Place de la République

2009, 6 min, HDV, colour
Baba Hillman,
with Fatoumata Dembaga

“A qui appartient la ville?”

A woman is running - crossing the city borders from the cité of La Rose des Vents northeast of Paris, through the buses and trains of the périphérique, to Port Royal and the Jardin Marco Polo. If the architecture of home - landscape, sidewalks, streets, windows, roofs, cultural codes of the space - shapes the movement of the body, just as language shapes the rhythm and pitch of the voice, how then to negotiate the maze of La Rose des Vents closed in on itself many kilometers from the city, with its paths and streets named Paul Cézanne, Henri Matisse, Eugène Delacroix, Edgar Degas.