Animation from Egypt & Africa

African animation, as it is, started about 70 years ago in Egypt, whose founders were Frenkel brothers. The most interesting thing is that pioneers of animation in Africa were not professional artists or animators. It was just a group of carpenters who emigrated to Egypt from Russia in search for freedom and work. No one expected from them something unusual, but first African animated cartoon was produced by them. They faced a lot of problems with necessary equipment and financing, but after all they finally made the first animated film in Egypt and in the whole Africa.

Mish Mish Afandi 1935 Egypt

The duration of this film, which is called “In Vain” (“Mafish fayda”) is just 10 minutes. Its main hero was Mish Mish Effendi, who was the prototype of well-known Mickey Mouse. But unfortunately this film was lost when Cairo burned in 1951.

However, the 2^nd film of Frenkel brothers “National defense” is still preserved and fortunately we have a chance to watch this unique cartoon today.

After this there were many endeavors, we can say, in every country of African continent, but they were just individual attempts, not in group or association or in national industry.

In this history of African animation we can remember names of some people, who played the most important role in it, such as Mustafa Alessane (Niger), Ali Moheb (in 1965 he established the first department of animation on Egyptian TV), Kibuchi (Congo), etc.

Those people made some unique attempts which somehow can present African animation, though we can’t say that there exists some movement of African animation – it’s just individual endeavors. We can’t compare it, say, with Japanese style of Manga or Anime, or with American or European style of animation.

African animation is not a real industry in the continent, because the economical case in Africa is hard and it is difficult to produce films, since animation is not like another arts, which can be produced individually. Qualitative animation needs a lot of money, equipments, assistants, etc.

For instance, the population of Ethiopia is 80 mln. people, but there live just 3 animators. There are no orders for work, no equipment, no any new projects.

Though, lights of hope come from European countries and their cultural centers who provide financial support to animators and their projects from African countries.

 For example, we can speak about “Africa Animated” project in Kenya which was initiated by UNESCO when its adviser in Nairobi Alonso Aznar established it in order to spot on the unique case of African art. He invited professional academic animators to learn artists from Africa through participation in workshops in the course of this project. In last 3 years there were held 3 projects which gathered animators from more than 10 countries from all-over Africa who brought with them their folkloric stories and motives and tried to mix pure African arts with the techniques of modern animation. 3 projects resulted in more than 20 short films, and animators after returning home had a chance to use their experience in their native countries.

This ongoing project is good news for the industry. Despite an abundance of talent, African animation faces many challenges. Production studios, equipment and financing are in short supply and distribution is limited.
I myself participated in the last project of “Africa animated” in Nairobi (the previous one was in South Africa, and the first one in Kenya and Tanzania).

We will see some of these films in our screening, too. Though these films are very unique , they are made with the best techniques and by the best professionals of animation in Africa, that is why they can’t give you the complete image of African animation, because in fact ,lack of equipment and professionals results in animation with different quality and style.

But this support is still not enough and does not provide in full for the needs of African animation. Almost all financial support for cultural purposes in Africa is intended for cinema or classical arts. But despite the obstacles, African directors continue to produce innovative animated films that are winning over international audiences.

So, nowadays industry of African animation exists only in Egypt and South Africa. Egypt started the real industry of animation since 1935 when Frenkel brothers made a cartoon “National defense”. In 1965 was opened first department of animation on TV, at that time also appeared Egyptian TV advertising. Nowadays there are about 50 studios of animation which produce animation commercially for Egypt, other African and Middle Eastern countries (Kuwait, Yemen, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Libya, etc.)

Although Africa has a long history of developing of its animation, still it did  not reach that level of animation as those countries, who started even after us. We have a very little number of academies which concern animation teaching and it is very hard to get all necessary professional equipments, software and the trainers which would help us to educate generations of animators with their own tradition of animation, or specifically African style of animation without being fully influenced by Western and Japanese styles of animation. 

Mohamed Ghazala

Cairo 2008

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