Ateyyat El Abnoudy

Ateyyat El Abnoudy was raised in rural El Simbelaween, Daqahlia Governorate, located on the north of the Nile Delta. She was born to a family of labourers, coming from a line of spice and textile merchants along the Nile. She was the sixth born of seven children, having four sisters and three brothers, and became the only girl in her family to finish school. El Abnoudy moved to Cairo for work and educational opportunities, and later attended the Cairo Higher Institute of Cinema for two years, with the majority of her learning focused on film theory. After making two films and desiring more filmmaking education, El Abnoudy spent three years at the International Film and Television School in London before returning to Egypt in 1976. ==Career==

El Abnoudy played various roles at the theater, such as stage manager and assistant. In 1972 she attended the Cairo Higher Institute of Cinema to finish her film studies. While there, she created Horse of Mud, which was not only her first documentary, but also Egypt's first documentary produced by a woman. El Abnoudy's films are known for dealing with political, social, and economic issues in Egypt. They challenged the censored state of film during Egypt's Sadat era. El Abnoudy faced censorship and criticism from the Egyptian state and press for depicting poverty and struggle in her films. The censorship board sought to cut scenes out of her short films that were unflattering to Egyptian society, such as images of children with dirt on their faces or malnourished animals. El Abnoudy received an Egyptian filmmakers first festival grand prize for her film Seas of Thirst at the 1985 edition of the Francophone Film Festival. Her work received new interest during the 2011 Egyptian revolution and became further studied by Egyptian film archivists in Cairo. After her death, El Abnoudy’s films continued to be screened at film festivals around the world, particularly in programming dedicated to Arab women filmmakers. == Directorial style ==

The emerging New Arab Cinema movement influenced El Abnoudy as a student filmmaker. She has also noted the influence of the non-commercialized decolonial Third Cinema movement during her time at the Cairo Higher Institute of Cinema. The topics of her documentaries were influenced by her working-class upbringing and her knowledge of law and social justice. El Abnoudy focuses on non-fiction documentaries, with her work being categorized under the genre of direct cinema due to her stylistic choice to portray realist depictions of Egypt’s working class rather than provide commentary. While making Horse of Mud, El Abnoudy described how she allowed her documentary subjects to direct and speak for themselves to promote realism and free personal expression. Her documentaries have also been described by El Abnoudy herself and scholars as examples of poetic realism. She primarily shot and edited her films herself on 16mm film, favouring its mobility and low cost. Her first digital film and her longest film at that time, was 1996’s Days of Democracy. El Abnoudy created both black and white and coloured films throughout her career. == Personal life ==

El Abnoudy and her husband adopted their daughter when she was four years old from a friend. Around 1990, El Abnoudy and Abdel-Rahman El Abnoudy divorced after over 20 years of marriage, and she continued to live in Cairo with her daughter and seven cats. She would continue to create films into the 1990s and 2000s before passing away in 2018 at the age of 78. == Filmography ==

• 1971, three international prizes at the Grand Prix Film Festival, Mannheim Film Festival and Damascus Film Festival. • 1972, French Critics Prize at Grenoble Film Festival. • 1992, Egyptian Film Critics Prize, Ismailia International Documentary & Short Film Festival. • 1998, Honoured, National Film Festival, Egyptian Ministry of Culture. ==References==