Hafedh Zalit, dancer-choreographer and AMA grantee, travelled from Tunis (Tunisia) to Bamako (Mali) to lead a Masterclass as part of Project Berka 174. He was hosted by Karemba Studio dance company from January 13 to 19.
Trained at the Centre National de Danse in Tunis and the National Academy of Classical Dance in Rome, Hafedh Zalit has been a dancer and choreographer since 1993. After starting his career at the National Ballet of Tunisia, he performed widely in Tunisia, France, Morocco, Portugal and Spain, both as a dancer and choreographer. In 2016, he won the Artists Without Borders Prize as well as the National Journalists’ Union of Tunisia Prize for his creation titled “Les ergs du sable.” As an artist, he seeks to examine to what extent dance and theatre can impact reality, without for that matter losing sight of their poetic and critical potential.
Named after the old slaves’ market in the medina of Tunis and the number of years since the abolition of slavery in Tunisia, Project Berka 174 seeks to create a contemporary “memory of place” through dance. The projet uses the historical concept of slavery as an analytical tool to interrogate and explore zones of ethnic, religious, nationalistic and economic conflict. Hafedh intends to build upon his stay in Bamako by creating a piece that will be presented at MASA Festival 2020 in Abidjan and at the Journées théâtrales de Carthage in 2020.
We are very proud to have supported Hafedh’s project and wish him much strength and inspiration for the next steps of his creative process!
