Sammy Baloji (born 1978) is a photographer from the Democratic Republic of the Congo. He works in Lubumbashi and Brussels, and held exhibitions in Amsterdam, Paris, Brussels, Bilbao, Cape Town and Bamako. [1] [2]
Sammy Baloji (born 1978) is a photographer from the Democratic Republic of the Congo. He works in Lubumbashi and Brussels, and held exhibitions in Amsterdam, Paris, Brussels, Bilbao, Cape Town and Bamako. [1] [2]
Baloji was born in Lubumbashi on December 29, 1978. He graduated in literature and human science at the University of Lubumbashi. [3] [4]
After his study he first began to work as a cartoonist. He later specialized in video art and photography. He made much of his work in his own province of Katanga. Recurrent in his work are ethnographic exploitation, architecture and urbanism, such as the exploitation of man and environment in the Congolese urban landscape. [3]
When the artist was younger, he and his family were in the midst of the growing poverty that followed the ending control of Belgium over the Katanga province. His father, Célestin Baloji, lost both his job and house as a result to this. During a day in 1998, when Baloji was leaving school, he was given a camera by his brother-in-law. He was later given a Canon camera from his aunt in 2003. After obtaining his first camera, Baloji had trained under photographer, Simon Mukundayi. [5]
The artist also cofounded the biennale at Lubumbashi with Gulda el Magambo Bin Ali in 2008, with the intention of art being more accessible within the area, as there were little resources for it at the time. [6]
Baloji is commonly known for his photographic works, which usually pertains to Lubumbashi's 20th century history, including Mémoire, The Album, and his Kolwezi series. [7] [8] [9]
The theme within most of Baloji's works is in relation to Lubumbashi's colonized history, which was initially controlled by Belgium. This includes the time where the Belgium king, Leopold II, was in possession of the Congolese people in the province, but they were eventually passed off to the Union Minière du Haut-Katanga. The union started to control the Congolese people into forced mining labor in 1911. The land that held Lubumbashi was rich in valuable materials, with the most abundant source being copper, something that can be seen in Baloji's sculpture work. [7]
Photographic Essay on Urban Planning was also a collection of photographs created by the artist himself. The series contained twelve images within a grid, depicting half as aerial images of Lubumbashi and the other six filled with flies and mosquitoes. This was in relation to the forced division by the Belgian colonizers on the Congolese people, under the disguise it was meant to separate the people from the malaria holding insects. [10]
Baloji also has works in sculpture. The two copper sculptures, Sociétés Secrètes and The Other Memorial were similar pieces that both depicted the texture of scarification, which were in reference to the artist's culture. Sociétés Secrètes contained eight bas-reliefs, which are all unique to one another due to the varying scarification patterns. The Other Memorial is dome shaped and also contains the patterns of scarification, but its historical meaning this time reflects certain instances that happened during World War I. [10]
Baloji and David Nadeau-Bernatchez co-directed the 2020 documentary film Rumba Rules, New Genealogies (Rumba Rules, nouvelles généalogies), about the music scene of Kinshasa. [11]
Mémoire is a series of images composed by Baloji himself, sharing the historical events of Lubumbashi during its colonization in the 20th century. The artist uses black-and-white archival photos of the Congolese people and crops them out onto a colored, contemporary background of mine sites they were forced to work on. Baloji does these compositions and edits in Photoshop. Multiple images within the series portrays the vulnerability and uneasiness of the figures presented on each of the photographs. [7]
The series was also done in a video adaption format, for Baloji's first use in time-based media. This over fourteen-minute video still follows the lines of the original photo series’ meaning, but is now presented by the dancing performance of Congolese choreographer, Faustin Linyekula. [12]
Solo shows
Group shows
In 2007 Baloji was twice awarded at the African Photography Encounters in Bamako, Mali, with the Prize Africa in Creation (Prix Afrique en Creation) and the Prize for the Image (Prix pour l’image). [16] In 2009 he was honored with a Prince Claus Award from the Netherlands, for "his highly original inscription of the painful history of human and environmental exploitation into the present-day landscape, for bringing Congo's current realities to an international platform, for his important contribution to the memory of the Congo providing a new reading of the present, and for his challenging demonstration that development can only be realized after duly taking into account the traumas of the past." [17]
He received two Prix Iris nominations for Rumba Rules, New Genealogies at the 24th Quebec Cinema Awards in 2022, for Best Documentary Film and Best Cinematography in a Documentary. [18]
Congolese music is one of the most influential music forms of the African continent. Since the 1930s, Congolese musicians have had a huge impact on the African musical scene and elsewhere. Many contemporary genres of music, such as Kenyan Benga and Colombian Champeta, have been heavily influenced by Congolese music. In 2021, Congolese rumba joined other living traditions such as Jamaican reggae music and Cuban rumba on UNESCO's "intangible cultural heritage of humanity" list.
Lubumbashi is the second-largest city in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, located in the country's southeasternmost part, along the border with Zambia. The capital and principal city of the Haut-Katanga Province, Lubumbashi is the center of mining in the region, acting as a hub for many of the country's largest mining companies. No definite population figures are available, but the population of the city's urban area is estimated to be around 2,584,000 in 2021.
The culture of the Democratic Republic of the Congo is extremely varied, reflecting the great diversity and different customs which exist in the country. Congolese culture combines the influence of tradition to the region, but also combines influences from abroad which arrived during the era of colonization and continue to have a strong influence, without destroying the individuality of many tribal customs.
Malick Sidibé was a Malian photographer from a Fulani (Fula) village in Soloba, who was noted for his black-and-white studies of popular culture in the 1960s in Bamako, Mali. Sidibé had a long and fruitful career as a photographer in Bamako, and was a well-known figure in his community. In 1994 he had his first exhibition outside of Mali and received much critical praise for his carefully composed portraits. Sidibé's work has since become well known and renowned on a global scale. His work was the subject of a number of publications and exhibited throughout Europe and the United States. In 2007, he received a Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at the Venice Biennale, becoming both the first photographer and the first African so recognized. Other awards he has received include a Hasselblad Award for photography in 2003, an International Center of Photography Infinity Award for Lifetime Achievement (2008), and a World Press Photo award (2010).
The University of Lubumbashi, also known by the acronym UNILU, is one of the largest universities in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It is located in Lubumbashi in Haut-Katanga Province, previously Katanga Province. The campus is located in the northern part of the city, west of the airport.
Abdoulaye Konaté is a Malian artist. He was born in Diré and lives and works in Bamako.
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"Indépendance Cha Cha" was a song performed by Joseph Kabasele from the group L'African Jazz in the popular Congolese rumba style. The song has been described as "Kabasele's most memorable song" and one of the first Pan-African hits.
Renzo Martens is a Dutch artist who currently lives and works in Amsterdam and Kinshasa. Martens became known for his controversial work, including Episode III: Enjoy Poverty (2008), a documentary that suggests that the Congo market their poverty as a natural resource. In 2010 Renzo Martens initiated the art institute Human Activities that postulates a gentrification program on a palm oil plantation in the Congolese rainforest.
The Katanga insurgency is an ongoing rebellion by a number of rebel groups in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, some of which aim for the creation of a separate state within Katanga. While the insurgency has been active in various forms since 1963, insurgent groups have recently redoubled their efforts after the 2011 jail break that freed Gédéon Kyungu Mutanga, who commanded the majority of the Katangese separatist groups until his surrender to Congolese authorities in October 2016.
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Joana Choumali is a freelance photographer based in Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire. She uses photography to explore issues of identity and the diversity of African cultures.
The following is a timeline of the history of the city of Lubumbashi, Democratic Republic of the Congo.
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Bogumil (Bogumił) Jewsiewicki Koss is a Polish-Canadian historian and an Africanist specialising in the history of Central Africa, notably the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and the social usage of visual memory.
Eddy Kamuanga Ilunga is a contemporary painter from the Democratic Republic of the Congo whose Afrofuturism works have been exhibited across Africa and in Europe and the United States.
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