Kiripi Katembo Siku, an art school student from the Democratic Republic of Congo, is a film maker with ingenuity and a mobile. He circumvents the restrictions and government censorship in Kinshasa, the country's capital, by attaching his mobile phone to a toy car, setting it to film, and then giving it to a girl to pull behind her on a piece of string as she walks through the streets of Kinshasa.
The resulting "Voiture en Carton" ("Cardboard Car") provides a rare glimpse of street-life in Kinshasa. The seven-minute film gives the viewer a clandestine look at life in the capital -- feet of children, youth gambling, and an UN jeep passing by.
According to CNN, he is one of a number of filmmakers in the DR Congo who says that using a mobile phone allows him to film in ways that were previously not possble. Film makers there say that filming permits are not given out anymore to avoid exposing corruption, poverty, and crime. Those brave enough to defy the authorities and shoot without permission risk fines, arrest, or worse.
Siku started making films last year after he participated in a mobile phone film making workshop held by French filmmaker, Marie-Dominique Dhelsing. Dhelsing organizes mobile film making master classes for young people in developing countries.
Siku's film has been entered into the international section of mobile phone film festival, 5th Pocket Films Festival to be held in Paris in June. He continues to shoot on mobile phones and has, with a number of his workshop colleagues, founded YEBELA, a collective of video artists who show their films in the streets of Kinshasa.
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