Refract: An Open Access Visual Studies Journal

Collective memory as an essential component to the survival of African people, enslaved and brutalized, dispersed and disoriented, finds an expression in VOLTA VOLTA. This expression begins quietly, gently, as we see images of Black bodies engaged in ritual spaces, such as young women dressed in white for a church ceremony, and ritual exchanges, like a man shaving himself in a small handheld mirror. These moments of the first half of the film are treated with a delicacy and patience to match their reverence, allowing for the viewer to sit through any restlessness that surfaces as the camera observes with a steady gaze, and to arrive at a place of knowing.