Khalik Allah facts for kids

Khalik Allah (born 1985) is an American filmmaker and photographer. His 2015 documentary film Field ... and his 2017 book Souls Against the Concrete depict people who inhabit the notorious Harlem corner of 125th Street and Lexington Avenue in New York City. His film Black Mother (2018) depicts people on the island of Jamaica. "He favours visual portraits of people on the street – filming their faces for several seconds as they pose as if for a still camera." Khalik lives in Long Island and is a Nominee member of Magnum Photos.

Life and work

Khalik was born in Brookhaven, New York. His mother is Jamaican and his father is Iranian. He grew up in Suffolk, Long Island, New York, but moved between Queens and Harlem throughout his childhood. His parents met at university in Bristol, England. He is a dual Jamaican-American citizen.

He started making movies at age 19 with a Hi-8 video camera. His first feature film, Popa Wu: A 5% Story (2010), was a "normal, talking heads documentary" about Popa Wu, "Wu-Tang Clan's de facto spiritual advisor" and a member of Five-Percent Nation. It took four years to make. Khalik took up still photography in 2010.

In June 2020 he became a Nominee member of Magnum Photos.

Souls Against the Concrete

Souls Against the Concrete consists of Khalik's photographs of people at night around the intersection of 125th Street and Lexington Avenue in New York City, between 2012 and 2016.

Khalik used slow-speed color film, usually intended for daylight photography, for its high contrast, with a 35 mm SLR camera from 1971. Because of photographing at night using available light, he used a fast manual focus normal lens at a large aperture (hence the shallow depth of field).

Black Mother

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Khalik used a Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH3 digital camera, and Super 8, Super 16 and Bolex film cameras.

Films

Documentary films

• Popa Wu: A 5% Story (2010) – 1 hr
• Antonyms of Beauty (2013) – 27 mins
• Black Mother (2018) – 1 hr 17 mins
• IWOW: I Walk On Water (2020) – 3 hrs 20 mins

Short films

• Urban Rashomon
• Khamaica

Music videos

• The Razah Code Underground Hip-Hop Chapter 1

Films with contributions by Khalik

• Lemonade (2016) – 46 mins, about Beyoncé, produced by Good Company and Jonathan Lia, premiered on HBO – Khalik was second unit director and cinematographer

See also

• I'm Waiting for the Man