Nondichao, le fils de Pierre Verger
Arnaud Akoha
2021 - 52 min - Film digital disk & HDCam - Couleur - Bénin

In 1955 Nondichao had a chance encounter with Pierre Verger. That started a lengthy exchange on knowledge, transmission and rebirth where the old French photographer and ethnologist introduced the young Beninese to Vodun and photography.
In this personal account Nondichao, now in his eighties, recounts his memories of the colonial times and his nostalgia of the era marked by flourishing anthropological and sociological research of which his hometown of Abomey hosted the first laboratories.
This documentary, the portrayal of the talented and non-emblematic historian of the kingdom of Danhomè (currently known as the Republic of Benin) is centered around the way others view the notion of identity through the lens of the initiatory rite knowledge and group culture associated to the people who claim that identity.