This captivating documentary explores the contemporary graffiti culture of Dakar, where painters, rappers and taggers have created a language of dissent and uncensored self-expression that gave prescient warning of the insurgency to come.

A film by Abdoul Aziz Cissé, Wagane Guéye

Documentary, 2012, Senegal, 65 min, Wolof/French

Programmer's Note (TIFF 2012, Toronto)
Dakar is renowned for its prolific art scene and rich visual culture. This year, Senegal witnessed an unprecedented peaceful uprising that was sparked by an emerging generation of artists and journalists rallying in its capital. Senegalese filmmaker Abdoul Aziz Cissé and Wagane Guèye The Walls of Dakar chronicles the city's recent - and already redacted - history, celebrating the everyday heroes who reinstated democracy in their country.

This captivating film unfolds as an investigation into the paintings that envelop the city's walls. Over generations, local artists have transformed the walls into sites for free expression, illustrating everyday hardships, articulating their communities' aspirations for a life of dignity. Functioning like pictographic scrolls, these murals narrate the untold history of Dakar's sprawling and chaotic ad hoc urban development. None of the authors of these murals have ever received official acknowledgement from the city's intelligentsia.

In the final years of former President Abdoulaye Wade's rule, his grip on the media tightened. As the repression of dissent was stepped up, anonymous artist-activists transformed the walls of Dakar into a site for uncensored defiance of autocracy, injustice and corruption, and were soon joined by rappers and graffiti artists, swelling to become a popular insurrection that changed the course of Senegal's history.

The Walls of Dakar is preceded by filmmaker, musician and artist Wasis Diop's Joe Ouakam, an artisanal documentary profiling the titular Senegalese artist, philosopher and performer, an emblematic, infamously rebellious figure in Dakar since the 1960s. Diop followed his friend Ouakam over the course of a day on the Dakar's busy streets, capturing his singular rhythm, and recording his emotions, words of wisdom and knowing silences.

Rasha Salti (TIFF 2012, Toronto)
http://tiff.net/filmsandschedules/tiff/2012/wallsofdakar

Directors: Abdoul Aziz Cissé, Wagane Guéye
Country: Senegal
Original Working Title: Dakar, parles-moi de murs
Year: 2012
Language: Wolof, French
Runtime: 65 minutes
Rating: PG

Exec. Producer: Marie Dione
Producer: Abdoul Aziz Cissé
Production Co.: Diwaan, IAC
Principal Cast: Mouhamadou Moustapha Mbaye

Screenplay: Abdoul Aziz Cissé, Wagane Guéye
Cinematographer: Arfang Sarr Crao
Editor: Abdoul Aziz Cissé
Sound: Moustapha Sait que...

Tags: Afrocentric | Essay Film | Civil Rights | Politics | Documentary