American Clay: An American Identity

Some stories don't just get told; they live inside you. American Clay is one of those stories. When I first heard about it, it felt less like a short film and more like a familiar whisper, the kind of truth you hear sitting on your grandmother's porch with the smell of your favorite family dinner brewing in the background, stories rising like ghosts that refuse to be forgotten and are always near.

American Clay follows a grandmother from North Carolina who was forced to flee after a brutal family tragedy. She rebuilds her life in Los Angeles, only to return home years later to reclaim what was lost: her family's fortune, and her own sense of identity. Her journey unfolds between angels and demons, light and shadow, reminding us that home isn't always a place you go back to; sometimes, it's a self you have to find again.

Courtesy of American Clay

Michelle Taylor, one of the storytellers behind American Clay, spoke about her grandmother with that kind of reverence we reserve for the women who held us together, our ancestors who long ago prayed for us today. Born in 1912 and descended from slaves, she was a firecracker, strong-spirited, complicated, and unforgettable. Michelle lived with her from the time she was a baby until the age of thirteen, listening as her grandmother's stories were shared with new listeners; a detail here, a memory there, always circling back to their family's truth. In Black families, storytelling is a living art form. We bend it, remix it, breathe through it, and in doing so, we keep our ancestors alive.

Carmen Perkins (she and Michelle are cousins, both granddaughters of Grandmother) shared that their uncle, an FBI agent with a historian's heart, spent years recording the elders before they passed, collecting their voices and stories like sacred relics. Those recordings are now digitized and preserved in the Library of Congress, proof that our memories matter, that our lineage is documented, and is divine. Its fidelity is not just to the story, but to the family. To loyalty. To legacy.

Courtesy of American Clay

American Clay doesn't run from the complexity of identity; it embraces it. It speaks of being Black, Native American, Southern, spiritual, all at once and unapologetically. Even the villains in this story have their place, because every family's truth comes with a shadow. And yet, through it all, there's this heartbeat of love and survival, a reminder that our families are not just part of America's story, they are America's story.

For me, American Clay feels like a reclamation of voice, of memory, of self. It's a story about the beauty of what we inherit and the courage it takes to share our truth. The clay of our past may be messy, but it's ours, it's molded by hands that worked, prayed, and dared to dream anyway.

American Clay made its debut in Edgartown during the Martha's Vineyard African American Film Festival (MVAAFF).

AMERICAN CLAY

A film by Christopher Jackson - Produced by Vi City - Presented by Saddlebrook Media In Association with Hundreds Entertainment - Starring Kaitlyn Jackson, Ella Taylor, Oliver Fredin, and Isaiah

The short film had its premiere at the Martha's Vineyard African American Film Festival in August 2025. - Other private screenings have taken place in New York and Los Angeles, including one at the Soho House West Hollywood in September 2025.

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