Lewisham artist cktrl celebrates his debut album, spirit, with a short film of the same name – directed by BAFTA-winning filmmaker Akinola Davies Jr. and commissioned by WePresent, the arts platform of WeTransfer. The film debuts as part of WePresent Selects, the platform’s monthly showcase of outstanding creative work from around the world.
spirit is at once a tribute to an album and a visual reckoning with something larger: community, family, Black-British Caribbean culture, and the way we hear – and see – classical music anew. That the film exists at all is itself a product of the world it depicts. cktrl and Akinola Davies Jr. have known each other for years, their creative kinship forged long before any commission, and it is those longstanding friendships, as much as anything, that give spirit its particular depth. Shot with the intimacy of memory and the weight of lived experience, Davies Jr.’s film finds in cktrl’s music a world worth dwelling in.
The short film is soundtracked by multiple tracks from the spirit album and flips between documentary and fiction. Central is an authentic family gathering which is the springboard for abstract themed set-ups that subvert stereotypical perceptions of Black youth and a series of staged, candid, slices of life using South East London as the backdrop.
The project follows conversations between WePresent, cktrl, and Davies Jr. that began last year – a natural collaboration given the platform’s long-standing commitment to original creative work at the intersection of music and film. WePresent has previously partnered with Michel Gondry and IDLES on Model Village, Wes Anderson and Jarvis Cocker on Aline, and Moses Sumney on Blackalachia.
Bradley Miller – known artistically as cktrl (pronounced “control”) – released spirit via R&R (home to Mk.gee and Dijon). Born and raised in South London, of Jamaican and Montserratian heritage, cktrl is a self-taught producer and classically trained clarinetist whose music moves fluidly between classical, ambient, jazz, and R&B. His work is defined by soulful production, fluid horns, and delicate strings – and by the emotional and spiritual depth beneath them.
The album takes its guiding light from a bell hooks quote: “Healing is an act of communion.” For cktrl, that idea is not abstract – it is embedded in every note, every collaboration, every act of making something together. The music explores love, vulnerability and healing, crafting a sound that is both culturally rooted and emotionally expansive.
“Our spirit is our light,” he says. “And without it, it’s just dark.”
