Zineb Sedira Pays Homage to 1960s Algerian Cinema Post-Liberation

Witnessing the worldwide struggle two summers ago during the outbreak of COVID-19 and the solidarity taking over the streets for the Black Lives Matter movement sparked a familiarity for French Algerian artist Zineb Sedira. “I thought this is the closest we have gotten since the 1960s when everyone everywhere was protesting against the Vietnam War,” she said over the phone, a few days before unveiling her presentation for the French pavilion at the 59th Venice Biennale—the most ambitious project of her 25-year career.

The London-based artist, who was raised in the Parisian suburbs, creates site-specific, mixed-media installations in reference to a lived or imagined place. She commonly utilizes critical elements of migration, such as language, photographs, and domestic objects, to capture generational shifts and trauma.

The shared camaraderie of 2020 felt “uncanny,” Sedira described, “because I have long been researching the collective international, political consciousness which has felt like a lost spirit.” Fittingly, Sedira’s pavilion exhibition, “Dreams have no title,” is an homage to the sociopolitical landscape of the 1960s through the lens of post-liberation Algerian cinema. Timing, in fact, could not be more appropriate for the artist, who is the first Algerian woman to represent the French pavilion.

Sedira’s immersive cinematic installation transports visitors to the ’60s through architectural cues—a wooden bar with large mirrors, a ruby-colored velvet couch, mid-century decorative objects, shelves lined with books and vinyl, and posters of classic Algerian films. Family portraits and artworks decorate the walls of another room where a rack of clothing and a vanity mirror occupy the corner. In addition to flea-market finds, Sedira’s own belongings constitute a large portion of the installation as “someone who lives in the ’60s,” according to the artist. The project’s main connection to Sedira, however, is her titular film playing in the small theater in the back of the pavilion, which visitors are directed to with an era-appropriate lightbox sign.

The 23-minute film, which Sedira shot inside the French pavilion, features the curators and film crew, the artist, and her son, friends, and colleagues—such as Sonia Boyce, the first Black woman to represent the U.K. in the Venice Biennale and the winner of this year’s Golden Lion for her presentation in the pavilion next door. Sedira compares her fashion of collaborative, non-hierarchical filmmaking to “the militant cinema of the ’60s when the whole cast and crew took on different roles.”

Besides its production technique, “Dreams have no title” echoes in its content a group of films co-produced by Algeria, France, and Italy following the former’s liberation from French rule in 1962. In making what Sedira calls “a film about films,” she has adopted the experimental narrative technique of mise en abyme by showing the filmmaking process within the work itself. A collage of sequences involve firsthand conversations about London’s Afro-Caribbean neighborhood Brixton and reenactments of scenes from referenced films, including Ettore Scola’s Le Bal from 1983; Costa Gavras’s 1969 political drama Z; and the 1966 spaghetti western The Pistol directed by Enzo Peri.

One particular work that changed Sedira’s artistic direction was the 1964 documentary Les Mains libres, the first film produced by post-independence Algeria. Sedira came across the Ennio Lorenzini–directed film during her research into the archives at Centre Algérien de la Cinématographie. After premiering at the Cannes Film Festival and having a short run in theaters, the film remained largely in obscurity for decades.

“There are powerful images of the transition into a new life after independence, such as Algerians entering the houses abandoned by the French,” Sedira said. “The film’s mixing of archival materials, photographic imagery, fiction, and documentary was a discovery of a new path for a militant activist aesthetic.” A few restored scenes from the documentary are included in Sedira’s work as a reminder of cinema’s role in history-writing. “Some might call this type of filmmaking propaganda but I am not keen on using the term, because these films show that cinema can be a tool to fight against a war,” she explained, adding that movies were a way for largely illiterate populations to connect and learn. “In villages without movie theaters, people would cover a wall with a white sheet and project these films.”

Although “Dreams have no title” is informed by films that were fully or partially financed by the Algerian state as part of nation-building efforts, Sedira transforms them into poetic renditions of memory. Footage of powdery interiors filled with smoke blends with actual production scenes that break the fourth wall. Enveloped by a voiceover by the artist, the work traverses narrative cinema, documentary, music video, and even photography. Sedira’s inclusion of her own voice aligns with her decision to cast people from her surroundings. “Most of the films at the time were voiced over by men, but my female voice in a French accent, as well as my friends acting in their mother tongues in Arabic or Spanish, question the idea of representation,” she said. “I am a product of many identities as an Arab woman born in France and living in the U.K.”