Feature via Nowness / Film by Alex Simpson and Sebastian Barros
“Nigerian Dambe is a brutal and exhilarating sport. A fight to the knockout with prize money at stake,” say Alex Simpson and Sebastian Barros, the London-based co-directors behind this new project. “This style of Nigerian boxing is fiercely competitive and largely undocumented.”
The story of Dambe is told through the eyes of 35-year-old Taiwo, a street boxer from Ogun State, Nigeria. Simpson and Barros conducted parts of Taiwo’s interview on top of one of Lagos’s many unfinished tower blocks that provide cinematic sunburnt views across the former capital. Shots reveal the Ogun fighter training in empty stairwells, underneath bypasses and with a make-shift punch bag made from rice. “We wanted to capture the essence of Dambe in a cinematic way,” say the directors. “Witnessing the practice through the eyes and experience of Taiwo felt like the most personal and effective way to do it.”
Read the full feature here at: Nowness
