Contemporary Italian Women Artists of African Descent: A Transnational and Intersectional Approach to their Lives and Works

This article considers the life and work of Afrodescendant Italian artists Iris Peynado, Nadia Kibout and Nadia Ali. Through my interviews with them and a critical analysis of their films, I underline the cultural value of their achievements and emphasize the discriminations that black women face in contemporary society and in the cinema industry. Racial, class and gender biases often are subjects of their filmmaking, and offer a critical site to reflect on the need for further social and political change. Their collective experience is seen in light of a transnational spatial and temporal continuity between black Italians and the diasporic communities around the world. A variety of nuanced cultural expressions makes it inaccurate to consider Italian Afrodescendant artists as a monolithic group of women having a single identity. In spite of societal biases, they are powerfully emerging as filmmakers, actresses, and activists. They contribute to our understanding that a true postcolonial approach requires a more fluid and flexible consideration of Italian identity as a transnational and multi-faceted expression of a fertile intersection of people of diverse genders, races, and religions.