Locals and visitors can immerse themselves in culture and cool air with the Key West Art & Historical Society’s “Art As History, History As Art” film series in the Helmerich Research & Learning Center at the Custom House Museum, 281 Front Street. Thursday, June 23 features “The Unseen” at 6:00 pm.

“The Unseen” is a charming, intimate, and often funny documentary of the resilience and creativity of blind students, showing them as both ordinary and extraordinary because of and in spite of their blindness. Brilliant Czech filmmaker Miroslav Janek points his camera at those who are often misunderstood or ignored, giving voice to the marginalized and challenging our assumptions of the status quo and what it means to be part of society.

With a running time of just under an hour, the Czech film with English subtitles documents students at a school for the blind, where they exuberantly show off their remarkable talents as musicians, as radio announcers, as daredevil bicyclists, and most unexpected of all, as photographers. Variety calls it “A small wonder’ that “takes hold of the heart immediately and never loosens its grip” and “brilliantly conceptualized and immaculately crafted piece of filmmaking.”

Made possible in part by the generosity of the Helmerich Trust, the “Art As History, History As Art” film series is curated by Society board member and cineaste Michael Shields, who offers “films that expand our vistas and give us fresh views of our home.” Tickets for the event can be purchased online at KWAHS.ORG/LEARN: $5 for members, $10 for non-members. For more information about this and other programs, please contact Adele Williams, Director of Education, at 305-295-6616, ext. 115. Your Museums. Your Community. It takes an Island.