Animation from Egypt & Africa

Noshi Iskandar

One of the most important pioneers of Egyptian animation,Noshi Iskandar (or Nos-hee Eskandar- نُصحي إسكندر ), passed away last week in the age of 71.

Noshi was one of establishers of the animation art and industry in Cairo since 1960s ,and was one of the first genrations who set up the animation departent in Egyptian TV in 1961.get many awards and participated by his films n many international festivals. Also he was teacher for generations of animators in many academies in Egypt,such as in animation deaprtment in Minia university for many years.

the Italian historian,Giannalberto Bendazzi wrote about him:

“An important person in the Egyptian animation was Noshi Iskandar (Cairo, 1938), a well-known caricaturist. His first film was One and Five (1969), followed by the trilogy Is it True, Abd Al, Question(1969), inspired by the war in Middle East. In 1974 he directed Where? and Room number…, a satire on bureaucracy; in 1975 he directed Excellent, a denunciation of corruption, and in 1980 Narcissus. One of his most faithful adherents was Radhà Djubran(1945-1997), who authored the short animation films Story of a Brat (1985) and The Lazy Sparrow (1991).”

Noshi Iskandar with the French pioneer,Paul Grimault in Leipzig Festival 1970s

Noshi with the Egyptian Minister of Culture when he got tribute in 2000

The first Egyptian animation studio was established by the Frenkel brothers in early 1935 and produced the first Egyptian and African Animation films under the title of the hero “Mish Mish” during the 1930s and 1940s, before the Frenkel brothers  emigrated to France in 1951.

Ali Moheeb

Some of the oldest studios were under supervision of artists like Ali Moheeb, Hasseb, and Abdel Aleem Zaki in the 1960s and 1970s. When Egyptian TV appeared in 1960s there was an animation department for producing titles of films and ads.

Some of the great artists worked in this department contributing to the revolution of animation in Egypt with short films, such as Noshi Iskander, Redha Goubran, Ahmed Saad and in another generation there was Shwekar Khalifa.

Bakkar by Mona Abou Alnasr 1990s

In the late 1980s Mona Abu Alnasr established her own studio after she came back from studying animation in the USA, and started her own projects with cooperation with Egyptian TV. And she continued to make series for the TV for the coming years.
 

Right now in Egypt there are more than 50 animation studios which vary between big, medium and small size studios, there are round 10 big studios which provide more than 100 animated hours yearly, between series, episodes, ads and short films.

Mona Abou Alnasr

“Al Sahar studio”, one of the biggest studios in Egypt, established by the Saudi investor in early 90s, started to work on the first Egyptian feature animated film “The Knight and the Princess” in 1998 and is not yet finished due to lack of funds.
Some of the studios really dominated the market, not only in Egypt, but also in Arab countries such as in Saudi Arabia and Emirates. Some of the studios monopolies the market of Egyptian TV completely and sometimes there is no way for small studios to enter the marketplace.
But for some small studios, there are some chances through cooperating with the larger studios on their own projects or by getting funds from other Arabian countries to make Arabian series or ads.
Therefore it could be considered that Egypt makes animation on behalf of Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, Libya, Yemen, and Kuwait …etc
 

The 5 Adventurers by Tarek Rashed

The work primarily is 2d as well as  clay animations in addition to new studios work with 3d and flash.
Some studios specialize in 3D like ”Tarek Rashed” which started in early 2000 making ads and then working on co-productions with Arabian countries in local series.
The studio ”Zamzam” specializes in Islamic series in clay animation. And with the same technique there are projects under the supervision of Eid Abdel Latif which recently got an award from CHINH, the Indian children’s festival.
There are medium sized studios which use the new techniques of flash like A+ Cartoon which uses and produces many works for the Egyptian TV.
 

In addition to the specialist studios, there are a lot of freelancers who work individually or part-time, or sometimes get their own projects such as Hussain Nemr, Hazem Gooda, Ahmed Fathi  and Mohamed Ghazala who produce many awarded works.
 

According to the educational level of artists, there are a lot of projects for Egyptian TV and Arab states; the 1990s and 2000s could be considered as the golden age of Egyptian animation. Many new studios opened and many graduate students became involved after training in academies which provide animation classes like the Cinema Institute, Helwan University and Minia University where I teach.
Every year there is more than 200 new graduate students who studied animation for at least 2 years, and at least 100 of them continue in working in animation as a career.
 

In Egypt, there are only 2 international festivals that have animation categories in their competitions; Cairo International Cinema Festival for Children and Ismailia International Film Festival for Documentary and Short films. But there are also some local festivals such as Al Sakia Animation festival.

 ASIFA Egypt

 

ASIFA Egypt logo

In September 2008, the first chapter of its kind in Africa and the Arab world was approved by the international board of ASIFA (Association International du Film d’Animation). This became the connection between the international network of animators and the African and Arabian ones, and proved to be a powerful player in the animation field in the region by holding activities such as workshops, screenings, panels and festivals.
One of the first activities of ASIFA Egypt is celebrating IAD (The International Animation Day) which is held yearly on 28^th of October, commemorating the first public performance of animation in 1892. The first Egyptian celebration of this event was held in Alexandria with collaboration with the Al Rasheed foundation for cultural development on 28^th October 2008.
The coming plans of ASIFA Egypt is to promote the art of animation, not only in Egypt, but also in the whole region by promoting networking activities and participating in international events.

 

  

How can we define African Animation? Is it animation produced in Africa by Africans? Or produced with  African budgets? Or produced for African audiences?
 
These are  important questions to answer before speaking about African animation.
 

To be more clear, does speaking about animation in Africa include films produced by foreigners and colonizers in Africa, such as animated works made by white people in South Africa? An example is “The Artist’s Dream” by the American Harold Shaw which was created in 1916 and considered as the first animated film made in Africa.
Other films include work by some non-African investors and producers like the Canadian Firdaus Kharas who directed “Magic Cellar”, 2006, the first animated series to be based on African culture, which was acquired for broadcast in the United States. Kharas has his own organization which can fund any of his co-production works with other countries, like this series which are co-produced with South Africa.
 

Moustapha Alessane

On the other hand, perhaps “African Animation” should be considered as work of African people or produced with African funding.
For these reasons, historical research into African animation could be approached in different ways.
For example  it could be considered that the first animated film produced by an African artist are animated shorts in 60s which were done by Moustapha Alassane from Niger.
 

Considering the nationality of the producers becomes complex; “Mish Mish Efendi” films were made by Belarusian Frenkel brothers but produced and

MISHMISH by Frenkel 1930s (Egypt)

funded by the Egyptian government as propaganda films for mobilization of the Egyptian army during the World War II in late 1930s, these films of “Mish Mish”, 1935, could be counted as the first REAL African animated films.

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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