Kabylifornie • Agathe Yamina Meziani

Belgo-Kabyle-Greek artist Agathe Yamina Meziani sets out to explore a territory that is at once close and distant: Kabylia, her father’s homeland. With a laptop, a few family videos and the power of the stage, Agathe Yamina Meziani revisits her story, from laughter to tears. Belgo-Kabyle-Greek artist Agathe Yamina Meziani sets out to explore a territory that is at once close and distant: Kabylia, her father’s homeland. Drawing on family archives and memories gathered in the course of her research, she pieces together a personal narrative where memory moves between fiction and reality. Kabylifornie tells the story of her family with humour and self-deprecation. Journeys by car, awkward jokes, moments of silence … The artist evokes the father figure through anecdotes that sketch the portrait of a relationship that is not always straightforward. But beneath the apparent light-heartedness lie other layers, legacies loaded with violence and unspoken truths. At the crossroads of stand-up and theatre, Agathe Yamina Meziani delivers a performance as funny as it is moving on the construction of identity and the complicated paths of reconciliation without forgiveness. The stories discussed refer to domestic violence and suicide