Bodies of Work

From the Classroom to the TV: Live and In Color 2011 – 2025

Overview of my work from this stage in my creative journey.

Talk It Out with Dr.Ralph Basui Watkins

This is a sample of the work we did on our television show Talk it Out with Dr. Ralph Basui Watkins. The show aired on Atlantan Interfaith Broadcasting Network (AIB). This was my second series on AIB.

This is a sample of my first series on AIB, Religion Roundtable. This is one of my very early shows from that series.

This is the first made for television documentary I produced, directed, co-shot and co-edited for AIB Network.

This is part one of my two part Out Egypt I’ve Called My Son: A Son’s Journey Black to Africa, a documentary I produced, directed, wrote and edited for AIB Network.

This a documentary I produced, directed, wrote, shot and edited for AIB Network, Experiencing Israel and Palestine: Our Story, Our Journey, Our Experience

This video records the vision we lived into while I pastored Wheat Street Baptist Church. This was our vision video.

While the pastor of Wheat Street Baptist Church, I produced a television show for the AIB Network, The Love Out Loud Broadcast, this is sample of that show.

While serving as the pastor of Wheat Street Baptist Church we started and opened a museum this video shares the opening of the museum.

While I was pastoring Wheat Street Baptist Church, I regularly Vlogged, this is a sample of one my vlogs. This was a vlog I did on Martin L. King Day.

The Jazz I Saw – 2016

Artist Statement: The Jazz I Saw

This work is about the music I see, feel and experience. Live music is a multi-sensory experience and this work seeks to explore the visual component of this living experience. The colors, textures and layers are brought together in these images as light, line and shape give form to the music I see. This work focuses primarily on the artist performing the music and me as audience. Jazz has a spiritual component that is mystical and difficult to capture or explain. Dr. Jason C. Bivins implies in his work that to write about jazz is like trying to capture smoke. These images are the smoke I try to capture. It is my hope that you can feel, smell and taste the smoke of jazz.

MFA – Faith in Sweet Auburn: The Next Chapter 2016

Artist Statement: Faith in Sweet Auburn: The Next Chapter

When I moved to Atlanta in 2011 I became deeply connected with Auburn Avenue after reading Gary M. Pomerantz’s book Where Peachtree Meets Sweet Auburn: A Saga of Race and Family. My connection to this street is rooted in its’ rich African American history. Auburn Avenue was the heartbeat of the African American community from the mid 1900s through the 1960s. It was the street where the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was raised and it is also his final resting place. In the late 1960s Auburn Avenue began to fall into decay after the new interstate-connector split the community from downtown and as Atlanta began its process of desegregation.

There have been several failed attempts to revitalize Auburn Avenue over the years. The street is going through yet another revitalization project centered around the new Atlanta Streetcar that hopes to reconnect Auburn Avenue with downtown. This work is about my engagement with this process as I hold in tension what was, what is and what is to come. It is about the people, the places and times of transition and its relationship to memory and more specifically how I am remembering. The images are markers for me in a process of an emerging relationship with Auburn Avenue and the people who walk, work and live on this street.

This work began as a straight street photography project. As the work progressed and the complexity of the changes occurring along Auburn Avenue became more apparent there was a need to expand the project beyond street photography. To do justice to the complexity of what was going with the work and my desire to remember the project became a mixed media undertaking.

This work includes a blog, Flickr page and Vimeo channel. These are meant to complement the street photography and to serve as both an archive and a place for conversation. This approach also gives the project greater depth and breadth as it shines a light on the people who are living in the midst of this transition. The pictures, people, the voices, the sounds, the conversations and the stories have been recorded in effort to tell the story of change as I seek to this moment in time.

MFA Images:

MFA Short Stories:

MFA Thesis:

MFA Thesis Show:

From Augusta to Hollywood: My Fuller Years 2005 to 2011

Overview of my work from this stage in my creative journey.

This is my final Sunday at First AME Church Los Angeles, where I served during my time at Fuller Seminary. I have always served in the church and the academy.

I shot this promo for my book From Jay Z to Jesus, a book I wrote while serving First AME Church LA and teaching at Fuller Seminary.

I shot this video to accompany my book, Leading Your African American Church through Pastoral Transition.

This is a promo I shot for an event at Fuller Seminary as we were engaging the question about the future of the African American Church.

This is a sermon I preached at First AME Church, where I was serving as the Executive Pastor, this the week of the inauguration of President Obama.

This is an example of an ad we ran during worship for the Young Adult Ministry I led at First AME Church from 2005 to 2011. This work informed all my writing during those years on hip hop and young adult ministry.

From Pittsburgh to Augusta Georgia and Augusta State University: 1998 to 2005

This video give an overview of my body of work during the years 1998 to 2005.

From Pastor to Scholar and Back Again: The Early Years DMin & PhD Work 1980s to 1997

This video gives an overview of the early years of my scholarly / pastoral journey.