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Filmmaker Abderrahmane Sissako to visit MIT

Cambridge, MA... French-based Mali-raised filmmaker Abderrahmane Sissako, whose shorts, documentaries and feature-length fiction film explore the exile experience and the relationship between African and Western societies, will be an Abramowitz Artist-in-Residence from April 20-May 1 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He will present a free public talk at MIT titled "L'EXIL une richesse pour l'Humanité" (Exile: The Wealth of Humanity") on Monday, April 27 at 7 p.m. in Room 6-120 (enter from 77 Massachusetts Ave.). The talk, which is in French with translation, is co-sponsored by the Dalai Lama Center for Ethics and Transformative Values.

On Monday, April 20, Sissako will also speak at the Harvard Film Archive's screening of "Bamako," at 7 p.m. at the Carpenter Center at 24 Quincy Street in Cambridge. Tickets are $10.

Sissako was born in 1961 in Kiffa, Mauritania and raised in Mali, his father's homeland. Before moving to Paris, where he now resides, Sissako studied at the VGIK Film Institute in Moscow, where "Le Jeu," a film he made as a graduation assignment, won the prize for best short at the Giornate del Cinema Africano of Perugia in 1991.

In 1998 he made his first feature film, ‘La vie sur Terre’, which was shown in Cannes as part of the series ‘Quinzaine des réalisateurs’. Half documentary and half fiction, this film depicts village life in Mali -- far removed from events of the world -- and reflects on the complicated relationship between Europe and Africa.

Sissako’s latest feature, "Bamako," depicts a trial, held in the Malian capital of Bamako, where the defendant is Western capitalism itself, facing charges that it has forcibly kept a decolonized Africa impoverished and oppressed. Alternating between the monologues that make up the testimony and a series of episodes from the daily life that continues around the trial – and sometimes interrupts (or even undermines) the proceedings – Sissako continues to explore the intertwining of public and private, global and local, modern and traditional so central to his earlier films.

In an interview with Kwame Anthony Applah for African Film NY, Sissako asserted, "Art is not the truth. I do not think creation has a mission to tell the truth. I am very aware that we live in an unjust world not engaged in finding the truth. I am aware that one can be totally destitute, and yet it is in that state of destitution that one finds human dignity, fundamental values."

The Abramowitz Memorial Lecture, presented by the Office of the Arts, was established at MIT through the generosity and imagination of William L. Abramowitz '35 as a memorial to his father. It has been sustained since his death by the devoted interest of his wife and children. Since 1961, the Series has brought renowned performing artists and writers to MIT to perform, present public lectures, and collaborate with students in free programs.

For more information, call 617/253-2787 (ARTS).