current projects

Gillette Venus - My Skin, My way Campaign (Role: Herself)

Scarborough film - (Role: Principal « Star »)

ParticipACTION - Public Service Announcement (Role: Lead)

Queen of Hearts - Short Film directed by: Lindsey Addawoo and Kyisha Williams (Role: Lead)

Full CV available upon request - email: kyisha.williams@me.com or visit Contact page

For direct bookings please contact Butler, Ruston & Bell

practice

Kyisha creates short narrative and documentary projects on socially relevant issues that touch all our lives. Kyisha takes what can be considered 'heavy' topics (such as incarceration, sexuality and assault) and makes them accessible and easier to discuss using deep character driven engaging stories. In other words, Kyisha takes ‘hard to look at’ issues and makes them beautiful. Kyisha enjoys film as it allows the opportunity to work collaboratively and to take part in healing our society by engaging audiences in vital dialogue about how we live or could live. Kyisha is currently studying Film Production at Toronto Film School.

Current Projects

Queen of Hearts 

Upcoming Projects

Mothering in Quarantine [Series]

Preference [feature film]

The Zoo [Short]

Queen of Hearts

synopsis

Queen of Hearts is an 11-minute short film about an all powerful, Black, supernatural Queen in a fictional Victorian Queendom. The film is a magical infusion of West African culture in a historically European setting. It offers a creative glimpse into the life of a complex Queen, whose world is shattered when she discovers that the love of her life is not who she thought he was. She soon discovers that there is a correlation between her overwhelming pain and her supernatural powers, making it difficult for her to differentiate between right and wrong decisions. With succubus-like abilities that arise in moments of distress, she fights to protect herself, and the ones she loves against those who want what she has: control.

hire us!

After our BravoFact win, we’ve been facilitating pitch workshops to help new creators get from thought to screen. email us to find out more.

Our film deals with consent and sexual violence, Bring us in to screen the film, do a Q&A and facilitated discussion on the issues raised in the film and what it can teach us in this reality.

the short

Co-written and Co-directed by lindsey addawoo and kyisha williams

A powerful young Queen struggles to navigate the supernatural abilities tied to her emotions, once tragedy strikes amongst those closest to her.

press

We are so grateful for all the love ‘Queen of Hearts’s Short Film has received. Thank you to all our supporters who loved us along from our crowdfunding campaign in 2016, to our BravoFact Pitch win in 2017, to our premiere in 2018 at Inside Out Film Festival and subsequent festival run! It’s been a blast!

Queen of Hearts is on an American Tour with the Black Femme Supremacy Film Festival!

Houston Chronicle

The Eyeopener

CBC Arts

Black Girl Nerds

recent screenings:

Regent Park Film Festival

Black Femme Supremacy Film Festival

VisuELLEs Film Festival

help us make the feature film

Queen of Hearts is on a roll and we aren’t done yet! We have story content to make a feature film or series but we need your help to develop the script and bring us all back into the Queen of Hearts world, lovingly referred to as the Black ‘Game of Thrones’.

Speaking Engagements

Speaking

Kyisha has been invited to Universities, Schools, Prisons, Governmental organizations, Non-profit organizations  and community groups to speak on a range of issues such as consent, women’s rights, health equity, criminalization, thriving as an emerging Black artist. Kyisha has also created original workshop material on many of the topics they speak about (see below).

Workshops

Kyisha facilitates workshops on a variety of topics including health equity, social justice, mindfulness, pitching film projects, self- love (self-marriage), consent, reproductive justice and much, much more  

Health Equity + Health Promotion Consulting

Kyisha’s health equity work includes (arts-based) education for marginalized groups primarily on sexual health, mental health and harm reduction. They also teach other public health professionals how to work effectively and meaningfully with marginalized populations including prisoners, sex workers, queer, Black and other Racialized communities.

In 2016,  they graduated from a Masters in Social and Behaviour Health Sciences (Health Promotion) from the Dalla Lana School of Public Health at University of Toronto and is now a Health Promoter specializing in health equity and marginalized population health.   

Kyisha is the recipient of awards from Canadian Federation of University Women, Dalla Lana School of Public Health (Health Equity), Canadian Association for HIV Research, and the City of Toronto (Access, Human Rights and Equity).   

HIDDEN Review by CANADIAN ART

Michelle Peek Photography, 2020.

Still[ness] Black is a durational performance art piece and video installation. Get in touch to find out how to bring it to your gallery.

Kyisha Williams is also an actor (ACTRA Apprentice) - see "Actor" page for more details

Kyisha (co-)curates art, film and stage shows featuring primarily Black Queer talent. Recent shows include Black Mystics (Art Gallery of Ontario) and Blockorama.

art gallery curation - ago's first fridays: black mystics

stage performance curation: blockorama affirming black talent and joy at pride

Support

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To support Kyisha’s practice financially via paypal please click one of the 'support' buttons below or send an e-transfer to kyisha.williams@me.com (if in Canada). For behind the scenes footage and more, become at patron at Kyisha’s Patreon Page.  

To donate your services or offer some other support please visit the "Contact" page

To purchase or screen kyisha’s video work visit vtape.org  

Thank you! Your support is invaluable.