>>  TESTIMONIES

>  Can you briefly introduce yourselves and what you love to do ? 

 N : I’m Nourchene, I’m 17, I live in the Medina and i’ve been participating in the workshops here for 7 years. I love theater and Cinema. 

A :  I’m Asma, I’m 17 as well, and I love everything that has to do with art, especially dance and contemporary dance. I’ve also been here for 7 years and I’m planning to stay. 

>    Can you describe your history at L’Art Rue ? How did you start joining the artistic workshops at here ? 

A : It started in the summer of 2015, precisely on the day in which we went to school to get our grades back, our parents met Béatrice. She got their numbers and explained to them that L’Art Rue was looking for children to act in a film. Through this I got to join the artistic workshops that summer, although I only attended a few times. At the beginning of 2016, L’Art Rue came to my school, Kouttab Louzir, to present the artistic workshops. And I’ve been attending them since then. 

N : Asma didn’t finish the first year (2015) but I did. The first thing we did was acting in two movies with Hichem Ben Ammar « Baba Msefer » and « Jamila Wal Wahch », and they’re actually still being broadcasted in schools. 

A : I also participated in Dream City in 2015 with Omar Abu Saad. Later we joined the workshops of Sonia Kallel together and participated in Dream City 2017. And we kept on trying each time there’s an audition and doing the artistic workshops in parallel. It was in 2017 that we started joining the cinema workshops and we still take part in them still.  

We’re actually the ones that have been part in the cinema workshops the longest, therefore we started learning about the techniques. We also did a lot of other workshops; with Lobna, Imen, Omar, Sonia… in addition to the Summer Camp workshops. 

>   How do you see the impact of the artistic workshops on yourselves ? 

N : at first, for anyone who would join the workshops it’s a matter of discovering, then it becomes a matter of deciding whether you really like them and want to continue being involved in them or if it’s something you don’t like anymore. In the beginning, we were too young to decide if we wanted to stay or not, but now, we decided to stay.  

As for the impact, of course there are a lot of things that have changed in me. Other than the techniques we’ve learned, I became a lot more self-confident, I learned how to act around people and with myself, how to work in groups while respecting others, listening to them, and respecting different opinions. 

A : For me, it helped me discover a lot of things about myself. When I was younger I thought I was only good at singing, but I also discovered that I love theater, dance, handcrafts with Thomas. I also learned how to express my opinion and give constructive criticism. It also helped me learn how to act with people outside of my family and close friends, because I got to meet different groups of people. It was a really beautiful experience to take part in Andrew’s workshop ; we learned how to work with disabled people as they have a different awareness of their bodies and of their environment than us. And self-confidence like Nourchene. Of course I still get a little shy when I get on stage or have to present something in front of people but it’s not something I’m afraid of anymore. I also really love Nourchene and our relationship with the team of L’Art Rue as they really trust us and enjoy our company.  

>    What motivated / inspired you to facilitate these workshops ? Is it the first time you do it ? 

N : It’s not the first time we facilitate workshops. We did this with Ms. Insaf from Sentiers for the workshops in the schools of Rue El Marr, and Asma also went with her to Bab Souika. She lets us work with the children under her supervision, and later on gives us her feedback. Little by little, we started doing that in in the workshops in Dar Bach Hamba as well ; each time one of us facilitates the session following her comments. Since we also did a few movies and acted in theater performances, we saw that we succeeded in those so we said why not try other things and see what comes out of them.   

A : As Nourchene said, this is not the first time we facilitate the workshops, however it is the first time we do it entirely on our own, without the supervision of Ms. Insaf. She selected the movies and let us do all the rest by ourselves.

>    How is this experience going for you so far ?  Did you learn something new from it ? 

A : I really love it ! Especially when the children call us Miss, it really gives us a lot of confidence in what we’re doing. And the children are really young compared to us, so they ask the same questions we used to ask when we were their age, so it’s not too complicated for us to find the right answers. We also continue to stay in touch with Mrs Insaf to develop more our abilities to analyse movies and how to organize the debate. We could even work with children a little older so the discussions get deeper. 

N : When we ask them if they liked the session and the movies we presented, they always say yes and want to stay with us after we’re done. We were in the same position as them a few years ago, so we really understand how they think and what they’re going through. 

>    How do you facilitate these workshops, how does the debate go, the interaction with the children ? 

A : At the beginning of the session we try to organize them as best as we could, and keep everything organized, and then once we start the discussion, our goal is to make them understand the movies because we noticed that they don’t always understand the greater meaning of the movies since they’re very young. 

N : During the debate, I feel that my role is to let each one of them express their opinion freely, whether they liked the movie or not. I want to encourage them to really explain to me what they liked and didn’t like. It’s not always easy for the children to do that so I usually give them examples and help them develop their own opinion on the movie. 

A : We also really want them to reach a point where they can discuss the movies on their own as a group. With Ms. Insaf that’s what we do : she asked us a question and then lets us discuss it freely between us, Nourchene would say something and then I would build on it. I really them to reach this point, but I also want them to respect each other and become closer as a group. 

N : It can also be a bit difficult for the children to really understand the movies especially when they’re not in Arabic, so we try to ask them the right questions and help them understand it on their own. 

A : In one of the movies, one of the children came to me and said that it was very similar to what they are living and really got emotionally attached to the characters, so I think that one was a really good session. 

>    What do you see yourself doing next with L’Art Rue ? 

A : For me, I still want develop my knowledge about cinema. I also really want to have this same group present for the rest of the year, or even during the summer so we can work with them and get better at facilitating these workshops. 

N : I, too, would like to know more about cinema. I want us to keep our group with Ms. Insaf so we can learn from her but also have this group so we can continue working with them and learn along the way.