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Kinshasa


2000

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Kinshasa
2000

Kin the beautiful

"We drive and swing around the capital of one of Africa’s “giants.” Kinshasa, a megalopolis: profusion and diversity, colours of the day and noises of the night. What I came to see was popular genius, and I’m not disappointed."

Abstracts

"Regarding Kinshasa, our only contact, for a very long time now, is expressed in terms of troubles and misfortune, corruption and wars, Mobutu’s dictatorship or Kabila’s assassination. It is nonetheless in spite, or because of, these genuine tribulations, that the city is probably the most creative one on the African continent. Apart from the rumbas in Zaire, whose rhythms have danced their way over to us, we are as a rule ignorant about the cultural punch that reigns here, in every form. I was able to see this for myself for five months, 'driving and swinging around' in a rusty old taxi along 'extremely vibrant' avenues, meeting these ladies and gentlemen, these Congolese artists.

'This is the story of a failure'… This is how I could have introduced this work, in the guise of a preliminary warning, the way that Ernesto Che Guevara did for his narrative on his Congolese misadventures. Of the thousand music groups and the thousands of craftspeople, of the hundreds of painters and sculptors, actors, poets and writers, and as many boxers, fighters, wrestlers and football players, I will preserve the frustrated memory of merely brushing the surface of the genius of this immense African city and bringing back only a minuscule testimony."

Extract from Zoé Zoé, Femmes du mondes, 2007, Éditions Gallimard

Works

Kinshasa 3180
Bar de la Perche, 2000

Kinshasa, DRC
Gouache on paper
24 x 60 cm

Kinshasa 3184
Sylvie au bloc à Bandal, 2000

Kinshasa, DRC
Gouache on paper
42 x 32 cm

Kinshasa 3190
Ici charge batterie, 2000

Kinshasa, DRC
Gouache enhanced silver print
40 x 30 cm

Kinshasa 3194
Bidon sur pneu, 2000

Kinshasa, DRC
Gouache enhanced silver print
40 x 30 cm

Kinshasa 3188
Ressorts à lames en fer, 2000

Kinshasa, DRC
Gouache enhanced silver print
40 x 30 cm

Kinshasa 3196
Pyramides de jantes, 2000

Kinshasa, DRC
Gouache enhanced silver print
30 x 40 cm

Kinshasa 3198
Cascades d'enjoliveurs, 2000

Kinshasa, DRC
Gouache enhanced silver print
40 x 30 cm

Kinshasa 3192
Bidons sur jantes, 2000

Kinshasa, DRC
Gouache enhanced silver print
40 x 30 cm

Kinshasa 3202
Clarisse, 2000

Kinshasa, DRC
Gouache on fabric
48 x 37 cm

Kinshasa 3204
Diane, 2000

Kinshasa, DRC
Gouache on paper
41 x 25 cm

Kinshasa 3206
Diane en maillot, 2000

Kinshasa, DRC
Silver print
30 x 40 cm

Kinshasa 3186
La Cité Africaine, 2000

Kinshasa, DRC
Gouache on paper
44 x 35 cm

Kinshasa 3208
La Tribune, 2000

Kinshasa, DRC
Gouache on paper
44 x 32 cm

Kinshasa 3210
Mbuyi Pasteur à l'entraînement, 2000

Kinshasa, DRC
Silver print
40 x 30 cm

Kinshasa 3212
Aux confins de la ville, 2000

Kinshasa, DRC
Sepia turned silver print
30 x 40 cm

Maps

Kinshasa 2790
Map of the DRC ethnic groups, 2000

Gouache on paper
68 x 58 cm

Kinshasa 2791
List of the DRC ethnic groups, 2000

Gouache on paper
68 x 58 cm

Kinshasa 2792
Map of the town of Kinshasa, 2000

Gouache on paper
96 x 129 cm

Books

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