The Block Museum

10/09/2026

Block Cinema Receives National Film Preservation Foundation Grant to Preserve Two Films by Rowena Pattee Kryder

The Block Museum of Art at Northwestern University has received a $28,910 Matching Grant from the…...

The Block Museum of Art at Northwestern University has received a $28,910 Matching Grant from the National Film Preservation Foundation to preserve two experimental animated films by artist Rowena Pattee Kryder: Metamorphosis (1962) and Passages (1982). Kryder (1935–2014) is a largely overlooked f...

10/09/2026

Greg Foster-Rice on “The Modern Metropolis” and Images of the City [Video]

How do images shape the way we experience a city? On September 30, 2026, The Block Museum of Art welcomed art historian Greg Foster-Rice for the exhibition keynote for…...

How do images shape the way we experience a city? On September 30, 2026, The Block Museum of Art welcomed art historian Greg Foster-Rice for the exhibition keynote for Picturing the Modern Metropolis: Prints and Photographs from The Block’s Collection. Drawing on works in the exhibition, Foster-Ri...

10/08/2026

First Looks: Student Associates on Works from The Block’s Collection

Each fall, The Block Museum Student Associates begin their year with an invitation to spend time in the galleries and follow their curiosity....

Each fall, The Block Museum Student Associates begin their year with an invitation to spend time in the galleries and follow their curiosity. Their first assignment asks them to choose objects that catch their attention and write about what they notice, what interests them, and what questions emerge...

10/07/2026

This Friday 10/9 at 7pm, Block Cinema The Block Museum presents 𝓔𝓛𝓔𝓥𝓔𝓝 𝓟.𝓜. (1928 🕚), a strange silent fable of the Detroit streets, projected in 35mm 🎞️ with live score 📻 by ᴅᴀᴍᴏɴ ʟᴏᴄᴋꜱ Damon Locks . Presented in partnership with International Anthem International Anthem

A film unlike any other, ELEVEN P.M. is a dreamlike melodrama starring an all African-American cast and set in Detroit, Michigan. Directed, produced by, and starring the mysterious Afro-Cuban filmmaker Richard D. Maurice, ELEVEN P.M.’s experimentation with narrative and visual techniques are utterly unique for their time, and remain startling today.

Veteran improviser, sound collagist, and visual artist ᴅᴀᴍᴏɴ ʟᴏᴄᴋꜱ will be providing a live score for this film, translating the film’s beguiling textures, musical themes, and twisting narrative into a sonic environment conjured from old 78rpm records and effects. 🎻

The screening will feature an introduction by Northwestern Screen Cultures doctoral candidate Tayler Scriber Tayler Scriber, shedding light on the film and its mysterious maker, Richard D. Maurice.

Free and open to the public. RSVP at bit.ly/11PM-BC25 or at the link in our bio.

10/07/2026

Meet Vicky Wang, 2026–2027 Curatorial Intern

Meet Vicky Wang, a Northwestern University student majoring in Art History with a minor in Art Theory and Practice and pursuing the Segal Design Certificate in the McCormick School of Engineering....

Meet Vicky Wang, a Northwestern University student majoring in Art History with a minor in Art Theory and Practice and pursuing the Segal Design Certificate in the McCormick School of Engineering. Originally from Taipei, Taiwan, Vicky is interested in the intersection of Japanese and Western art, as...

10/06/2026

Meet Angelina Randazzo, 2026–2027 Curatorial Intern

Meet Angelina Randazzo, a Northwestern University senior studying Radio/Television/Film and earning a certificate in Integrated Marketing Communications....

Meet Angelina Randazzo, a Northwestern University senior studying Radio/Television/Film and earning a certificate in Integrated Marketing Communications. A filmmaker from Metro Detroit, Angelina is interested in how moving-image work, photography, and documentation intersect with contemporary art. A...

10/05/2026

Collection Council Selects Work by Adebunmi Gbadebo for 2025–2026 Acquisition

The Block Museum of Art at Northwestern University announces the acquisition of Many Mornings Later (2025–26) by American artist…...

The Block Museum of Art at Northwestern University announces the acquisition of Many Mornings Later (2025–26) by American artist Adebunmi Gbadebo, whose work is currently featured in the 2026 Venice Biennale. The large-scale handmade paper work was selected by The Block’s 2025–26 Collection Co...

10/02/2026

Block Cinema Awarded Science on Screen Grant for 2026–2027

$6,700 grant will support films and conversations exploring Indigenous knowledge, science, and healing during Block Cinema’s 25th anniversary year…...

$6,700 grant will support films and conversations exploring Indigenous knowledge, science, and healing during Block Cinema’s 25th anniversary year Block Cinema at Northwestern University’s Block Museum of Art has been awarded a $6,700 Science on Screen grant for the 2026–27 season. The grant, ...

10/01/2026

“Repossessed: Reviving Supernatural Cinema from Beyond the Grave” is a series of three films about possession and resurrection whose eerie afterlives invite us to think about film preservation as a kind of séance.

From the lost shot-on-video horror of Florida Panhandle triple-threat Kip Hanks, to the surreal Detroit-set reverie of Black film pioneer Richard D. Maurice’s ELEVEN P.M. (1928), to Louisville maverick William Girdler’s drive-in doppelgänger to one of the biggest hits of the 1970s, these films were made by defiantly independent filmmakers working far outside the studio system. Each of these remarkable films, surviving in only one or two known copies, might have died with their creators; instead, the strange forces of fate and the passions of obsessed (or possessed) collectors have conspired to keep them alive. For each of these extremely rare screenings, a Block Cinema team member will provide an extended introduction to the mysterious circumstances behind the film’s death and resurrection, inviting audiences to approach the projection as a communion with the dead.

bit.ly/BlockCinema
trailer by Ben Creech

10/01/2026

TONIGHT - 7PM - FREE
“Make room Brian DePalma and John Carpenter, you’re the greatest but I’m coming up. Kip Hanks, Pensacola FL.”
Thus reads a classified ad in a 1986 issue of Fangoria, the same year the 22-year-old Hanks debuted THE DUST, a 25-minute, 16mm horror comedy made with a grant from the American Film Institute. With memorable creature effects and locations, THE DUST was a promising entry in the decade’s avalanche of independent regional horror films; with his shot-on-video follow-up, COLD HANDS (1991), writer-director Hanks matured, building on THE DUST’s death-and-resurrection themes to craft something ambitious, personal, and chilling.

Hanks passed away in 2008 with his most significant work unseen and unseeable. Fast forward to 2025, when Block Cinema ordered a pair of purportedly blank U-matic tapes on eBay for testing purposes. What arrived was nothing less than the master copy of COLD HANDS – a discovery that coincided uncannily with our discovery of a print of THE DUST in the collection of nearby venue Chicago Filmmakers. Designated by fate, circumstance, or some unknown force to resurrect Hanks’ work, Block Cinema is proud to present the first ever public screening of a new digital preservation of COLD HANDS, reunited with its sibling THE DUST in 16mm.

With an introduction by Block Cinema curator Michael Metzger Mike Metzger and a post-film discussion with independent filmmaker and Northwestern professor Spencer Parsons .