This Washington Post story talks about the difficulties faces by artists of all stripes when working in the unstable environment of Africa.
N'DJAMENA, Chad -- At first light, a film crew was shooting a scene for "Dry Season," a Chadian filmmaker's soulful tale of war and redemption, when gunfire rang out. The camera and sound men watched nervously as pickup trucks bristling with rebel fighters rolled right across their set.
"We heard 'Boom, boom, boom,' " said the director, Mahamat-Saleh Haroun, recalling the morning of April 13, when rebels tried to topple the government. "I thought my Ethiopian cameraman was playing an elaborate practical joke. It sounded like the set of 'Jurassic Park.' But then we realized -- wow, this is real war unfolding. It was art imitating life -- live!"
The shaken crew ran home, but Haroun went directly to his laptop computer and began rewriting the script. The film originally was set to begin and end in the rugged, austere desert of eastern Chad near the Sudanese border, but the area was now far too dangerous for filmmaking.
That evening, some of the crew members said they wanted to leave Chad. But Haroun, 45, tried to rally them. "The current crisis makes the film even more important to complete," he told them.
Filmmakers, poets and painters struggle to make a living in Africa, where people tend to be more concerned about survival than surrealism, Haroun and other African artists said. While suffering often inspires great art, Haroun said, political repression also silences potential talent.