A photographic and filmic dexterity finding its nucleus in real life experience. Candid portraits that remain in cognitive thought. A stylistic virtue that comes across as haphazard play.
Tyler Mitchell is a filmmaker and photographer from Atlanta currently based in Brooklyn, New York. A recent film graduate from NYU, his venture into photography was prompted by a skater friend’s introduction to a Canon 7D.
With his work coming full circle his lens has been graced by the presence of Jaden Smith and Kevin Abstract. Collaborating with Abstract has quickly set him apart as a filmmaker to watch. Filming the rapper with pink hair in a brooding gaze, Tyler used an underground club as the backdrop for ‘Hell/Heroina‘ released in 2014 and made a satirical music video titled ‘Dirt‘ for Brockhampton that was led by Abstract.
A career-defining moment in the young creative’s life was the release of his photography book, El Paquete (his first self-published book). In Havana, Cuba, Tyler aimed to remove himself from that which is familiar to him. The end product of the 30 rolls of film used and developed is an arresting body of work taking the shape of a publication. Within its pages is reflected the raw energy and youth of an area on the verge of digital advancement. El Paquete gained traction from publications such as Dazed and i-D and quickly skyrocketed the young talent’s photographic work, cementing him as a prominent creative within the photographic landscape. Since then, Tyler has exhibited at the 2018 Aperture Summer Open in New York.
Tyler’s work reflects rawness and honesty. His practice cannot be boxed into a specific set of aesthetic values as he plays with both shadow and shadow-less representations, saturated and desaturated stylings. What remains true in his work is its candid, easy-going nature that wraps around your mind as you see individuals depicted in intimate gazes and pensive thought. The young creative’s craft is advanced and his career is soaring at a considerably young age and seeing where his work takes him next will be a blast I’m sure.
Michel-Rolph Trouillot in his book Silencing the Past: The Power and the Production of History interrogates ideas about the history and pastness, demonstrating how positions of power silence certain voices from History. He points to how oppressive, destructive and inhuman interpretations of people of colour led to colonial powers not being able to imagine histories or a History that could be animated, directed and authored by people of colour.
The work of Kitso Lynn Lelliott also unpacks the philosophical and ontological constructions of race that emerged during European Imperialism, which resulted in multilayered tools and attitudes for ‘Othering’. One of the most important tool was that of hegemonic colonial languages; language as the foundation of these constructions, as well as what allows for these constructions to continue to have life. In this sense, Lelliott, similar to what Trouillot states, looks at pastness as a position as much as a temporal concept (Trouillot 1995: 15).
Her solo presentation of a multimedia body of work, titled I was her and she was me and those we might become, was born out her PhD research related to the perpetuation of the idea of “racially marked beings” and how this led to the erasure of knowledges held in diverse languages. This becomes more apparent when one thinks of language as more than sounds for communication. Language carries a particular imaginary of the world, a way to interpret the world and a way to describe the world.
As a way to speak back to these dominant narratives, Lelliott uses the “language of the ghostly” to gesture towards the presence and absence of omitted knowledges and histories. This is incredibly powerful as it is a reminder of the conscious and active act of silencing, while simultaneously pointing out that the imaginaries, mythologies, memories and multitude of ancestral histories can never be silenced.
About her installation Lelliott stated that, “It is a gesture to reclaim an agency to articulate the narratives that make us, through dialogue that is always in flux, so they might produce a shape we see fit for ourselves.” In this statement we can directly see interest in voicing from spaces beyond epistemic power, as well as how epistemic articulation that pushes against hegemonic forms of knowledge identification and construction offers avenues to break down these hegemonic practices and knowledge hierarchies. This is particularly relevant in a time when we are thinking about decolonial practices and how they can be played out in real life.
“. . . But we may want to keep in mind that deeds and words are not as distinguishable as often we presume. History does not belong only to its narrators, professional or amateur. While some of us debate what history is or was, others take it into their own hands.” (Michel-Rolph Trouillot, Silencing the Past 1995: 153)
Salomon Lighthelm is a South African director currently residing in New York with his family. Lighthelm started his career in music and sound design after recording his own tracks during his youth spent in Johannesburg. His family moved to Dubai and subsequently Sydney, where Salomon was pulled in by the culture and music that he experienced. With ease he took up writing and scoring films that progressed into Kickstarter funded films such as Anomaly, inspiring many other young filmmakers to practice crowd funding. In my interview with the director we discuss his background, style and views on his own work.
Salomon’s approach to cinematic storytelling is characterized by the human stories that fall at its core. Never having studied film in an official capacity, Salomon describes his practice as one where he learns by doing.
Reflecting on Anomaly, the Kickstarter funded project that grew from two minutes to a 37-minute short film, Salomon had the following to say, “It all happened without much forethought quite honestly. My friend Dan Difelice and I wanted to explore the short film format and realized that our idea might be able to live beyond 2 minutes. Initially we only wanted to create a short art film, but then realized that maybe the idea had legs on it, and we could turn it into a 7 minutes film. That became 12 minutes, then 15 minutes, and eventually we had a 27 page script, which turned into a 37 minute short film.”Anomaly takes on the space race of the 1960s as its subject matter being inspired by traditional Christmas Nativity; the film explores events of two thousand years ago through a modern day lens. The story follows relationships intertwining around an unprecedented astronomical event, while a couple deals with life’s realities during a time of inexplicable significance.
Screenshot from ‘Anomaly’
Salomon still takes a shot at working with sound and music in his film pieces and expresses that he enjoys getting his hands dirty, especially in director’s cuts. Stating that he previously used to think more in terms of sound when considering his projects, Salomon’s focus has since shifted.
“Recently I find myself being drawn to interesting characters, more so than visual or sonic ideas. I think my process has evolved from cutting projects around a piece of music, to cutting them based on the beauty of the images, and now I’m trying to focus on developing projects around performance and characters. But the process will come full-circle, there’s no wrong or right way…every artist evolves differently, and has a different emphasis that might shift with time.”
Indicating that he has a particular fondness of colourful imagery containing high contrasts, Salomon strives to make his work feel cinematic and timeless. Showing a particular interest in fashion from a lighting and styling viewpoint, he expresses that that is where he plans to venture next with music videos.
In many of Salomon’s film pieces he makes use of silhouetting, partial lighting, flare and the use of coloured lighting.“I believe in the power of mystery and allowing the audience to do a bit of the thinking and digging workto find the answers for themselves. Using light to partially expose my characters,and subtracting light to create silhouettes are things I do to make the audience more ‘active’, to have them lean in. I do like using coloured light, where appropriate, though I do think in general coloured light is completely overused.I don’t swing colours in post so most of those effects are achieved by using lights that can shift tones via the touch of a dial, or alternatively throwing gels in front of the lights.”
Another signature of Salomon’s is his use of recurring imagery that he attributes to his belief that humans are transcendent creatures, all in a search for meaning, “The imagery that I like to use is hopefully both human and divine – its Michelangelo – the Sistine Chapel – Adam reaching for God.”
Salomon’s body of work contains juxtapositions of natural and city landscapes. When asked about its significance he had the following to say: “It comes back to my interest in contrast, tensionsand juxtapositions in general. I like violence and intimacy, light and dark, urban and landscape and everything in between. I like edits that push and pull – that have loud moments and insanely quiet ones. Life is like that, and maybe that’s why it’s significant to me.”
Screenshot from ‘Mr Martyr’
With the human story at the heart of his narratives, Salomon states that he is not drawn to stories that do not contain a basis of reality. Enjoying stories that are real and extreme, he wishes to create a scope of work spanning from violent, to irreverent and subversive to sensitive and vulnerable; “..more than that I want do it within the same film – Jacques Audiard is a master at that. I don’t want everything to be so trendy and cool, that it is void of any soul – I love work that has a heartbeat”.
Salomon has a talent for telling stories of people from various demographics removed from his own, this can be seen in works such as Mr Martyr and Rocket Wars. Rocket Wars’ narrative is that of a war to keep peace in the small village of Vrontados in Chios. The parishioners of two Greek Orthodox churches engage in a battle on Holy Saturday, firing over 100,000 homemade rockets at one another once the sun has gone down. Mr Martyr has a completely different narrative tone and follows the story of a young boxer who is surrounded by gang violence.
Explaining that his ability to tell these stories may be due to the fact that he has grown up in different places all his life, he calls no where home and everywhere home. “I’m an outsider everywhere I go, and I used to despise that fact, because I always thought it would limit my ability to tell stories. However I have learnt that the outsider’s perspective is not only valid but is also important. To be able to come into a situation and see it objectively and from a non-biased point of view is an asset.”
Salomon’s body of work demonstrates a unique ability to take on virtually any human narrative with ease. His style of cinematic narrative is one that has grown with him over many years of moving from place to place. His approach to story telling is unmatched.
The UK based director known for ‘A Young Summer’s Heart’ and the video for ‘Black Crow’ took over my Mac Book screen with his vivid imagery last night. Pizzichini’s work has a defining style and the ability to be real and surreal simultaneously. The unique diversity of Pizzichini’s skill compels his viewer to travel between feelings of discomfort and warm nostalgia. In my interview with Pizzichini we discussed his work further.
Born in Brazil, Pizzichini was raised between South America and Canada. Spending time in both Italy and Sweden, Pizzichini has settled in the UK and has been there for the past 9 years. “I think travelling around this much helped open my eyes to how similar people can be, and different perceptions of beauty.” Pizzichini tells me that filmmaking came to him almost by accident – “I was just put into the course and went with it.” Expressing that it was a blissful accident he aims to celebrate beauty and connect people in everything he does.
There is no evident pattern in the subject matter Pizzichini chooses to portray. The constants in his work are the stylized imagery that ranges on near perfection yet still maintaining their organic nature, as well as his focus on youth and youth culture from various demographics. Pizzichini, vigilant in his use of lighting strays away from imagery that appears lit. “Sometimes I have an idea in my head and then try to find the right subjects to bring it to life. Other times, the ideas come from the available elements.”
“I’m always trying to go beyond my subjects’ demographic or background and find out who they are as people. That’s the only way we can connect as people.” Pizzichini works from the UK but frequently travels for projects and states that Italy is a source of constant inspiration to him. Pizzichini is at the helm of writing and directing his film projects and his intention to bring people together in his work is clearly noticeable within this realm.
‘A Young Summer’s Heart’ was directed by Pizzichini in collaboration with The Mill and Smuggler. Released in 2015, the short film was shot in Calabria, Italy. In this film Pizzichini invites his viewers into a story that takes a closer look at a non-conformist Danish skateboarder discovering the streets of Italy on a summer holiday. At the heart of the film’s narrative is the summer fling between the skater and a local girl, and the language barrier between the two young lovers, as well as her father’s displeasure to her association with the young Danish skater. These elements contribute to a charming and wholesome storyline.
The video for Beyond the Wizards Sleeve’s song ‘Black Crow’ was directed by Pizzichini and released in 2016. This piece articulates a sense of immanent death for the off centre electro duo consisting of Erol Alkan, an electronic music rebel, and Richard Norris, a renowned record producer.
“Beneath the dramatic peaks of the track, there’s an underlying tension that’s always lingering. It doesn’t scream at you, but its there, like a sense of impending doom. I wanted the video to be in constant dialogue with that feeling by creating a world that could almost be normal, but is clearly not. Though shot in a matter-of-fact way, the imagery is constantly teetering between innocence and brutality.”
The music video for this track directed by Pizzichini evokes feelings of intense discomfort for its viewer as strange forms of brutality is shown in the form of two girls who are made out to be rivals. The brutality is shown in the form of these girls dragging around heavy bags with their bodies by means of a harness on a tennis court and injuring one another with tennis balls. The brutality of the video is juxtaposed by the youthful innocence of the girls portrayed. In stark contrast to the warm feelings that ‘A Young Summer’s Heart’ evokes as well as its real nature, the ‘Black Crow’ video invites its viewer into an eerie alternative reality that ranges on perfect discomfort.
I once came across a quote by Steven Fry that read, “a true thing, poorly expressed, is a lie.” These words seemed to tumble around in the back of my mind as I made my way through the survey of Michael MacGarry’s films. Beginning with an animation made as a student in 1999, the exhibition traces his output as a filmmaker, and as a first time viewer of a number of the works, it was refreshing to see a progressing clarity of vision and form as MacGarry masters his craft. Filmmaking is central to MacGarry’s artistic output, and a number of the sculptures, which he exhibits at solo shows, often begin their lives as props for the films, or like his photographic series, take the films and their themes as their reference point.
Held in the basement of the Wits Art Museum, with the walls painted black and the room left dark, ten films are spread throughout the space, either projected onto the walls or on flat screen TV’s, with headphones and bean bags, allowing for a more intimate viewing experience.
Still from Sea of Ash
A kaleidoscope of themes come together, both in the individual films as well as collectively, revealing some of the pressing issues of our day which have been the focus of MacGarry’s practice. Using the form of narrative cinema to combine notions of historic and current imperialism, modernity, migration, economic disparity and urbanization amongst others, MacGarry holds up a poignant mirror to some of the most prevalent issues across Africa today. Excuse me, while I disappear (2015), poetically depicts China’s overshadowing presence in Angola by weaving the narrative of a young municipal worker in and through the huge, largely unoccupied residential buildings constructed in Kilamba Kiaxi, a new city built by the Chinese outside Luanda. Moreover, in the midst of all this, there is a constant interrogation of the artist’s own position within these grand narratives. We see this self-reflexivity most predominately in films such as LHR – JNB (2002 -2010), Sea of Ash (2015) and culminating very personally in the most recently made, two-channel film installation titled Parang (2017), which focuses on the artist’s family history in the Far East.
Speaking to the artist, he said the title for the show came from a feature film he is currently working on and incorporates some of the recurring themes of representational violence seen in a variety of his work. The title, Show No Pain could also be somewhat revealing of the artist’s own practice; giving us as viewers a small insight into the demands and trials placed on an artist pursuing such a career, and the thick skin you have to grow to “make it in the art world.” For someone who’s CV boasts works shown at the Tate Modern and Gugenheim Bilbao amongst other prestigious international institutions, it is fitting that WAM would acknowledge a local artist in the middle of what promises to be a lifetime of progressive artistic production.
Over the years, Joburg has acquired a formidably dangerous cinematic image. Local crime films like Tsotsi, Jerusalema and iNumberNumber are built on scenes of hijacked buildings and explosive violence. International sci-fi such as Dredd, the atrocious Chappie and Resident Evil: The Final Chapter extend this visual mayhem to the future. But as film historian Alexandra Parker argues in her book Urban Film and Everyday Practice, the suburbs have generally lacked such a definitive sense of place. Its main role is as a placid façade, contrasted with the apparent disorder of the city around it.
But for director Sibs Shongwe-La Mer, the “daydream/purgatory of suburbia’’ is a source of profound inspiration. His feature production Necktie Youth, released when he was only 23, follows its cast through the sprawl of manicured gardens, anonymous car parks and ominously quiet streets which cascade out around the inner city. Atmospherically filmed in black and white, the story follows a social group of privileged youths snorting, fucking and generally losing their damn minds. While the film can often be raw, and its protagonists unsympathetic, this is an accurate representation of their state of terminally arrested adolescence. For Shongwe-La Mer, who also acts in the film, the project was a reaction to his own experience of growing up in the city- “I think Johannesburg is very much a part of my DNA and psychology, whether I like or not. It informs a lot of my observation and feelings and then quite naturally seeps into my cinematic sensibilities.”
His work is informed by a rich knowledge of cinema history, drawing inspiration from European masters like Pier Paolo Pasolini, and contemporary auteurs like Wong Kar-Wai. Wai’s lovelorn Hong Kong nights are an obvious touchstone. But above all, he regards French director Jean-Luc Godard as a primary influence. The imprint of Godard films like Breathless and Bande à Part is all over Necktie Youth, particularly with its portrayal of hyper-consumerist, nihilistic characters. The film elegantly reapplies techniques from the 1960s French New Wave into 21st century Johannesburg. Its most striking feature is the use of black and white, which it uses to capture the long shadows of life under the Highveld sun. The film excels at capturing the eerie stillness that you can often find in Johannesburg- an empty park, the deserted streets at night. As the director himself describes it, his work aims to capture “that sense of blissful alienation”.
His jaded characters are representatives of a cultural shift in South Africa, as the ‘born free’ generation enter their twenties. But such focus on what he astutely calls “the decadent world of the noveau rich” has a global pertinence. And he has been noticed abroad with a frankly dizzying array of international projects lined up. As he told us:
“There’s a lot happening at the same time right about now. We are blessed to be working on a US television debut with Charles King and the good folks at Macro in Hollywood.
The series shoots in eight different capitals across the world and features subculture influencers such as Grimes, Justice, Prayers and others. It’s a cross continental love affair So we are busy casting and packaging that. We have a feature film, The Sound of Animals Fighting that shoots in Brazil later this year starring Yung Lean and other talent that I’m really excited about. Our new feature company is also working with Mille Et Une in Paris on a really ambitions South African epic, Color Of The Skull, and some American writers on a Chicago gang story that we are looking at executive producing as an American series.”
Having already achieved a confident directorial voice at a young age, his next projects are poised to take a vision honed in the Northern suburbs to the world.
This quote from Charles Bukowski is Zandi Tisani‘s favourite quote, and quite fittingly came up in our conversation about her journey as a filmmaker. Discovering her love for film did not come from one particular moment, but rather from a series of related events. The desire to be a storyteller has always burned fiercely in her heart, and so she studied film and media at varsity. Screenwriting seemed like the perfect way to have this desire manifest itself, and this became Zandi’s first step into the world of film. After varsity she studied photography for two years. Armed with training in visual and literary fields, she got to work.
After moving to Joburg from Cape Town the only work she could get was as a stylist on sets. This was another step towards her filmmaker career. Through styling she was able to make a home for herself on sets – the space she now feels most comfortable. Her first attempt at directing came from the Zaki Ibrahim video Go With It in 2012. From that video she gained confidence in knowing that she has a vision, and an interest in exploring parts of herself through film.
Zandi works under the company Goodcop, and the focus on her own work began with the comedy drama Heroes in 2014. The birth of this short film came from a lingering memory of her family being the first black family to move into her street in the 80s when the Group Areas Act was being dismantled. Developing from that memory, Heroes is about a man who moves into his father’s house and the community discover that there will be a black family moving into their street. It is intended to be a commentary on white male masculinity and the kind of inherent violence in the idea of being a hero and saving the community from this ‘threat’. Right on the heel of Heroes Zandile did a documentary as part of a project called My Hood. Living in Yeoville at the time, Zandi did extensive research, which resulted in the experimental documentary Highlands that looks at the history of the area.
Zandi then spent two years writing for South African television, but during this time she was getting increasingly frustrated with writing for what she describes as “typical South African tv”. This inspired her to write the pilot for her own show titled People You May Know. “People You May Know is very much about my generation,” Zandi explains, “People who are kids who graduated around the time of the recession. Stepped out into a world that wasn’t able to accommodate them, you know. They went to varsity and did all the stuff that people tell you to do to secure a stable lifestyle, and we found ourselves coming into an unstable world.”. This web series is intended to show the real struggles and anxieties that come with being part of this generation. “I just feel like when I see my people on South African television, I feel like I don’t see people who are like me. I feel like people from my generation are [presented in a] very sterile manner, [with] aspirational ways of framing our lifestyles,” Zandi continues. People You May Know therefore aims to speak back to this by presenting an authentic view on young people in South Africa trying to sustain and grow themselves.
“The way I get into a story is to look at who it happened to, so it’s very much about people, and I suppose me trying to understand people, and me trying to understand myself through that process.”. For Zandi the most exciting part about working in film is the entire creative process. “You can’t do it alone,” Zandi explains, “You have to keep sharing it with people. And as you share it with people it becomes a new thing…whatever vision I have in mind and however excited I am, I know for a fact that it is not going to end up being exactly that thing…it [the final film] will be as much a surprise or a discovery to me as it will be for the audience.”.
Zandi explains that being part of the first wave of filmmakers to re-work stereotypical South African narratives has been challenging. “I think as South African’s we have a very particular way of speaking about ourselves and our narrative. I think we still see ourselves very much as these tropes and there is very little room for things to fall in between,” Zandi explains. For her our conservatism as a country overflows into our techniques and characters in storytelling. This filters into the kind of content that is produced for television. Zandi is interested in engaging with South African conservatism and offering content that challenges audiences. “You can’t quantify what a story can do or how people will respond. You kind of have to have the courage to put it out there anyway”.
Zandi is most excited about the independent work she will be doing as part of her collective People You May Know, which at the moment includes one other member, photographer Gonste More. “I want to give myself room to do something that is a little bit more raw and little bit more about exploring the art form of cinema, as opposed to seeing it as a vehicle for selling things or selling ideas,” Zandi explains. She is also excited about developing her feature film. Generally, Zandi is working towards building her own style of filmmaking and trying to understand herself better through that process.
To keep up with what Zandi is up to and to find out when Goodcop will be re-launching their website, check her out on Twitter.
Look 1: Zandi wears pink coat by H&M, choker top by Topshop, accessories are models own
Look 2: Zandi wears sheer dress by Topshop, accessories are models own
Sheetal Magan is part of a new generation of South African filmmakers, immersed in a young context that is already reinventing itself through its own complex honesty and the rejection of a stoic condescension towards emerging voices. These pioneers of the industry are subverting hierarchical and patriarchal monopolies on the imagination, as well as one-dimensional cultural confessionals, seizing their own permission to be genuinely aspirational in terms of thinking outside the limitations and refusing to let those lines-of-sight settle. As an up-and-coming filmmaker, Magan’s repertoire already speaks to an immense and unhindered curiosity, willing to boldly submerse itself in the subconscious grit of multifarious worlds, in refracted layers of consciousness and evocative atmospheres moving well-beyond the zones of complacent satisfaction.
In God Dank vir Klank(2011), Magan was already experimenting with genre through documentary-fiction, interrogating conversational currents around Zef culture and issues of appropriation, and incorporating visible failure as a strategy towards demystification. Magan is emerging as a tenacious risk-taker, immediately destabilising stereotypical confines through her lack of fear for navigating foreign landscapes. Despite a low-budget, in City of Ashes (2014), Magan took-on dystopian speculative-fiction, channelling current South African anxieties through the vision of ground-zero Johannesburg in the year 2024, disordering secular structure and invoking the phantasmagoric layers of history and experience that resonate within the city. The Fall of Ganesh (2015), which premiered at the Durban International Film Festival (DIFF), coalesced from a palpable personal encounter, that for Magan, really exploded illusions of ‘social-cohesion’ in South Africa and stuck in her body as an involuntary shake, well-after a mob riled against her family during a particular Diwali celebration. Can a sense of disorienting displacement seep through the grounding of rituals? Who defines our rites of passage and what relationships are we allowed to articulate?
The Fall of Ganesh is a tactile reflection of Magan’s ability to subtly weave together multiple threads that resonate with the intricacies of non-linear emotion and the mysteries of human experience. Her work is beginning to reflect a powerful, untold undercurrent and it’s being recognised through her inclusion in prestigious platforms such as DIFF’s Talents Durban Doc Station, Urucu Media’s Realness South African screenwriters’ residency, and the Cannes South African Film Factory, through which the short film Paraya (2016) was created. Paraya premiered at the Cannes Film Festival and is also set to screen at the Toronto International Film Festival and the upcoming Jozi Film Festival. Magan’s first feature film, The Day and Night of Brahma is currently in development and she is also currently working on an eight part mini- series entitled the Acts of Man.
When I spoke to Magan about her navigations within Indian culture, I couldn’t help but think of Marji in Persepolis donning her ‘punk is not ded’ jacket and it made me incredibly excited for the potential of South African cinema- I imagined, through the perspectives that Magan related, a South African Asghar Farhadi and Hindu metaphysical intuition bleeding through the aesthetic of Shane Carruth’s Upstream Color. Could there be a kind of South African Tarkovskian texture, infused with honey and ghee, merging with contemporary, digitally-diasporic dispersions? Magan is throwing punches at being boxed-in and the strength of her unique visual language, before even releasing her first feature film, stretches the imagination towards the realisation of such radically new possibilities.
Our interview would actually begin in the front seat of my car as we made our way through Johannesburg central. My appointment with Ms Tajdin had been made very late by an ANC convoy that had decided to cut in front of us. With no ways of getting through, and a very angry Metro police officer making sure we didn’t, we had no choice but to admire the spectacle making its way to Ellis park stadium to hear our esteemed president.
For Amirah this is the quintessential African experience. “It’s getting stuck in traffic from Benjamin Netanyahu’s visit as she landed in Kenya. It is seeing children running across the road, the sound of Papa Wemba blaring from the car speakers. That is what Africa is, it is Life”
Her first feature film entitled “Fluorescent Sin” like so much of her work functions to grasp such images of Africa. Yet for this film maker is it these very scenes of everyday life that offer her work its transcendence. Her commissioned short film for Sole DXB, entitled Baqal, features mesmerizing images of late night grocery and stores. Filmed in a dreamy decadence the images slowly pan of over the vender. As puffs of smoke wisp from their weary lips the viewer is made to feel like a nocturnal hunter on their evening’s inquisition.
For Amirah the spaces she roams are not clearly separated by geographic boundaries. She herself is no stranger to travel. A ‘global Bedouin’ she has lived in Kenya, Dubai, having received her art degree from Rhodes University. Her work has even shown at the Cannes and Sundance film festival and has attended residencies in Chile and Johannesburg. Her works celebrate how, where ever you travel you will always experience the same culture, the same store fronts. In all her travels it is in such street scenes that she sees the commonalities between the places she travels. “We think we are different but when you step out you can actually realise that we are all the same”. This self-identified Bedouin shows us the similarities of experiences and in doing so a shared humanity that is able to thrive.
Her own journey into filmmaker would start at 14 after watching the 1962 film “To kill a mocking bird”. She hated the movie for having betrayed the visuals of the book she so loved with the same name. Her decision to enter into film was one of wanting to take charge of the visual telling story. Her future works would centre on themes of womanhood, sister relationships and drag queens.
She is currently working on the script for her film, Hawa Hawaii, within it she deals with a complicated relationship with a mother and her flamboyant son.
“With HAWA HAWAII, I’ve brought the story closer to home and my heart, setting it in my home country of Kenya and more importantly, Mombasa – an island I have a complicated relationship with owing to its ancestral hold over my heritage and identity that continues to unravel itself to me. This coastal region has been the home of more than just my father and forefathers, it’s been the home of some of Africa’s most colourful characters, inspired artists and wandering souls. Hailing from this Swahili background myself, I felt compelled to pen a story set within it is sometimes restricting confines yet incredibly rich history.
As a Swahili woman myself who has never been able to live up to my expected role as a daughter, grand daughter and woman, but who nonetheless has a deep love for my culture and religion, I am bound by my birthright to share this story with the world. Not only because of the urgency with which it needs to be made but because it is MY love letter to my people and a community that is fast disappearing, silently.”
Her work is sincerely personal but it is in these intimate spaces that we are shown how not so different our intimate relationships can be. A must see work of hers is entitled “ Minerva’s Lilies”. Here she follows the corporeal fantasy world experienced by two sisters guided by the soft backdrop of a Dubai dessert covered roads. The soft Swahili Taarab music goads us to mediate on their moments with their mother. It’s a film that shows how even within the close and personal relationship between mother and daughters, a sense of individuality is also brewing. The girls experiencing their sensual pleasures of having their hair braided and taking bubble baths. The girls ride their bikes as their mother is left in the shot with her deep thoughts. It is a close relationship but it is one where all are growing to be their greater individual selves.
Amirah also recognizes the challenges of being able to tell her story as a film maker. She like many other woman in the industry have the great responsibility of telling our stories. Whether black, woman or African, these are our stories as those who feel the oppressive burdens of being within such categories. Yet when one watches her work we see that there is life beyond such oppression as we lose ourselves within those quiet intimate moments. She herself is no stranger to the trials of being a black woman in the industry and acknowledges that there is still much to be done. She sees her work as one of setting an example of what is possible for other young budding filmmakers. “My legacy is to dedicate myself to the cause”. Her success becomes the destiny set for others surpass.
You can follow Amirah on her website, onvimeo and on Instagram.
