Ugo Mangin

For Real

Returning to the familiarity of his childhood bedroom, provocative and impossibly stylish French-Cameroonian rapper Ichon is undergoing a process of artistic reinvention. Feeling pigeonholed in a hard-edged persona that he feels does not represent the real him, Ichon struggles to produce his first album as a singer-songwriter. Aided by beginner-level YouTube tutorials and buoyed by his close confidante and cheerleader, his mother, his turbulent process of regeneration is further complicated by the doubts and limitations imposed on him by his producing partners, who seem unsure of how to handle this rebirth. Captured in ethereal MiniDV, the vulnerability of his artistic practice unfolds between his recording and psychotherapy sessions. The road to artistic freedom is rarely smooth and For Real lets us in on the rocky parts of a journey that we seldom see.