Sonia Kessi is an Algerian photographer and filmmaker born in At Ferɛac, a mountain village in Kabylia, northern Algeria. She began her career in photography with The Nouba of the Shepherdesses, a photographic series that challenges viewers’ expectations of the Kabyle people as confined to folkloric or buccolic traditions. In 2017, Sonia participated in a documentary filmmaking workshop and directed her first film, Nnuba (Taking Turns). Akal is her second documentary film.