Wild Style

Featuring a post-screening discussion with director Charlie Ahearn and artist Rob Stull, moderated by Prof. Pacey Foster, founder of the Massachusetts Hip-Hop Archive at UMASS Boston.

Before the feature, we'll screen a hip hop short film from director Charlie Ahearn. 

Wild Style follows Raymond Zoro (real life graffiti artist Lee Quinones), whose work attracts the attention of an East Village art fancier (Patti Astor), who commissions him to paint the stage for a giant Rapper's Convention. 

A documentation of the earliest days of hip hop in the boroughs of New York, everything in Wild Style is authentic—the story, style, characters, and most of the actors are drawn from the community. It features a pantheon of old-school pioneers, including Grandmaster Flash, Busy Bee, The Cold Crush Brothers, and more. 

Wild Style chronicles the influential South Bronx youth culture of the day— before it became globally known—and shows many important hip hop personalities in their milieu before they went on to reap national acclaim. Chief among these is Fab 5 Freddy, who hosted Yo! MTV Raps from its inception. As vibrant and relevant as ever, Wild Style presents the first celluloid vision of hip-hop as a unified culture, linking graffiti, break dancing, DJing, freestyle MCing and the emergence of the hip hop nation, culminating in one of the greatest hip hop parties in history.

About Charlie Ahearn

Charlie Ahearn is an American film director and creative cultural artist living in New York City. Although predominantly involved in film and video production, he is also known for his work as a visual artist, author, and radio host. 

About Pacey Foster 

Pacey Foster is Associate Professor of Management at UMASS Boston. He received his Ph.D. from the Wallace E. Carroll School of Management at Boston College and his research focuses on social networks and economic and regional dynamics in the creative economy. In 2016, Professor Foster launched the Massachusetts Hip-Hop Archive in collaboration with the UMass Boston’s Healey Library and Special Collections and the Boston Public Library. His research has been published by scholarly outlets including the Oxford Handbook of Creative Industries, Regional Studies, Work and Occupations and Poetics, and has been featured in local and international press.

About Rob Stull

Rob Stull is an accomplished artist, storyteller, curator and teacher from Boston, Massachusetts. He has worked professionally for 30-plus years in the comic book, advertising and entertainment industries. His projects include: Spider-Man Adventures, Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man, Marvel vs Capcom, Iron Man, Uncanny X-Men, X-Force, Wolverine, Nightwing, 52, Firestorm and more. He has been published by Marvel, DC, Image Comics, Top Cow Productions, Chaos Comics, Crusade, Dark Horse Comics, Aspen, Lion Forge and others. He created and curated Sequential Art: The Next Step, a first of its kind 10-year traveling exhibition spotlighting the work of African American comic book artists and their contributions to the industry and popular culture. His work has been exhibited throughout the United States and Internationally. He is featured in the books The History of American Graffiti (2011) and Black Comix: African American Independent Comics, Art and Culture (2010). Outside of comics, Stull has produced art and illustration work for the music and entertainment industries. His long list of clients and collaborators include, Camp Lo, Clear Channel, Cornerstone Promotions, Dinco D from Leaders Of The New School, Guru from Gang Starr, Les Nubians, Red Pill Productions, The Fader Magazine, The Matrix Films, Time Warner, Tommy Boy Records, Tribeca, Virgin Records America Inc. and Warner Brothers. Stull was the first African-American artist-in-residence at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston (2019-2021), where his work was featured in the ground-breaking exhibition “Writing The Future: Basquiat and the Hip-Hop Generation.” He co-developed “The Mural Project,” a multi-part project highlighting the intergenerational connections and importance of youth participation in cultivating Hip-Hop culture.