Nottingham Contemporary

About the directors and speakers:

Sarah Maldoror was born in France, a Guadeloupean of African descent, she is respectfully regarded as the matriarch of African cinema (she was the first woman of color to make a feature film). For her, filmmaking was a weapon for struggle and liberation from the very beginning of her experiences in cinema. Her 1968 debut film Monagambée, which examines torture techniques used by the French in the Algerian war, was selected for the Quinzaine des réalisateurs/Directors’ Fortnight at Cannes in 1971. The following year she made her emblematic œuvre, Sambizanga, which relates a woman’s experience during the Angola liberation struggle. The film shared the prestigious Tanit d’Or prize at the Carthage Film Festival that same year.

Mathieu Kleyebe Abonnenc was born in 1977 in Paris (French Guyana) Lives in Metz, France. Through a multi-faceted approach that encompasses his activities as an artist, researcher, curator and film programmer, Mathieu Kleyebe Abonnenc attempts to explore areas that have been neglected by colonial and post-colonial history. The absence, obsession and representation of violence are just some of the topics explored in the work of this artist who proceeds by extraction and excavation, and works towards re-inscribing, in our collective history, individuals and cultural materials that have been silenced.

Annouchka de Andrade is the director of the International Film Festival of Amiens and has worked for 20 years in the field of visual and cinematographic arts. She made her debut at the ARP (Authors-Directors-Producers) then became production assistant and programmed the Mac Mahon cinema. Her skills and curiosity of the “other” led her to the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, working in Colombia (Andean countries) as an audiovisual attaché, and then to Seville to head the French Institute.

Elvira Dyangani Ose was very recently appointed Director of The Showroom. Dyangani Ose was Senior Curator at Creative Time, a New York-based non-profit public arts organisation. Currently Lecturer in Visual Cultures at Goldsmiths, Dyangani Ose is a member of the Thought Council at the Fondazione Prada and is an independent curator. She was Curator of the eighth edition of the Göteborg International Biennial for Contemporary art (GIBCA 2015) and Curator, International Art at Tate Modern (2011 – 2014). She also recently joined Tate Modern’s Advisory Council.