MIA Magazine American Black Film Festival June 2016 | Page 7

MONDAY, JUNE 13, 2016

AN INDEPENDENT SUPPLEMENT BY MIA MEDIA & COMMUNICATIONS GROUP TO THE SUN SENTINEL

BB7

Omari Hardwick is ABFF’s 2016 Grand Juror President

By Danielle Stedman

Omari Hardwick, the eloquent and
accomplished actor, poet and activist, hails from
Decatur, Georgia. He is a current leading African
American male actor staring in TV and film.
Hardwick has the honor of serving as the
2016 Grand Juror President at the American
Black Film Festival (ABFF) on June 15-19th in
Miami Beach, FL. Being no stranger to the “Dog
Days” as he calls them, Hardwick has lived the
plight of the emerging artist who is working on
their creative abilities and struggling to build a
name for themselves in the entertainment
industry.
He delights in the idea that ABFF provides a
necessary space “for those artist that are the
color brown, who just haven’t had that many
areas for processing what you're needing to do
with your craft, how you need to get the craft to
the eyes of the execs that you want to get it to
and how to just get better at your craft.”
However, Hardwick does still keep an
evenhanded frame of mind by challenging the
construct of race as it pertains to the abilities of
African American talent. He comments, “I
challenge us to remain challenged to not just
think of ourselves as black film-makers only.
There is no Denzel, Sidney Poitier or Cicely
Tyson if we think from that perspective. I am
proud to be an African American in the position
to remind fellow African American artists and
have them belie