Netflix, Ruth E. Carter
and Lil’ Flip: It’s August
on Martha’s Vineyard
By Sandra E. Garcia Photographs by Gabriela Herman Reporting from Oak Bluffs, Mass. Aug. 17, 2026
Sitting onstage at the Martha’s Vineyard African American Film Festival thereseemed to be one thing Ruth E. Carter, the Oscar-winning costume designer of“Black Panther,” really wanted the audience to know.
“This is Wakanda for a month,” Carter said, referring to the fictional African utopiaand home of the Marvel superhero.
“The festival has become a place that screens documentaries about Black luminaries; these have included the artists Jean-Michel Basquiat and Romare Bearden, and the scholar Chester Pierce, who coined the term microaggression.”