L’Almamy Samori Touré – An Unmade Film by Ousmane Sembène, decomposed, disarranged and reproduced by Chimurenga
As part of the 14th edition of Partcours, RAW Material Company is pleased to invite you to the launch of a research installation titled L’Almamy Samori Touré – An Unmade Film by Ousmane Sembène**, decomposed, an-arranged and reproduced by Chimurenga, on Monday, December 8, 2025, at 5:00 p.m. at RAW Material Company, Zone B, Villa 2A.
This research installation is part of a long-term inquiry by Chimurenga, a pan African research and publishing collective based in Cape Town, into the political, artistic and epistemological implications of Ousmane Sembène’s unrealised film on Samori Touré, a major historical figure of anti-colonial resistance whose story remains deeply rooted in collective memory throughout West Africa.
Chimurenga reads Sembène’s film project on Samori Touré as a milestone in Pan African thought and practice, and a unique example of rewriting the history of Africa’s resistance to colonisation; an attempt at counter-cartographic and historiographic narration that unsettles the chronological and territorial frames established by the 1884-85 Berlin Conference.
Even though the project could not be completed during Sembene’s lifetime, it provides an important platform to investigate questions such as the forms required to tell African history, especially our histories of resistance; the possibility to reproduce territory through storytelling, territories erased by colonialism; and, crucially, the means required for collective self-actualisation by African peoples.
Indeed, Sembène’s film project is part of what Chimurenga calls “The Archive of the Unfinished”: projects that invite us to study “process” more closely because “product” never or hasn’t yet arrived; projects that operate as liberated zones, where an imagination of another world, a decolonised world, can be rehearsed and practiced.
Fittingly, Chimurenga’s research takes the form of a roving and evolving installation across the geography Sembène imagined for his film, the old Samorian empire.
Following a presentation in Conakry during July 2025, on the aesthetic dimensions of Guinea’s Socialist Cultural Revolution, this gathering at RAW Material Company (Act II) brings together writers, artists and historians, to produce new knowledge on Sembene’s historic project. More broadly, the Dakar iteration of Chimurenga’s research, which takes the form of a bibliographic installation and live broadcasting studio, is a collective reflection on the production of an African historiography through creative practice, including film, music, theatre, visual arts, oral and written literatures, and more.
——————————————
Acknowledgements /
Throughout the research process, RAW Material Company and Chimurenga were supported by generous contributors, without whom the Dakar stage would not have been possible. We would like to name them here and express our sincere thanks: Nafissatou Bakhoum and Diouma Faye (Cheikh Anta Diop Fundamental Institute of Black Africa), Bassam Chaïtou (Jom Collection, Dakar), Mohamed Challouf (Ciné-Sud Patrimoine Association), Aboubacar Demba Cissokho (AFP), Germain Coly, Ndiaga Thiombane, and Maimouna Diouf (Department of Cinematography, Ministry of Culture, Crafts, and Tourism), Oumy Diakhaté (Daniel Sorano National Theater), Albert Diatta (Senegal Archives Department), Hélène Diedhiou (Léopold Sédar Senghor Foundation), Yves Eric Elouga (Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa), Assane Kane (Torobee Distribution), Moustapha Ndiaye, also known as "Picasso " (Chief Decorator), Professor Felwine Sarr (Duke University), Oumou Sy (Les Ateliers Leydi), and Professor Ibrahima Wane (Cheikh Anta Diop University).
——————————————
Program
Monday December 08th - 5:00 p.m.
PASS — Session on Popular music and the production of history | Chimurenga & guests
/ 5 p.m. | Opening — Pan African Space Station* (PASS) — ON AIR
/ 6 p.m. | On Popular Music and the Production of History — A listening session Prof. Ibrahima Wane & Ntone Edjabe
/ 8 p.m. | Listening session — A set by Ntone Edjabe
Wednesday December 10th - 5:00 pm
PASS — Sessions on Cinema, African history and the archive of the unfinished | Chimurenga & guests
/ 5 p.m. | On film projects, Kattan & Talatay Nder — Conversation between William Ousmane Mbaye and Papa Samba Kane, moderated by Aboubacar Demba Cissokho
/ 7 p.m. | A listening session inspired by Abdoulaye Sadji’s essay “Ce que dit la musique africaine” — with Prof. Ibrahima Wane, Prof. Felwine Sarr and Ntone Edjabe
Thursday December 11th - 5:00 pm
PASS — Sessions on the Afterlives of Sembene's film project on Samory Touré | Chimurenga & guests
/ 5 p.m. | On his journey alongside Sembène, the preservation of his work and memory — Clarence Delgado in conversation with Aboubacar Demba Cissokho
/ 6 p.m. | On Daaray Sembène, Thiès, and the Ousmane Sembène Association, and its traveling evening school — Hadja Maimouna Niang and Prof. Maguèye Kassé in conversation with Fatou Kandé Senghor
/ 7 p.m. | On his book, Senegalese Cinema: Ousmane Sembène, Artist of a Resilient Africa — Prof. Alpha Amadou SY in conversation with Aboubacar Demba Cissokho
/ 8.30 p.m. | On his collaboration with Ousmane Sembène on Samori — Moustapha Ndiaye also known as Picasso in conversation with Ntone Edjabe
Friday December 12th - 3:30 pm
PASS — Sessions on literature, a challenge for African historiography | Chimurenga & guests
/ 3.30 p.m. | On African historiography — Babacar Buuba Diop in conversation with Prof. Ibrahima Wane
/ 5 p.m. | Three takes on the writing of Samori - A conversation between Moses Marz (historian and cartographer) and Fatoumata Sagnane (journalist and producer) and Ntone Edjabe
/ 6.30 p.m. | On the history of Senegal in his novels — Boris Boubacar Diop in conversation with Aboubacar Demba Cissokho
Saturday December 13th - 3:30 pm
PASS — Sessions on theater, fashion and the arts in the production of history, the case of “l’École de Dakar (The Dakar School)” | Chimurenga & guests
/ 3.30 p.m. | On the production of the imaginary around African history in the fields of theater, cinema, and fashion — Lamine Seyba Traoré and Oumou SY in conversation with Madiaw Ndiaye
/ 5:30 p.m. | On the work and life of Alpha Waly Diallo — Massamba Mbaye in Conversation with Babacar Mbaye Diop
/ 6:30 p.m. | On the archive of the unfinished — Eva Munyiri (filmmaker and theorist) and Annabelle Aventurin (film archivist and curator) in conversation with Ntone Edjabe
All live sessions of the Pan African Space Station (PASS) will also be streamed online on :
https://panafricanspacestation.org.za/
——————————————
**© Ousmane Sembène Estate – All rights reserved. Courtesy of Filmi Domireew.
image 1 :Poster (or related illustration) for Sembène Ousmane’s unfinished film project L’Almamy Samori Touré. Developed by his production company FILMI DOOMIREW, this project represents a major milestone in Sembène’s reflections on African history and resistance. © Ousmane Sembène Estate / Sembène Family.
image 2 : Portrait of L’Almamy Samori Touré on the cover of Issue 1 of the journal Afrique Histoire, January–February–March 1981. See the article by Sékéné Mody Cissoko, “A Stunning Victory of Almamy Samory: The 1885 Check to the Colonial Occupation of the Sudan,” pp. 17–21. © Afrique Histoire.