Sinners cinematographer Autumn Durald Arkapaw became the first Black woman, and first woman of any race, to win the Oscar for best cinematography.
Arkapaw, who is of Filipino and African American Creole descent, won best cinematography at the 2026 Oscars. She triumphed over fellow nominees Dan Laustsen (Frankenstein), Darius Khondji (Marty Supreme), Michael Bauman (One Battle After Another) and Adolpho Veloso (Train Dreams).
During her speech, Arkapaw thanked Rachel Morrison, one of a number of female cinematographers who’d been nominated for Oscars but failed to win. Morrison was nominated in 2018 for Mudbound. The other two women nominated were Ari Wegner for The Power of the Dog in 2021 and Mandy Walker in 2022 for Elvis.
She began by thanking Sinners director Coogler, recalling, “Whenever I say thank you to Ryan, he replies and says, ‘no, thank you, thank you for believing in me and thank you for trusting me,’ and that’s the kind of guy that I get to make films with.”
And she led a powerful moment from the stage as she invited every woman in the Dolby Theatre to stand up.
“I’m so honored to be here and I really want all the women in the room to stand up because I feel like I don’t get here without you guys,” she said. “I have felt so much love from all the women on this whole campaign and gotten to meet so many people, and I just feel like moments like this happen because of you guys, and I want to thank you for that.”
Arkapaw’s award is just one of multiple Oscars won by Sinners on Sunday night. Though the Ryan Coogler-directed film got off to a slow start despite its 16 nominations, its gone on to win best actor for star Michael B. Jordan, original screenplay and score. Many awards experts predicted One Battle After Another would win the cinematography prize, and alternatively that Sinners would win best casting, but the opposite happened, with One Battle nabbing the Oscars’ first casting award.
Backstage, Arkapaw continued to acknowledge making history with her win “after 98 years,” saying in the press room “you have so much to say” and “so much in your head.”
She added, “The one thing I was going to say that I have written down was that a lot of little girls that look like me will sleep really well tonight, and I know that. Just that, just being on stage getting this award for a movie like that will change so many girls’ lives, because they’ll be inspired when they weren’t before.”
And she praised Coogler for supporting women on his sets.
“Ryan gives us — the women on this film and our heads of department — he gives us those opportunities to shine and be ourselves and work in a creative environment where we’re leading, we’re strong, we have power, trust us, and that’s a very important thing, and it doesn’t happen very often,” she said. “So he’s opened those doors. I’m very good friends with Rachel Morrison, and she recommended me when she was unavailable. So I knew that if this was going to happen, it was going to happen with someone like him.”
As for calling out other women at the ceremony, she said, “I think I just wanted [say] to all the women in the room, because moments like this don’t happen without women kind of standing up for you and advocating for you. And you know, I know that this happened because of that, so I want to say thank you … I’ve learned over the past few months going through this process that it does take a village to make stuff like this happen. But this isn’t about me anymore. This is about so much more, and I know that, and I wanted it for all the ladies in the room, and I wanted it for all the girls at home.”
English (US) ·