The Cultural Foundation is excited to announce the launch of “A way of surviving, a way of life…”, a compelling exhibition by celebrated artist Zineb Sedira. Open from October 3, 2024, to March 8, 2025, the exhibition highlights Sedira’s innovative cinematic practice, showcasing her work from 2002 to 2022, with a focus on identity, memory, culture, and resistance.
Zineb Sedira, born in 1963 to Algerian parents, uses her art to delve into personal stories that resonate with broader global concerns regarding cultural liberation and the intricacies of diaspora. The exhibition features four powerful films: Dreams Have No Titles (2022), mise-en-scène (2019), Image Keepers (2010), and Mother Tongue (2002). Together, they offer a poignant narrative that examines the challenges of migration, memory, and the intergenerational passage of knowledge.
A highlight of the exhibition is the installation of Dreams Have No Titles, presented as a full-scale cinema box in the atrium of the Cultural Foundation.
This award-winning film premiered at the French Pavilion during the 59th Venice Biennale in 2022, intertwining Sedira’s personal journey with the history of anticolonial cinema in Algeria. It addresses themes of displacement, mobility, integration, and yearning, all viewed through an autobiographical lens that connects her experiences to avant-garde cinema and diasporic narratives.
The film mise-en-scène reinterprets archival footage from 1960s Algerian anti-colonial cinema, crafting a new narrative that underscores Algeria’s critical historical events and the collaborative ethos of activist filmmakers. The film’s textured quality, shaped by the passage of time, symbolizes the deterioration of memory and the obstacles of preserving archival material.
Image Keepers is a video installation that presents a dual biographical portrait of photographer Mohamed Kouaci through the perspective of his widow, Safia. This touching interview weaves together their personal and professional narratives.
In one of Sedira’s most lauded video installations, Mother Tongue employs a triple-screen format to showcase discussions among three generations of women: Sedira herself, her mother, and her daughter. The work examines how the transmission of memory evolves with language shifts across generations.
Sedira’s films, recognized on an international scale, intricately blend archival research, oral histories, and personal storytelling. By fusing individual and familial narratives with official accounts, she offers nuanced viewpoints that challenge and reinterpret existing stories, providing valuable insights into both personal experiences and political contexts.
This engaging exhibition is free to the public, inviting audiences to immerse themselves in Sedira’s impactful work at the Cultural Foundation’s ground floor.