Far from being a simple Moorish proverb, this image illustrates the value that the patriarchal Mauritanian society places on its women. In order to be beautiful, desirable, to fit the mould and find a husband, the Moorish woman must be round. To respond to this canon of beauty, which varies from obesity to overweight depending on the period, there are two techniques.

The first, centuries-old and traditional: the forced feeding of young girls to marry (mbelha in hassanya) based on milk, porridge and millet powder in large quantities ingested under physical duress.

The second: modern force-feeding as an «individual choice» using food, natural products for rapid growth, but also medicines used for their side effects or pills for livestock. In order to obtain the desired shapes and achieve the ideal of beauty conveyed by Mauritanian society, some women are willing to take inconsiderate risks for their health.

The Mbelha project, carried out in February 2020, is at the crossroads of the documentary and artistic fields. It aims to represent the different realities experienced by the Moorish people by staging the techniques of force-feeding.

Thus, I chose to speak with the participants, all of whom were between 20 and 30 years old. This generational choice was motivated by the hindsight that new generations can have, both carried by the stories of their elders; stuck in the norms of beauty that en- dure; motivated by the hope of a change induced by the opening to other societies and finally aware of the dangers of the practice of force-feeding on their health. The scenes are the result of these intimate interviews, whose anonymous testimonies are transcribed and can be broadcast on a soundtrack.

The Mbelha project is not in-tended to denounce a cultural practice from a Western point of view but to give voice to the Mauritanian women concerned by making them participate and get involved. It is essential for me to see a parallel with the representation of women’s bodies conveyed in Europe and its consequences. Encouraged to be thin, firm and shapely, we have at our disposal slimming and firming creams, techniques to erase cellulite and stretch marks, appetite suppressant pills, fitness classes, diets to lose weight etc.. These are all dangers for physical and psychological health. In conclusion, to each given society corresponds an ideal of beauty to which women submit themselves.

The project therefore questions, more globally, the influence and impact of beauty standards on women, their bodies and their image.

The chosen aesthetics can be summed up as follows: beautiful and trashy, raw lights, bright colors, ironically playing with advertising codes in order to aestheticize the violence of a practice. My bias is therefore the following: to show what access to an ideal of beauty can imply for women who are subject to the injunctions of a given society. The exclusive use of the 50mm fixed focal length and vertical format, as well as the predominance of tight shots, makes it possible to represent the crushing of the woman despite her physical weight and her shapes, which are meant to be imposing.