A rope climb as a way to tell the story of women’s rights: that is the premise of “Woman on Rope”, a project by Guila Clara Kessous directed by Aurelia Khazan. L’essentiel reports that it was recently presented at Casino 2000 in Mondorf-les-Bains, as well as in Mondorff, on the French side of the border. This appearance in the two neighbouring border towns highlights an approach that brings together history, the body and artistic expression.
Here, the physical act provides the thread of a story: climbing higher, pausing, then starting to move again. According to the project’s presentation, this physical progression serves to explore a history in which gains can be challenged. Our article presents this approach based on its documentation and the words of its creator; it is not a review following a full viewing.
A vertical history of rights
The project’s website describes a vertical chronology: each handhold corresponds to a date, place or moment in women’s history. Climbing becomes a way of moving through gains, contested freedoms and paths that need to be reopened. The rope thus gives visible form to a history that might otherwise remain a series of abstract reference points.
Guila Clara Kessous told L’essentiel that the idea also came from a personal challenge. As a child, she was mocked because she could not climb a rope; much later, after having two children, she began practising and developed the story from that experience. Her own journey informs the project, but does not make the physical ability to climb a prerequisite for emancipation. The metaphor is about momentum and collective effort, not an individual formula for erasing inequality.
In the interview, Kessous cites sexual violence used as a weapon of war in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the restrictions imposed on women by the Taliban in Afghanistan as examples of setbacks. Bringing these examples together with the gains referred to gives the chronology its momentum: the aim is to tell the story of rights that are built up and can also be attacked. These are the examples chosen by the creator to explain her film.
When movement becomes a story
The film’s presentation links this climb to women’s place in sport: being able to train, be visible and access spaces for sporting activity. The body is both a means of expressing an idea and the subject of concrete freedoms. This choice brings an immediately understandable experience—physical effort—closer to broader collective questions.
The proposed reading operates on two levels. There is Kessous’s personal challenge, which gave rise to the idea, and the collective chronology the project seeks to represent. Distinguishing between them avoids reducing a struggle for rights to a question of individual willpower. The climb offers an image through which to discuss it; it does not measure how much equality a society has achieved.
The website also envisages educational use in schools. In this context, a screening would be a starting point for exploring the stages in the history of women’s rights. This is presented as an ambition, with no account of an already evaluated school programme. Kessous also told L’essentiel that she would like to organise discussions around the film every 8 March, International Women’s Day. No schedule for upcoming screenings has been provided.
A work created by several voices
“Woman on Rope” is a project by Guila Clara Kessous, who also performs in it, and is directed by Aurelia Khazan. The distinction clarifies their roles: the idea and on-screen presence are Kessous’s; the film’s direction is credited to Khazan. The UNESCO profile also places Kessous within a career in which art serves the defence of human rights and gender equality.
Named a UNESCO Artist for Peace in 2012, Kessous has organised the international Femina Vox forum since 2021. She founded it, and it is held each year under the patronage of UNESCO, according to the organisation’s profile. This context helps explain the continuity of her approach. It does not mean that UNESCO produced, funded or officially selected “Woman on Rope”.
The film’s website lists a presentation on 8 March 2026. L’essentiel subsequently reports a screening at the Cannes Film Festival in May, followed by a recent presentation at Casino 2000 in Mondorf-les-Bains and in Mondorff, France. The two towns are close to one another but lie on opposite sides of the border; the account gives no date or time that would allow an upcoming screening to be announced. The Cannes appearance is reported as a screening, not as participation in the official competition.
What the rope makes visible
The project chooses a simple image to make perceptible a history marked by breaks and new beginnings. The rope traces an axis; the climb connects movement with memory. In the creators’ description, this structure gives space to interruptions as well as advances.
The useful point of reference for discovering this project is therefore the relationship between movement and chronology: how can a physical journey tell a story about something other than a performance? That is the question raised by its documentary presentation. Its appearance in Mondorf gives it a foothold in local cultural news, while also opening up onto the creators’ broader ambition: to spark discussion about women’s rights.
References
- L’essentiel, presentation in Luxembourg and interview with Guila Clara Kessous
- Official “Woman on Rope” website
- UNESCO profile of Guila Clara Kessous
Guila Clara Kessous speaking at a workshop at Boston University on 28 April 2016. Archive photograph, separate from the screenings of “Woman on Rope” in Mondorf.
Center for the Study of Europe Boston University — Wikimedia Commons — CC BY-SA 2.0.
