BLKNWS: TERMS & CONDITIONS - THE ENCYCLOPEDIA

BLKNWS isn't interested in reporting the news as we know it. Conceived by Los Angeles artist and filmmaker Kahlil Joseph, the project began as an installation inside Black barbershops before evolving into the feature-length film BLKNWS: Terms & Conditions.

Rather than following the conventions of a traditional broadcast, Joseph constructs a living archive that moves fluidly between fiction, documentary, historical footage and cultural memory. The result feels less like watching the news and more like being immersed in the rhythms, conversations and complexities of Black life across the diaspora.

Structured more like a music album than a film, BLKNWS brings together poets, journalists and novelists instead of a conventional writers' room. Together they build a narrative that challenges mainstream media while expanding what storytelling can look like. It's not concerned with delivering headlines—it's about creating an experience that asks audiences to feel, question and engage with Black culture on its own terms.

The first single from Kahlil Joseph’s debut feature film, BLKNWS: Terms & Conditions (2025).

Khalil Joseph's first feature film BLKNWS starts by announcing itself as taking the form of an encyclopedia. As seen in this introduction, it's a specific encyclopedia, Africana: The Encyclopedia of the African and African-American Experience, a collection of knowledge about the African diaspora originally conceived of by W.E.B. DuBois. The prologue of BLKNWS is structured as flipping through this encyclopedia, with video clips of all different aspect ratios and visual quality strobing past the audience at an electrifying pace and beat.