Growing up in the colorful and loud melting pot capital of Ghana, my interactions with art in
general and cinema in particular, was heavily influenced by the West. As a filmmaker, I am
colonized by western cinema and vocabulary. My desire to tell my stories is contaminated and
held hostage by silent western demands. I live in their dictionary and with their vocabulary. My
greatest struggle is to decolonize my mind. Rebirth my MIND AND SOUL.
I love cinema, but I am suspicious of cinema. It is a weapon used against my people and me.
Just like the guns, chains and shackles, it was used against my psyche, beliefs and culture. My
greatest fear as a filmmaker, is to end up confused about who I am, with an impoverished brain,
intellectually displaced, and bankrupt of my CULTURE.
As a storyteller, defending my imagination is key. I defend my ideas, I defend my stories. I
defend my continuity. I defend my identity. PERIOD.
I am greedy about my stories. Internally, I am always fighting the silent powers telling me what
stories to tell. The artist is expected to compromise to “silent” demands. Consciously, every
story I make I am driven by it, internally. DELIBRATE.
I testify as a displaced person because I struggle to tell my own stories. All human beings make
stories to have a sense of continuity. Fighting to declare my own identity, my own story is
therapy for me; gives me a sense of continuity. Makes me HUMAN.
When I am begging, I am compromising. Until we Africans create the economic infrastructure that is also
interested in multiplying and transforming the cultural expression of black people, it remains mortgaged. And when your imagination is mortgaged, the story of a people is COMPROMISED.
Film is a language and I am attempting to create my own vocabulary.
No matter how IMPERFECT. Demands COURAGE
Nana Yaw Yeboah 