09 Feb 2025 5 min read Blog

Black History Month: Oscar Micheaux

Learn about the first major Black filmmaker and the most successful Black filmmaker of the first half of the 20th century.

Today's Black History Month illustration is of Oscar Micheaux (1884-1951), the first major Black filmmaker and the most successful Black filmmaker of the first half of the 20th century.

An illustration of the filmmaker Oscar Micheaux by Alleanna Harris — Oscar Micheaux by Alleanna Harris

He wrote, produced and directed 44 films between 1919 and 1948. His films featured contemporary Black life, complex characters, and he sought to counter the negative on-screen portrayal of Black people on screen.

A black and white photo of the filmmaker Oscar Micheaux, circa 1913 — Oscar Micheaux, c. 1913

In 1913, he released his first novel, The Conquest The Story of a Negro Pioneer, loosely based on his own life as a homesteader. It attracted attention from a film production company in LA, which wanted to adapt the book into a film. The deal fell through, and he decided to produce and shoot the film himself in Chicago.

A black and white photo of filmmaker Oscar Micheaux with his film camera, courtesy of the NYPL — Image Courtesy of the General Research and Reference Division, the New York Public Library.

Micheaux set up his own film and book publishing company, then released the film, “The Homesteader” in 1919. The silent film featured a Black man who entered a rocky marriage with a Black woman, played by actress Evelyn Preer, despite being in love with a white woman. It garnered praise from critics, and one of them called it a “historic breakthrough, a creditable, dignified achievement.”

Below is Micheaux’s second film, “Within Our Gates” (1920), the earliest known surviving feature film directed by an African American. (Shout out to the Library of Congress!) Within Our Gates was created in response to The Birth of a Nation and showed the reality of Dixie racism in 1920.

Micheaux wanted to offer audience a Black version of Hollywood movies, but because he operated under financial and technical restraints, his films were poorly lit and edited. He used non-professional actors and scenes were shot in one take, often filled with flubs.

A black and white photo of the filmmaker Oscar Micheaux directing a film with his crew behind him — Courtesy of Kino Lorber

Even though Black critics and audiences rejected his later films as racially ambivalent due to bourgeois ideologies, his films brought diverse images of Black life and social issues to the screen for the first time. His prolific career was truly groundbreaking, especially for the time he lived in.

A photo of filmmaker Oscar Micheaux in old age — Courtesy of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Photographs and Prints Division, New York Public Library

The Oscar Micheaux illustration is available as an art print here.

I’ll be back on Monday with another illustration and story!

-Alleanna

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