Maysles Documentary Center

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Maysles Documentary Center

Maysles Documentary Center (MDC) is a Harlem-based nonprofit organization committed to community, ed
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MDC was founded by legendary filmmaker Albert Maysles (1926–2015) in 2005. He and wife Gillian Walker chose Harlem to contribute to this community's rich cultural history and aid in the facilitation of what is taken for granted below 96th street: consistent access to documentary films and conversation with filmmakers, the act of filmmaking, and engaging with films to make a difference. A 2013 reci

pient of the National Medal of Arts, among many other honors, Albert, along with brother David, was an early creator of direct cinema and among the first to capture life as it unfolded before their camera, without scripts, sets, or narration. MDC's mission began with a summer education program for youth, whose parents were incarcerated, to encourage creative self-expression, holistic youth development and community building. Today, our low or no-cost education programs range from film literacy classes for children, filmmaking for high school students, intro and advanced filmmaking and editing for adults, and a cinema management job training program for Harlem residents. Maysles Cinema, at the MDC, is the only independent film house north of Lincoln Center devoted exclusively to documentary programming.

04/02/2026

Wednesday, April 8th at 7PM

DEATH BY NUMBERS
Kim A. Snyder, 2024, 33 min.

DEATH BY NUMBERS turns an intimate lens on school shooting survivor Sam Fuentes’s journey to reclaim her power, processing trauma through journaling. To prepare for a confrontation with her assailant in his harrowing sentencing trial, she examines complex questions of collective hatred and community justice.

+ Post-screening discussion with film director Kim A. Snyder and writer Sam Fuentes!

Ticket link in bio!

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03/31/2026

Saturday, April 4th at 7PM
A STATE OF PASSION
Carol Mansour & Muna Khalidi, 2024, 90 min.

After 43 horrific days working round the clock under constant bombardment in the emergency rooms of Gaza’s Al Shifa and Al Ahli hospitals, British-Palestinian reconstructive surgeon, Dr. Ghassan Abu Sittah, emerged to find himself as a face of Palestinian resistance.

With news footage of him pale and shell-shocked reverberating around the world, he spoke of a catalogue of horrors from lacerated bodies, to amputations without anesthetics, orphaned children with no surviving family, and the deliberate targeting of medics and hospital facilities.

This was Ghassan’s sixth and most horrific Gaza “war”. Why does he do it? Where does he find the strength to face it again and again? How does it impact his family? How do they process the risks he takes? The answer lies simply in their shared passion: Palestine, a passion they articulate through their support of his perilous humanitarian work.

Filmmakers Carol Mansour and Muna Khalidi, close friends of the Abu Sittahs, share that same passion. They were waiting anxiously for Ghassan to emerge from Gaza, following a long and terrifying journey through the night, to meet him in Amman. Determined to capture his raw emotions they began filming him the moment he arrived through the door. Following him to Beirut, Amman, London, Kuwait and Dubai, they and he explore their common State of Passion.

+ Post-screening discussion with Dr. Muhammad Ali Khalidi, board member of the Institute of Palestine Studies; and CUNY philosophy professor and Doctors Against Genocide doctor, Dr. Salman Khan

Ticket link in bio!

03/28/2026

SET IT OFF: Today is the first day of our community archiving workshop and film series coproduced by the Exclusive gallery tour by , hip hop quilts and a film screening of “IT WAS ALL A DREAM” alongside “A PICTURE STORY” until 6 PM. Feel free to drop by!

03/23/2026

Jessie Maple’s Will closes out Cinema Week at Maysles—a landmark work from one of the first Black women to direct an independent feature in the U.S. Raw, urgent, and deeply human, Will captures Harlem with a clarity and compassion that still resonates today.

Join us as we celebrate the power of independent Black cinema.

🎟️ A limited number of free tickets are available, sponsored by and at the box office.

🎤 Following the screening: a virtual post-screening talkback with Jessie Maple’s memoirist, E. Daniel Butler, and her daughter, Audrey Maple Snipes.

03/20/2026

Tonight we screen the legendary documentary Gimme Shelter (1970) by Albert Maysles, David Maysles and Charlotte Zwerin—-following The Rolling Stones on their 1969 tour and capturing the historic Altamont Free Concert.

See it the way it was meant to be seen: in a theater.

🎟 Tickets moving fast.

Part of Cinema Week NYC, limited number of free tickets available in person at the Maysles Box Office.

03/17/2026

Happy St Patrick’s Day! Celebrating the legacies of Irish freedom struggles as part of a movement against global colonialism. On Saturday March 21, we screen St Clair Bourne’s “The Black and The Green” which documents African American civil rights activists visiting Northern Ireland during “The Troubles”

Part of “World of Black Documentaries” LINK IN THE BIO
(Restored print courtesy of )

Photo #1: Activist/writer Jean Carey Bond

Photo #2: Matt Jones

Photo #3: Jim Dunn (left) and Jean Carey Bond (right)

03/15/2026

In this powerful early documentary, St. Clair Bourne captures a young Black man navigating the crossroads of faith, politics, and identity during the Black Power era. At a moment when the church, the campus, and the movement all offered different paths toward social transformation, Bourne asks what it means to choose a calling.

As notes: “If ‘theologian’ was replaced with ‘documentarian,’ perhaps we can access the frame of mind with which St. Clair Bourne approached his work in the 1970s.” Like the film’s protagonist—caught between being a student, a militant, and a parishioner—Bourne was documenting questions he himself was living through.

Presented on 16mm film, honoring the material form and political urgency of Bourne’s early work.

🎥 Screening at Maysles Documentary Center LINK IN BIO (Print courtesy of )

Followed by post screening conversation with musician and Pastor

FREE TICKETS AVAILABLE at the box office as part of

03/08/2026

On this International Working Women’s Day we remember the life and legacy of Jessie Maple (1937-2023) one of the first African American women to direct a feature length film. Maple was also the first ever African American woman member of the Camera Operators Union, an experience she recalls in her book “How to Become A Union Camerawoman” Along with her husband Leroy Patton, Jessie Maple founded the influential 20 West Theater in Harlem, a Black cinema and spiritual forerunner of the Maysles Documentary Center.

We will celebrate Jessie Maple on March 24 with a screening of “Will” Check out our bio and links for information forthcoming.

02/24/2026

🎬 Double Feature at Maysles Documentary Center | Feb 24, 2026

Curated by

Join us for two incisive shorts exploring hip-hop, urban fashion, and capitalism:

✨ HOODWEAR DIARIES (2025) – Aishamanne Williams examines streetwear, urban style, and who profits from culture born in the streets of NYC.
✨ STOLEN MOMENTS (2001) – Shaka King & Kristan Sprague’s visual mixtape dissects hip-hop’s uneasy embrace of commerce on the eve of The Blueprint by Jay-Z.

💬 Stick around for a post-screening panel with Timmhotep Aku, Shaka King & Kristan Sprague as they dive into culture, critique, and capitalism.

Address

343 Malcolm X Boulevard
New York, NY
10027

Telephone

+16468531296

Website

http://www.maysles.org/

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