Malian director Souleymane Cissé, the African cinema pioneer who over five decades gained prominence for works infused with deep humanism and political engagement, died on Wednesday. He was 84.
News of Cissé’s death was announced by his daughter, Mariam Cissé. “Papa died today in Bamako. We are all in shock. He dedicated all his life to his country, to cinema and to art,” she said in a statement. The cause of his death has not been specified.
Cissé, who was born in the Malian capital of Bamako and studied film in Moscow, became the first Black African filmmaker to win a prize for a feature film at Cannes in 1987 for “Yeelen” (“The Light”), his drama drawn from Kenyan folk stories about the conflict between a father and son over magic powers.
In 2014 his “Timbuktu,” a cri de coeur against fundamentalist violence and intolerance, screened in the Cannes competition to rave reviews and won seven César awards in France, including best director and best film.
In 2023, Cissé also won the Cannes Directors’ Fortnight Carrosse d’Or award for “Finye” (“The Wind”), a campus protest movie in which the students are living under a military dictatorship and contending with a patriarchal society deeply rooted in ancestral superstitions.
Cissé is one of only two directors to have twice won the grand prize at Burkina Faso’s preeminent Panafrican Film and Television Festival (FESPACO).
He was due to fly to Burkina Faso capital’s Ouagadougou on Thursday to preside over the 29th edition of the festival’s main jury.
News of Cissé’s death elicited an outpour of tributes. Mali’s Minister of Culture Mamou Daffe lamented the loss “of this monument of African cinema” in a statement. New York’s Film at Lincoln Center praised him as “one of cinema’s greats”, citing “Yeelen” for “catapulting African film to the world stage.”
