Saturday, July 04, 2009
Friday, July 03, 2009
ghana animation
An animation made with found objects from Ghana -
Information about the animators is limited, although it would seem that the animators were NOT ghanian. More information will follow once I verify.
Notwithstanding the found objects present interesting features such as the use of an image which is also to be found in Congolese in popular painting, as well as Northern Nigeria.
The image of the man climbing the tree with a snake, lion and crocodile surrounding him at the bottom. The very same painting that Congolese filmmaker JM Kibushi refers to in his animated film "Muana Mboka".
See video at 1:05 - 1:14 mins for the referred painting.
Information about the animators is limited, although it would seem that the animators were NOT ghanian. More information will follow once I verify.
Notwithstanding the found objects present interesting features such as the use of an image which is also to be found in Congolese in popular painting, as well as Northern Nigeria.
The image of the man climbing the tree with a snake, lion and crocodile surrounding him at the bottom. The very same painting that Congolese filmmaker JM Kibushi refers to in his animated film "Muana Mboka".
See video at 1:05 - 1:14 mins for the referred painting.
African Animation Festival - ANIMAFRIK
ANIMAFRIK is African Animation Festival that will be running in October in Ghana. There is a current call out for submissions to the festival, one can send
DVD submissions to:
Address: Courier: Animafrik Festival, No.5. Anowa Link, Tesano, Accra, Ghana
or mail P.O.Box KN 150, Kaneshie, Accra, Ghana
The festival will close submission on July 31 2009.
For more information on the festival read the Africancolours post
or alternatively
AWN's article on the festival.
DVD submissions to:
Address: Courier: Animafrik Festival, No.5. Anowa Link, Tesano, Accra, Ghana
or mail P.O.Box KN 150, Kaneshie, Accra, Ghana
The festival will close submission on July 31 2009.
For more information on the festival read the Africancolours post
or alternatively
AWN's article on the festival.
Thursday, July 02, 2009
On Kuwaiti Comic Strip "THE 99"
An enlightening article by the BBC World News on the creation of Islamic Superheros in the Kuwaiti comic strip called "THE 99"
Monday, June 29, 2009
African Animation Scholarship Programme
News update from my contacts:
SAE presents the African Animation Scholarship Programme
Calling all aspiring African animators! From pixels to puppets, cutouts to claymation, the world of animation is becoming an increasingly popular area of study.
For those looking to join SAE to expand their animated horizons, SAE is proud to announce the availability of 15 coveted part-scholarships.
SAE Cape Town will be offering 10 scholarships for Sub-Saharan African students and 5 South African students, allowing prospective students the opportunity to pursue their dream career in animation.
To secure your head-start in this exciting field, simply log www.saescholarships.com
SAE presents the African Animation Scholarship Programme
Calling all aspiring African animators! From pixels to puppets, cutouts to claymation, the world of animation is becoming an increasingly popular area of study.
For those looking to join SAE to expand their animated horizons, SAE is proud to announce the availability of 15 coveted part-scholarships.
SAE Cape Town will be offering 10 scholarships for Sub-Saharan African students and 5 South African students, allowing prospective students the opportunity to pursue their dream career in animation.
To secure your head-start in this exciting field, simply log www.saescholarships.com
Thursday, June 25, 2009
a great link on contemporary african culture : African Digital Art
The African Digital Art website is a real find for anyone interested in contemporary african digital art culture. I highly recommend this link for some great finds related to not only African animation but digital art at large.
see:
African Digital Art
see:
African Digital Art
some new animated finds....
here are some links/ videos that have been sent to me from various African animators... enjoy!
Kenneth Coker - Originally from Lagos, Nigeria, he studied at Memphis college of art and completed the film below as his graduate showreel.
Micheal Rix - Based in Johannesburg, South Africa. The film was originally produced as a music video for South African rock band The Parlotones, but was rejected.
Kenneth Coker - Originally from Lagos, Nigeria, he studied at Memphis college of art and completed the film below as his graduate showreel.
Iwa from Kenneth Coker on Vimeo.
Oni Ise Owo from Kenneth Coker on Vimeo.
Micheal Rix - Based in Johannesburg, South Africa. The film was originally produced as a music video for South African rock band The Parlotones, but was rejected.
Saturday, June 20, 2009
Binyavanga, "How to write about Africa"
Just by accident I stumbled across Binyavanga's article "How to write about Africa" published in the Africa in the Picture 2008 program (Amsterdam).It can also be found on-line on the GRANTA magazine. Binyavanga's sense of humour is acutely perceptive, for anyone in the field of African studies or writing about Africa... to give you a taster here is Binyavanga's opening paragraph...
Highly recommended!
Always use the word 'Africa' or 'Darkness' or 'Safari' in your title. Subtitles may include the words 'Zanzibar', 'Masai', 'Zulu', 'Zambezi', 'Congo', 'Nile', 'Big', 'Sky', 'Shadow', 'Drum', 'Sun' or 'Bygone'. Also useful are words such as 'Guerrillas', 'Timeless', 'Primordial' and 'Tribal'....
Highly recommended!
Friday, June 19, 2009
SCOLMA Annual Conference: Africa and the Moving Image: the Role of Libraries and Archives
The recent conference held at Newnham College, Cambridge, was a veritable attempt to begin to address the difficulties facing the future of African film, or rather specifically more so film made by African's for an African audience and its urgent need of suitable archives.
The lineup of guest speakers included:
Dr Guido Convents: Current Issues in African Moving Image and its Preservation
Mr Keith Shiri: African Film and Documentary: The Contemporary Scene
Prf. Vivian Bickford Smith : Film as Evidence, Film as istory and Film in History
Dr Emma Hunter: African History on Screen and in the Classroom: Moving Images in the teaching of African History
Dr Emma Sandon: Colonial Film: Moving Images of the British Empire. A 3-year AHRC funded project
Susanne Hammacher: Looking back - Looking Forward: Tasks ad Challenges of an Archival Ethnographic Film Collection and the Digital Future.
------------------
The opening paper by Guido Convents presented an overview of some of the problems facing the archival of African film within the local context, with a focus on the DRC. This was supplemented by a screening of documentary made by a young Congolese filmmaker about the current state of an archival unit in Kinshasa.
The presentation and documentary highlighted Convents; key arguement, that whilst there are archives of colonial film (for a European audience and also propagandist or educational film for local African audiences), there is hardly any interest in archiving film that was produced after colonialism.
He develops this further by later proposing that the archive within an African context could also include key films that have influenced early African filmakers, such as European Neorealistic films screened in the 50's, the Western film, etc.
+(Hugo+Friedhofer)+-+CD+Front+Cover.jpg)
Convents asks whether these films should be considered when thinking of the purpose of the archive within a local context, alongside the local post-colonial productions? That is to say, an understanding of the images that early African filmakers were exposed to, in some way provides an understanding of their own approach to filmmaking, and in turn their cultural influences that pervade all aspects of life. When talking of the diverse cultural influences, Convents gives as an example Papa Wemba's musical influences from the rumba, and his early exposure to the music of Luis Mariano.
Convents provided an exhaustive list of key organisations that have been involved in the archival of African film, FIAF, FIAT, URTNA, UNESCO to mention a few. However the successes of these organisations in prioritising archiving, would seem is dependant on finance and access to technologies that allow for the digital storage of these films, as well as sourcing the films themselves.
Convents' examples from the DRC point at two key problems with the current state of play in archiving African film: firstly the need of local archives for the local, and secondly the lack of interest by Western archives in post-colonial film, both as historical evidence and as a cultural narrative.
------------------
Keith Shiri, director of London's African film festival, "Africa at the Pictures", proceeded Convents with a brief personal account of his experience of African film, and a sample screening of the variety of work emerging on the continent ranging from Nollywood to higher production value "Relentless" see below:
You can read more about this film by Andy Amadi Okoroafor at this blog:
Dodge and Burn
or go directly to the films official website:
clamfilms
Keith Shiri's presented his current project; the setting up of a UK based distribution company for African film which will be officially launching towards the end of the year. He believes that this will act as a platform to ensure that African filmmakers interests are best served and to promote African film in the UK.
Although the title of the scheduled talk was "African Film and Documentary : The Contemporary Scene", Mr Shiri's talked veered away from the topic, and focused more on the workings of the distribution company. It did not deliver the expected overview or flavour of contemporary African film or documentary, and was dissapointing to a degree.
The setting up of an official distribution company was met with support as it is clear that African filmmakers face an increasingly difficult task in disseminating their films to larger audiences. However there was little further discussion on what the greater implications of distribution:
such as creating audiences,
where they intend to screen the films,
what selection criteria they use for programming,
what are the problems African filmmakers face,
what are the current emergent technologies and how they are impacting on distribution, such as DVD or DV?
Although Mr Shiri evidently carries a knowledge of the contemporary landscape of African film, he was not clear in identifying some of these key issues.
------------------
Prof. Vivien Birkette-Smith's paper on film as historical evidence, and film as history raised some interesting salient observations about the uses of the moving image by the historian. Here he identifies three key ways that historians engage with film; film as evidence, film in history, film as history.
The questions that were raised here presented the difficulties that historians face when turning to the moving image as history, such as the possibility of error, oversimplification, a lack of context. He also provides the counter position in defense of film stating that it can draw attention to 'uncomfortable truths' and reveal a sense of history.
Birkette-Smith provides ample sources of literature in this field, and developed his arguement thoroughly, presenting a strong case for the possibility of seeing the uses of different types of film as history in history.
The lineup of guest speakers included:
Dr Guido Convents: Current Issues in African Moving Image and its Preservation
Mr Keith Shiri: African Film and Documentary: The Contemporary Scene
Prf. Vivian Bickford Smith : Film as Evidence, Film as istory and Film in History
Dr Emma Hunter: African History on Screen and in the Classroom: Moving Images in the teaching of African History
Dr Emma Sandon: Colonial Film: Moving Images of the British Empire. A 3-year AHRC funded project
Susanne Hammacher: Looking back - Looking Forward: Tasks ad Challenges of an Archival Ethnographic Film Collection and the Digital Future.
------------------
The opening paper by Guido Convents presented an overview of some of the problems facing the archival of African film within the local context, with a focus on the DRC. This was supplemented by a screening of documentary made by a young Congolese filmmaker about the current state of an archival unit in Kinshasa.
The presentation and documentary highlighted Convents; key arguement, that whilst there are archives of colonial film (for a European audience and also propagandist or educational film for local African audiences), there is hardly any interest in archiving film that was produced after colonialism.
He develops this further by later proposing that the archive within an African context could also include key films that have influenced early African filmakers, such as European Neorealistic films screened in the 50's, the Western film, etc.
+(Hugo+Friedhofer)+-+CD+Front+Cover.jpg)
Convents asks whether these films should be considered when thinking of the purpose of the archive within a local context, alongside the local post-colonial productions? That is to say, an understanding of the images that early African filmakers were exposed to, in some way provides an understanding of their own approach to filmmaking, and in turn their cultural influences that pervade all aspects of life. When talking of the diverse cultural influences, Convents gives as an example Papa Wemba's musical influences from the rumba, and his early exposure to the music of Luis Mariano.
Convents provided an exhaustive list of key organisations that have been involved in the archival of African film, FIAF, FIAT, URTNA, UNESCO to mention a few. However the successes of these organisations in prioritising archiving, would seem is dependant on finance and access to technologies that allow for the digital storage of these films, as well as sourcing the films themselves.
Convents' examples from the DRC point at two key problems with the current state of play in archiving African film: firstly the need of local archives for the local, and secondly the lack of interest by Western archives in post-colonial film, both as historical evidence and as a cultural narrative.
------------------
Keith Shiri, director of London's African film festival, "Africa at the Pictures", proceeded Convents with a brief personal account of his experience of African film, and a sample screening of the variety of work emerging on the continent ranging from Nollywood to higher production value "Relentless" see below:
RELENTLESS from Fortproject on Vimeo.
You can read more about this film by Andy Amadi Okoroafor at this blog:
Dodge and Burn
or go directly to the films official website:
clamfilms
Keith Shiri's presented his current project; the setting up of a UK based distribution company for African film which will be officially launching towards the end of the year. He believes that this will act as a platform to ensure that African filmmakers interests are best served and to promote African film in the UK.
Although the title of the scheduled talk was "African Film and Documentary : The Contemporary Scene", Mr Shiri's talked veered away from the topic, and focused more on the workings of the distribution company. It did not deliver the expected overview or flavour of contemporary African film or documentary, and was dissapointing to a degree.
The setting up of an official distribution company was met with support as it is clear that African filmmakers face an increasingly difficult task in disseminating their films to larger audiences. However there was little further discussion on what the greater implications of distribution:
such as creating audiences,
where they intend to screen the films,
what selection criteria they use for programming,
what are the problems African filmmakers face,
what are the current emergent technologies and how they are impacting on distribution, such as DVD or DV?
Although Mr Shiri evidently carries a knowledge of the contemporary landscape of African film, he was not clear in identifying some of these key issues.
------------------
Prof. Vivien Birkette-Smith's paper on film as historical evidence, and film as history raised some interesting salient observations about the uses of the moving image by the historian. Here he identifies three key ways that historians engage with film; film as evidence, film in history, film as history.
The questions that were raised here presented the difficulties that historians face when turning to the moving image as history, such as the possibility of error, oversimplification, a lack of context. He also provides the counter position in defense of film stating that it can draw attention to 'uncomfortable truths' and reveal a sense of history.
Birkette-Smith provides ample sources of literature in this field, and developed his arguement thoroughly, presenting a strong case for the possibility of seeing the uses of different types of film as history in history.
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