Zinder

So close? Too far? That is exactly where the Kara-Kara neighbourhood is, home to gangs, outcasts, prostitutes and trafficking on the hill of Zinder, second Nigerien city, where Aïcha Macky grew up. Of the gangs and their palaces the director, like many, knows but the noisy rumour and the fear they inspire. But they too are Zinder and Niger, no doubt its cursed part, linked to violence and poverty, a youth whose bodies go into life as into battle each day, in order to get by. It is between these dividing lines and as many outbursts (often at night) that Aïcha Macky seeks to create the picture of a world she can feel becoming part of herself, between contradictory feelings and on a human scale, her attention worthy of a balancing-act. JB

Participation in the 2018 Nantes Produire au Sud Workshop