Kibuki: Spirits in Zanzibar
by Lizzy Brooks
Kibuki: Spirits in Zanzibar
by Lizzy Brooks
An experiment in trance, cultural exchange, and the meaning of healing.
An experiment in trance, cultural exchange, and the meaning of healing.
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Wishlist
Use the WishList to contribute cash and loan items - or - Make a contribution by selecting an incentive directly.
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$10 USD
We want everyone who contributes to watch the film. If you give us ten dollars, we'll send you a link to watch Kibuki online or download it to own.Claimed: 13 of 'Unlimited'
Select This Incentive
$25 USD
Own the full Kibuki package on DVD. The DVD version of the film includes bonus materials like additional interviews with the healers and the director (they explain Kibuki spirit possession in greater detail than the film could go into). It also includes a collection of video excerpts from the project that give a fuller picture of the culture and landscape of Zanzibar.
Claimed: 29 of 'Unlimited'
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$50 USD
Thank you for your generosity! To honor your commitment to the project, we will give you a limited edition photographic print from the Kibuki archives, signed by the director.
Claimed: 9 of 'Unlimited'
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$75 USD
Help support the spirtual healing community in Zanzibar. Many women save for years before they can afford the materials and fees associated with Kibuki trance medicine. A portion of your donation will go into a scholarship fund to pay for medicinal herbs, ritual garments, and ceremonial libations. In exchange, you will receive a print of the full supplies list associated with a Kibuki trance ceremony (from betel nut to brandy).
Claimed: 11 of 'Unlimited'
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$125 USD
Healing is art, and Kibuki is honored to partner with Sediment Press for original, limited-edition imagery. We will give you a multi-colored hand-printed poster, signed by the Charles Robertson (of Sediment Press) and Lizzy Brooks (of Kibuki).
Claimed: 7 of 'Unlimited'
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$250 USD
Welcome to the team. We're putting your name in the credits, and we're giving you the limited edition DVD package. Thanks thanks thanks!
Claimed: 2 of 'Unlimited'
Select This Incentive
$500 USD
Let's talk about the project. Sit down with the director in person or over Skype for a conversation about trance medicine, Kibuki healing, and the process of cultural exchange. After the conversation, your limited edition DVD package will mean so much more to you. And it will mean more to us when we see your name in the credits.
Claimed: 1 of 'Unlimited'
Select This Incentive
$1,000 USD
We'll bring the screening to you. We'll all sit down to watch the film at a location of your choice. Afterwards, our crew will be there for a Q&A, with Zanzibari incense burning. You will also get the DVD package and your name in the credits. (If you’re not in the Bay Area, we will mail you Zanzibari incense, and do the Q&A over Skype).
Claimed: 0 of 10
Select This Incentive
$2,500 USD
You are obviously a family member. Or-- if you weren't before, then you are now. Thank you hero.Claimed: 0 of 5
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Story
About The Project
The Kibuki film began as an experiment. I was on a language study in Zanzibar, when I met Asha, a spirit healer and the leader of a ring of dancers who use trance and hypnosis to let go of their bodies, to move with inhuman rhythms. The kibuki spirits are a pantheon of mystical creatures who enter these dancers, climb into their heads, and possess them.
I was so fascinated with the kibuki that I began hanging around Asha’s compound during the slow hours between ritual dances. On a tropical afternoon, while a lazy fan barely swayed the mosquito netting in the children’s bedroom where I was napping, Asha offered to do a treatment on me. She brought her colleagues and her assistants into the room, and they gathered around me in a circle. They began chanting and clapping and someone lit an incense with strangest scent I’ve ever smelled. Asha took hold of the top of my head and moved my body in a circle. I choked and gasped and I started to tremble. The blood rushed to my head and I screamed. The next thing I knew, I was lying on the ground. Someone splashed water on me. I was still shaking and I had the warmest feeling, like some dream syrup drug had pumped through all my veins.
Asha told me that I was possessed with a spirit, and that I should return to Zanzibar for a full Kibuki treatment. Once I was trained in the trance, I could join the other dancers in the ring.
I spent fifteen months in Zanzibar, from December of 2010 to March of 2012. I worked with a local crew to film my own kibuki treatment, and the process of learning a different culture, the sense of disorientation that comes when you move from one way of thinking to another. I was always an outsider in Zanzibar. Some beliefs and practices remain opaque.
Kibuki has been three years in the making and the process has changed me, both as a person and an artist. I believe in the medical properties of the possession trance, even as I struggle to reconcile magical thinking with my pragmatic Western education. I am humbled to remember my naiveté in thinking that as a white American woman, I could just wander into another culture and make friends. I made deep friendships during my time in Zanzibar, but only after I understood that we are all tethered to the cruel mechanics of the global economy. These personal transformations are built into the film, and only by finishing the piece can I share my own learning with my friends, colleagues, and peers here in the US.
Incentives
Select This Incentive
$10 USD
We want everyone who contributes to watch the film. If you give us ten dollars, we'll send you a link to watch Kibuki online or download it to own.Claimed: 13 of 'Unlimited'
Select This Incentive
$25 USD
Own the full Kibuki package on DVD. The DVD version of the film includes bonus materials like additional interviews with the healers and the director (they explain Kibuki spirit possession in greater detail than the film could go into). It also includes a collection of video excerpts from the project that give a fuller picture of the culture and landscape of Zanzibar.
Claimed: 29 of 'Unlimited'
Select This Incentive
$50 USD
Thank you for your generosity! To honor your commitment to the project, we will give you a limited edition photographic print from the Kibuki archives, signed by the director.
Claimed: 9 of 'Unlimited'
Select This Incentive
$75 USD
Help support the spirtual healing community in Zanzibar. Many women save for years before they can afford the materials and fees associated with Kibuki trance medicine. A portion of your donation will go into a scholarship fund to pay for medicinal herbs, ritual garments, and ceremonial libations. In exchange, you will receive a print of the full supplies list associated with a Kibuki trance ceremony (from betel nut to brandy).
Claimed: 11 of 'Unlimited'
Select This Incentive
$125 USD
Healing is art, and Kibuki is honored to partner with Sediment Press for original, limited-edition imagery. We will give you a multi-colored hand-printed poster, signed by the Charles Robertson (of Sediment Press) and Lizzy Brooks (of Kibuki).
Claimed: 7 of 'Unlimited'
Select This Incentive
$250 USD
Welcome to the team. We're putting your name in the credits, and we're giving you the limited edition DVD package. Thanks thanks thanks!
Claimed: 2 of 'Unlimited'
Select This Incentive
$500 USD
Let's talk about the project. Sit down with the director in person or over Skype for a conversation about trance medicine, Kibuki healing, and the process of cultural exchange. After the conversation, your limited edition DVD package will mean so much more to you. And it will mean more to us when we see your name in the credits.
Claimed: 1 of 'Unlimited'
Select This Incentive
$1,000 USD
We'll bring the screening to you. We'll all sit down to watch the film at a location of your choice. Afterwards, our crew will be there for a Q&A, with Zanzibari incense burning. You will also get the DVD package and your name in the credits. (If you’re not in the Bay Area, we will mail you Zanzibari incense, and do the Q&A over Skype).
Claimed: 0 of 10
Select This Incentive
$2,500 USD
You are obviously a family member. Or-- if you weren't before, then you are now. Thank you hero.Claimed: 0 of 5
- Updates
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Current Team
About This Team
Elizabeth Brooks is the director of Kibuki. She is a mixed media artist, and a member of the San Francisco experimental cinema community. Her work explores the boundary between fact and fiction, using film, video, writing, and sound to blur the line between memory and imagination.
She holds an MA in African Studies from the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London, and an MFA in Photographic and Electronic Media from the Maryland Institute College of Art. She was a 2010 recipient of a Fulbright grant to Tanzania. She currently works as the Youth Curriculum Manager at the San Francisco Film Society, and her bilingual children’s book, Mama Has a Job, was recently selected for publication by Mkuki na Nyota publishers in Tanzania.
Lutfiya Hassan Suleiman is the assistant director, crew manager, and story consultant for the Kibuki film. She was born in Zanzibar and studied in Mombasa, Kenya. She is a community advocate and organizer for increased opportunities for women in the Michenzani district of Stonetown, Zanzibar. She has advocated for improved access to health care for women, and she opens her home to provide counseling and support for women suffering from domestic abuse. In addition to her community work, Lutfiya owns and operates a women’s clothing shop, the Moon Glow Boutique, and she cares for her five-year-old
daughter, Sarah.
Asha Osman Kilimani is the owner and lead healer of the Kilimani Kibuki ring, and worked with the Kibuki film to arrange access to rituals, and to organize interviews with recognized experts. Asha also appears in the film, and served as a story consultant for the rough edit.Asha was born in Zanzibar and married at age 16. She was ill intermittently, suffering from depression and infertility, until she was diagnosed as possessed by a Kibuki spirit. Her spirits demanded that she undergo treatment many times until she herself became an experienced healer. In the year 2000, she and her husband began to treat patients and to hold Kibuki healing rituals in their home. The business has prospered and Kilimani is now recognized as one of the five primary Kibuki rings. Recently Kilimani expanded its operations to sell juice and to organize sound equipment for off-site ceremonies.
Heidi Petty is the producer for Kibuki: spirits in Zanzibar. Heidi specializes in documentaries that push the boundaries of sound in film. She developed her directing and producing style in the musical underground, with tight shots and organic camerawork that bring the viewer into the world of the artist. Heidi grew up in Nikiski, Alaska, and moved to San Francisco to work at the junction of film and technology. Since joining 12fps, she has produced video content for clients and projects as diverse as Google Play, Wine Forest, and the fashion designer First Rite.Winston Merchan is a filmmaker from Southern California, and the editor for Kibuki. His forte is Editing, Motion Graphics, and all that involves Post-Production. Gaining most of his inspiration from both the streets and outer space, his current focus is documentary. He has gained experience from working at several Post-Facilities throughout Los Angeles and San Francisco. You can either spot him skateboarding an empty swimming pool or comparing office chairs at Staples.
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