Joe Ouakam

synopsis

The camera accompanies Senegalese artist Joe Ouakam (real name Issa Samb, 1945–2017) on his restless wanderings through Dakar, listening to his poems and reflections, recording small performances and his perceptiveness – his ability to let himself be permeated by people and places. The film centres on Ouakam’s outdoor studio at 17 Jules Ferry Street – a space he intensely inhabited and transformed, where he created and destroyed his works. This address was also the meeting place for the radical art collective, Laboratoire Agit'Art, of which he was a co-founder.

“People always felt that they knew him, because his figure was so familiar and visible in the streets of Dakar where he regularly walked to feel the city’s breath and life. But this impression was quite wrong, because Issa Samb was a mystery and an enigma.” — Aboubacar Demba Cissokho, “Issa Samb ‘Joe Ouakam’ All-Round Artist” (obituary)

Source: Issa Samb "Joe Ouakam" All-Round Artist

biography

Laboratoire Agit’Art is a Senegalese multidisciplinary art collective, founded in 1974 by artist Issa Samb, filmmaker Djibril Diop Mambéty, painter El Hadji Sy, and playwright Youssoupha Dione. The collective aimed to fight for the freedom of artistic expression, respond to socio-political issues, and challenge cultural policies based on the concept of négritude. The documentary Joe Ouakam (2012) was directed by Wasis Diop.

Wasis Diop (b. 1950) is a Senegalese musician, composer, and singer. As a film composer, he contributed to the film Hyenas (Hyènes, 1992), and other works by his brother, Djibril Diop Mambety (1945–1998), a long-time friend of Joe Ouakam, and co-founder of Laboratoire Agit’Art.

film details

director:

Wasis Diop