Short documentary film “Scalp Deep” by Naseeba Bagalaaliwo

We present to you the winner of the third Small Project Grant 2019: Naseeba Bagalaaliwo. Naseeba will be using the 2.000.000 UGX to create a short film titled ‘Scalp Deep’ exploring the nature of female identity, femininity and beauty through the lens of African women with short cropped or shaved hair. The link between femininity and long hair is a prevalent trend throughout every culture worldwide. The emotional ties to our hair are just as significant as the statement on inflexible beauty standards. Through this film, Naseeba hopes to create a portrait of African women through their natural beauty and interrogate stereotypes and assumptions about femininity through hair or rather lack of it. Naseeba graduated from Durham University with a degree in Law and Politics. She is an Afrika Kommt! Fellow and did her fellowship with the Robert Bosch Stiftung. Inspired by art, politics, people and culture she hopes to combine her passions by producing female-focused local content with diverse creators. ‘Scalp Deep’ was originally intended to be a documentary film with a number of interviews, but with the onset of the Covid-19 crisis, this proved to be difficult. Naseeba therefore decided to turn the research and interview material she had collected so far into an animated film. Producing an animated short film was a challenging task for Naseeba, as it was her first time. At the same time, she used the time of lockdown intensively to familiarise herself with the new production format, drew endlessly and finally completed her work in October 2020.