She’s bold, she’s creative and she’s super talented! Meet Senegalese graffiti artist and rapper Zeinixx in Dakar.
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00:00Xenics was the lady in the building
00:04Graffiti
00:06Meet the amazing Xenics
00:09Xenics is a hip-hop innovator and activist who has made her mark as Senegal's premier female graffiti artist.
00:15She dedicates most of her time to empowering other young creators.
00:19Xenics was the lady in the building
00:24Graffiti
00:26Xenics was the lady in the building
00:29Graffiti
00:31Meet the amazing Xenics
00:33Xenics was the lady in the building
00:35This place is amazing. I want to know about this. Can you tell me about it?
00:40We're in Leo Paltzida Synchro Cultural Institute in Bikin.
00:44This is my sanctuary, the place where I learned how to do graffiti.
00:49This place is my second home. I come here every day for the last 15 years.
00:55Well, it looks like there's a lot of things going on here.
00:59Why don't we go over there and you tell me about everything that's happening here?
01:07We're in Xen Workshop, which means Xenics Entertainment, my enterprise,
01:13where I put forward the transmission of knowledge to the youth.
01:17I share with them what I've experienced throughout the years.
01:24As it was not so evident to get to this point and learn graffiti at that time.
01:38I'd really like to provide this chance to the young generation of now.
01:42I started graffiti at the age of 17.
01:45Here you have young Xenics with small sketching, drawing, searching, etc.
01:51Trying to find my mark.
01:59When I was 17, I was already a painter who wanted to be directly connected to the art world.
02:05I wanted to be a painter.
02:08When I was 17, I was already a painter who wanted to be directly connected to the painting.
02:13In the long run, I discovered graffiti via TV viewing.
02:18Firstly, I saw people sprayed onto big walls and what amazed me was the wide space for expression they had.
02:23Then immediately I said to myself that I need the same to show off my talent.
02:28And as a woman, would you say that you actually brought something on the table that wasn't here before?
02:36As I went along, I've been able to learn from my experiences, from my life.
02:47That even though we're in a hip-hop environment that can be very male-dominated here in Senegal,
02:53I learned that art has no sex.
02:55In fact, it is the art in the heart and also the human being at the center.
03:00I said then to myself, why not do things my way?
03:06I love everything that I heard here and now I want to see a real wall.
03:09Can we go outside and check out something amazing?
03:12Let's go.
03:15The wall.
03:23Fifteen young talented artists, who after one month of training in graffiti,
03:27had realized together this wall with their own ideas,
03:30with the desire to share what they had kept for a while in their within.
03:34That's it.
03:37And there they painted Jodnaniye Weku, which means it's time to break the chains and to be free.
03:43Their main topics are peace, love and some others, hip-hop values and culture.
03:54And with that, we leave Xenix on a high note.