Gaston Kaboré
Gaston Jean-Marie Kaboré (born April 23, 1951 in Bobo-Dioulasso , Upper Volta , today Burkina Faso ) is a filmmaker from the West African state of Burkina Faso.
Life
Kaboré studied history at the "Center d'Etudes Supérieures d'Histoire" in 'Ouagadougou and graduated with a master's degree from the Sorbonne in Paris . During his studies he dealt with how Africa was perceived from the outside. In 1974 he enrolled at the École supérieure d'études cinematographiques in Paris, which he successfully completed in 1976. Back in Africa, he was appointed director of the Institut African d'Education Cinematographique .
The cinematic works
After graduation, his 1982 feature film Wend Kuuni was a breakthrough for African cinema due to the way in which he brought the tradition of oral transmission to the screen. The film unfolds episodes of the story of a foundling, who in Buud Yam (1997) goes in search of his family of origin as a young adult.
In the film Zan Boko (1988) the situation between two groups comes to a head. Kaboré contrasts a modest, self-respecting life in the country with the corrupt methods of inflated empires on the occasion of urban expansion. In the end, the economically powerful have the upper hand, but are publicly exposed.
In Gaston's films, women or children are always the focus. Rabi , for example, is about a 10-year-old boy who plays with a turtle, uses it as a toy, then begins to recognize it as an independent living being and finally releases it into freedom. But the film contains another story in which Rabi serves as a messenger: It is the disappointed love of the now old tobacco seller, who for years waits in vain for Pusga, whom she had promised herself. In the end, the already frail Pusga sets out to ask his former lover for forgiveness.
In his films, Kaboré shows the working people: working in the fields, weaving mats, making pottery and burning, forging or stamping yams. Gaston Kaboré lets the viewer linger at the location and empathize with the present situation. The camera's sensitive eye directs the gaze from the surroundings, to the people, their sensitivities, their posture, their hands and faces. The atmosphere in which the viewer is immersed prepares later action. More than the dialogues, the images drive the action.
In 1997 he was awarded the prize of the pan-African film festival FESPACO for his cinematic epic Buud Yam .
Christoph Schlingensief introduces Gaston Kaboré on YouTube as "incredibly personable, very emotional and subtle".
Imagine
It is important for Kaboré to give Africa its own cinematic expression. Since the late 1990s he has almost exclusively devoted himself to teaching. And consequently, he founded the IMAGINE center in Ouagadougou for the training and further education of young African filmmakers who work in different areas, such as scriptwriting, dramaturgy, film editing, sound engineering, animation and multimedia. Classes are held in either French or English and the seminar leaders come from all over the world. Gaston Kaboré continuously expanded his center over the years. Today IMAGINE in Ouagadougou has three buildings with extensive living quarters for students and teaching staff, as well as an open-air cinema.
Jury memberships
- 1995 jury member Film Festival in Cannes
- 1994 member of the jury at the Venice Film Festival
- 2009 jury member of the Berlinale 2009
Individual evidence
- ↑ Schlingensief on Berlinale Jury 2009 on YouTube
- ↑ website from imagine.bf ( Memento of the original from July 17th, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
Web links
- biography
- Gaston Kaboré in the Internet Movie Database (English)
See also
personal data | |
---|---|
SURNAME | Kaboré, Gaston |
ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Kaboré, Gaston Jean-Marie (full name) |
BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Burkinabe filmmaker |
DATE OF BIRTH | April 23, 1951 |
PLACE OF BIRTH | Bobo-Dioulasso , Upper Volta , today Burkina Faso |