mind why textbooks were written the way they were with things left out of the 'story' we’re supposed to think about our country...and why media usually wants us to pay attention to the miseries of other countries so we focus on being 'fortunate.' Hopefully, [Pamela’s] work will leave more with their eyes wide open…!"
Marlena Jareaux, chair of Howard County Lynching Truth & Reconciliation
"A very powerful testimony..." "stunning and breathtaking... [Pamela] allowed [herself] to claim the anger that the experience of being a Black citizen of this country has engendered... Women often are silenced. ...Black women especially are often demonized for expressions of authenticity and honesty, but I really found myself...hypnotized by [her] voice and [her] willingness to go where actually many of us don’t want to go, whether we’re white or we’re Black… I think that [Pamela’s] monologue is just important for all Americans to see. It’s not just [her] as a Black person witnessing to Black people. It’s [Pamela] as an American citizen witnessing to the world."
Marita Golden, bestselling author and recipient of the Author’s Guild Award for Distinguished Service to the Literary Community
"The film was so moving I can't put it into words."
Susan, Marymount University student
"I finally had time to sit and watch it. To really see it. To ingest it and to suffer with it. I am so taken by it, and so disheartened over all the facts about what racism does to our souls and how pervasive it is.
I am so moved...." "And I think back to the times when I voted as a young woman (I am 8 years older than [the filmmaker]). I don’t have memories like [hers]. As I sit here typing this, I know that I contribute to the system with the votes I have cast. Did I vote for Bill Clinton? Shit. Maybe. I don’t remember having strong feelings about any of it at that time in my life--I was too busy being [in my] 20s and 30s. I was reaping the privilege of being white and never having to think about it or about the ramifications of what it meant." "Thank you [to Pamela] for [her] film. Thank you for [her] work. Thank you for the honor to be witness to this and to walk as best I can alongside in solidarity. With deep respect"
I am so moved...." "And I think back to the times when I voted as a young woman (I am 8 years older than [the filmmaker]). I don’t have memories like [hers]. As I sit here typing this, I know that I contribute to the system with the votes I have cast. Did I vote for Bill Clinton? Shit. Maybe. I don’t remember having strong feelings about any of it at that time in my life--I was too busy being [in my] 20s and 30s. I was reaping the privilege of being white and never having to think about it or about the ramifications of what it meant." "Thank you [to Pamela] for [her] film. Thank you for [her] work. Thank you for the honor to be witness to this and to walk as best I can alongside in solidarity. With deep respect"
artist Sanzi Kermes
Image from Interrupted poster.
Image from Interrupted poster.
In Skagaströnd, Iceland, filming Interrupted.
In Skagaströnd, Iceland, filming Interrupted.
Interrupted photos by Bridget Turner.
Movie still from Generation.
On set for Generation.
Generation photos by Denée Barr.
ABOUT HER FILM GENERATION
“An experimental short by Pamela Woolford demonstrated an intimate technique of storytelling involving multiple art disciplines, innovative use of dialogue and narrative.”
Denise Johnson, New Pittsburgh Courier critic in her article “Black Bottom Film Festival—‘A celebration of the Black artistic voice and creative stamina’”
A "soul-stirring story...." "...the film is beautiful. ...it's pensive. It emotes. ...[an] amazing film."
Tim Gordon, film critic, DC Radio's FilmGordon Show
"Beautifully shot. Very evocative. A great mix of oral tradition and past remembrance and meditations on the body as suffering and a source of resistance and resilience." "This is a lovely and groundbreaking film.”
Marita Golden, NPR Best Book author and Two-Time NAACP Image Award nominee
"Pamela's visual and auditory expression adds layer after layer of emotion.... I love the mystery, like I had stumbled upon some secret ritual to the past...." "the significance of her voice and artistic point of view was instantly apparent."
Lindsey Yancich, gallery manager, Joan Hisaoka Healing Arts Gallery
"I...found the storytelling and setting a beautiful and haunting mix."
Bonnie Thornton Dill, feminist scholar and dean, College of the Arts and Humanities, University of Maryland
"I...was moved to tears. This is such a phenomenal film!
Bevil Townsend, curator, In Your Ear arts series at DC Arts Center
"...indeed a wonderful film."
Tre' McGriff, founder/director, CineOdyssey Film Festival
ABOUT HER FICTION
“I believe her novel-in-progress, Sleep, will one day afford her the acclaim that comes to few first novelists. The novel is a sensitive and thorough exploration of the lives of three people—quite specific in the details and characterization of those three, but universal because Pamela’s artistry opens a window to allow us to view ourselves, our loved ones, our neighbors in those three people. Sleep is a precious piece of work and deserves a wide audience.”
Edward P. Jones, Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist
"Great voice.... ['Just After Supper'] has that feel of good literature."
Mark Wisniewski, novelist and Pushcart Prize contributing editor
"what a marvelous first sentence [to 'just after supper'], beginning with eagerness and intimacy, and then that ominous twist.'
Josephine Yu, poet and three-time Pushcart Prize nominee
"beautiful prose, a must read."
reader Kara Wahn
'just after supper' is "...wonderful.... this is an incomparable story about stories and reading, and about family and belonging, to touch your heart and senses."
Susannah Ewing, lecturer for academic writing, University of Hamburg
'pleasant people' is "GLORIOUS." "This story...is magical!"
Melissa Scholes Young, author and American University associate professor in literature
'pLEASANT PEOPLE' IS "a STUNNING PIECE."
writer Tony Press
'PLEASANT PEOPLE' IS "PHENOMENAL.... I ADMIRE [PAMELA] AND [HER] WORK SO MUCH"
artist Heedan Chung
Generation still.
Generation still.
Generation still.
Generation still.
Generation still.
Generation still.
Generation still.
Generation still.
Generation still.
Generation still.
Generation still.
Generation still.
Denée Barr photographer.
Denée Barr photographer..
On the Generation set.
Generation photos by Denee Barr.
ABOUT HER MEMOIR WRITINGS
“a gifted writer…doing what [she was] born to do—mine a good story. ...Meditations is broad in scope and emotions…[and] moving”
Dawn Davis, VP at Simon & Schuster and publisher of The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl by Issa Rae, The Butler by Wil Haygood, and The Pursuit of Happyness by Chris Gardner
“Stutter is written with a spare crystal clear beauty and has a definite cinematic quality. A moving commentary on missed connections and the deeper meaning of ‘recognitions.’”
Marita Golden, NPR Best Book author and Two-Time NAACP Image Award nominee
“I hold [Pamela] and [her] work in strong regard, strong regard indeed, and I’m behind [Meditations on a Marriage] 150%.”
Richard McCann, author of Mother of Sorrows and former president of PEN/Faulkner Foundation
This is What Happened is "moving and very carefully calibrated.”
Arik Gabbai, senior editor, Smithsonian Magazine
ABOUT HER VLOG TRUTH & STORY
Truth & Story, vlog #5, 10 Ways to Beat Writer's Block is "charming. It really is a fine thing. There's a lot of wisdom there re. writing—& it's fun to watch."
Mark Wisniewski, novelist and Pushcart Prize contributing editor
"I love this vlog."
Jena Schwartz, essayist, poet, and writing coach
