Hamedine Kane, Habiter le Monde and Jungle Alpha at Africa in Motion

LUX Scotland is delighted to present Habiter le Monde and Jungle Alpha by Mauritanian artist-director, Hamedine Kane, as part of Africa in Motion.

Habiter le Monde or, Inhabiting the World, navigates the paths crossed and inscribed by refugees, designed and serendipitous alike: harbours, enclaves, deltas, and borders, spaces transformed into places of desolation and detention. The work draws on ancient and modern mythologies of walking – from pilgrimages and diasporas to flâneurisms and derives – as part of its effect. As the artist’s trail presses itself into the grass, into the dust and along the borders of territories and gardens, the film reveals a state in which the mind, body and the world are aligned, as though they were three characters finally in conversation together. Habiter le Monde reveals an immediate method for unfolding stories, of hope, love, play and despair, in order to reclaim the hostile territories and transform them back into fertile ground for life and creativity. Each walk containing its own measure, complete at every point along the way.

In Jungle Alpha, Kane reunites with a long lost childhood friend after hearing him by chance on a French radio station, speaking on a programme to mark Interntational Refugee Day. Both having emigrated from the same small village on the Senegalese-Mauritanian border, the film brings into focus the experience of living in the Calais Jungle as Alpha reveals to his friend the life he has built for himself in this new and sometimes difficult place.

The screening includes an introduction in French by Hamedine Kane followed by an English translation. Both films include English Subtitles.

Programme

Introduction by Hamedine Kane, 16 mins. French with English translation

Hamedine Kane, Habiter le Monde, 2016. Video, 15 mins

Hamedine Kane, Jungle Alpha, 2016. Video, 18 mins

Hamedine Kane (born in 1983 in Ksar, Mauritania) is a Senegalese and Mauritanian artist-director. He lives and works in Brussels and Dakar. For the past two years, his work has focused on the subjects of exile and wandering. His artistic practice evolves in relation to the context in which his work is situated, leading him to take a more acute look at public spaces and to consider them as places where interaction and encounter take place.