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Identity

A Young Director Explores Living Between Two Cultures, Through Fashion and Film

Edelawit Hussien used her upbringing in both Ethiopia and America as inspiration in her new short film, "ADDIS AFRICANA," which strives to highlight the experience of growing up on the crossroads of two cultural planes.
Still from "ADDIS AFRICANA"

Filmmaker Edelawit Hussien is pleased with the reception of her latest short fashion film, ADDIS AFRICANA. Although it takes place in New York, people from Senegal and Ethiopia have commented on how close it feels to their own lives. Set to show at South Africa's International Fashion Film Festival in April, the piece strives to illuminate the experience of those who have grown up between two or more cultures. Hussein—a senior at New York University with an impressive professional background at creative agencies like MATTE and Milk—pulled from her own multicultural past and present for inspiration.

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Born and raised in Ethiopia, Hussien moved to Seattle with her family at age seven, and since then, she's lived in Atlanta, Kansas City, New York, and Boston. For now, she calls Brooklyn home (but says she'd move anywhere after college "for the right project").

ADDIS AFRICANA is shot from the perspective of an urban young person, incorporating aspects of Hussein's Ethiopian and American identity—which have, at times, felt conflicting to her—and bringing in imagery from a solo trip to Morocco she took last winter. Broadly sat down with Hussein at New York City's Cafe Henrie to learn how she integrated international cultures through representation and aesthetic in ADDIS AFRICANA.

BROADLY: How did the idea of the film come about?
Edelawit Hussien: The idea of the film was a representation of my idea of the millennial Africana individual of the diaspora. ADDIS AFRICANA represents this changing view of Africans and what they're creating. The initial idea came from an evening where I was surrounded by a lot of women of color who worked in the creative industry. Hearing about their stories and what kind of work they were making, I was thinking about how I never really had that as a kid growing up, people who look like me doing the similar type of creative work that I'd like to be doing.

It's so important for Africans to tell African stories.

The film felt like it was very personal. Can you talk about those aspects of it?
Some of the scenes were things I remember from my [childhood], like when the model Alewya [Demmisse] was lying on the yellow flowers. There's this flower that's so predominant in so many areas of Ethiopia; as a kid I would run in [fields of it] and play around in them and be so carefree. My life wasn't so congested with things to look at or do or see or watch. The opening motorcycle scene—my mom has a similar photo where she was on a motorcycle looking so in control.

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Growing up, [I often felt] too Ethiopian for particular situations or too American for others. I remember times in Ethiopia when someone would tell a joke and everyone would laugh and I wouldn't get the joke because I'd have to understand the full cultural structure of why it's funny. It's moments like that where I'm in this extra third area.

Still from ADDIS AFRICANA

Being from Morocco and living in New York, what I loved about ADDIS AFRICANA was how seamlessly you blended the cultures. People love to consider the entire continent of Africa strictly within this third-world context, and this seemed to push against that narrative while relating it to New York. How conscious was that?
When people hear that I'm from Ethiopia, the only image that pops into their head is the 80s famine. I'm like, I am so sorry that that's the only idea of Ethiopia that you have—oh, and coffee! I didn't want [the film] to be cliche. In terms of translating that whole notion of an individual at the crossroads of two cultural planes, it needed to be edited and shot in a way that's inspired by and incorporating those cultures. I think it's really important that it was edited to show that crossroads and not make it seem so calculated. It's not like I'm Ethiopian one day [and American the next].

Representation has been a big theme in pop culture recently. We're seeing the works of directors like Ava DuVernay make their way into the mainstream, but it feels so late for that to be happening. What are your thoughts on representation in the film industry?
It's so important for Africans to tell African stories. I do think things are slowly changing, but it shouldn't be a headline. It should be something inclusive, where you don't need your token whatever. If there's a story [about a person of color], it would seem very disingenuous to have someone else tell it. Can you imagine how this would be interpreted if I wasn't one?

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Growing up, [I often felt] too Ethiopian for particular situations or too American for others.

Can you talk about how you went about casting for this?
I definitely wanted to be true to the message I was sending, so it was very important for me to have an African model. Alewya was someone I met through a mutual friend and I thought she had really great energy. She's Ethiopian by way of London, so she has a similar poly-cultural experience. It was really important for me to have someone who could represent that and be on the same wavelength about the message at the core of the film. The two men with the gasoline jug—which is a reference to Merkato [an open-air marketplace] in Ethiopia—are two of my friends who both have similar stories. I think that's where we're all headed: You're always going to be at the crossroads of something, and I think that's what strengthens all of us. The more cultures and things that you've seen or experienced or represent, the more we can foster a genuine idea of what America is.

Was the film in any way a reaction to politics right now?
When I initially had the idea for this project, I did not foresee this huge change we're experiencing; it was more focused on the good things that are happening, about how I have so much more access to different artists and musicians and all of that. Even when we shot in October, I completely did not foresee this. I guess, after the fact, the film embodies the good things that are happening in innovation and creativity.

Still from "ADDIS AFRICANA"

Since this is a fashion film, can you talk about the clothing and how it was chosen?
For each scene of ADDIS AFRICANA, it was very important that the wardrobe, the set, and the lighting all complimented each other. At the end of the day it's a fantasy, a dream. Every color choice and texture mattered. When we did the gasoline jug scene, she's wearing that orange jacket [because] it has a very industrial feel to it. Sometimes fashion is seen as so trivial, but there are ways to utilize wardrobe to get a message across. If that whole set didn't exist and you just had to interpret why she was wearing those particular things, I think you could come to the realization of what the message is just from the wardrobe. It was also inspired by a few Ethiopian models and actresses that I'm fond of, like the Eritrean–Italian actress Zeudi Araya, who is so iconic to me.

What were some of the challenges in making this film?
As a whole, one of the most difficult parts about making this was getting the set right. Even the stickers on the motorcycle were designed to fit this idea. I think sometimes when your work focuses on color, New York can be so uninspiring. If you've ever been to any African capital, you see how things are repurposed and reused in ways that you would never see here. Even when I was looking for a proper Coca-Cola crate, it was like $200 on eBay—this is how much people are romanticizing [this culture]. It was a lot of work to put together the different elements to create this world here in New York, which is what the core of this film is about.