SATURDAY 20 SEPTEMBER | 17:30 | SCREENING | POST-COLONIAL

Sammy Baloji alternates excerpts from 1943 and 1957 archives—colonial propaganda produced by the National Institute for Agronomic Studies in the Belgian Congo—with images of those very same sites filmed in the 21st century. Laura Horelli films Simon Tjimbawe as he responds to questions sent by a museum in Braunschweig, where the belt of his ancestor, Chief Kahimemua—executed by the Germans in 1896—is exhibited. Broersen & Lukács reinterpret the song from Walt Disney’s 1967 film “The Jungle Book”, emblematic of Western imperialism through its distorted vision of nature and animals. In a dilapidated greenhouse, a composite of Western botanical gardens where plant and tree species from colonised countries are altered, a ghostly figure emerges in a dance recalling that of “The Jungle Book”, before vanishing and giving way to the avatars of a Dutch Afro-Surinamese music group. Victor Missud and Marina Russo Villani film the water people in Benin. Once in resistance against colonisation, they now confront the water hyacinth, which suffocates their lake as it reproduces at vertiginous speed.

Sammy Baloji: Aequare. The Future that Never Was | Exp. documentary | 4k | colour | 0:21:00 | Democratic Republic of Congo / Belgium | 2024

The film swings between archival film clips dating from 1943 and 1957, sourced from INEAC’s colonial propaganda, and 21st century captures of the same Yangambi premises, like a pendulum that never moves time forwards. An acronym for the former National Institute for the Agronomic Study of the Belgian Congo, its post-colonial successor, the Institut national pour l’Etude et la Recherche Agronomique (INERA), is on film so suffused with past, colonial ‘coordinate systems’ that the present looks inert and at a standstill, as if held hostage by frames of knowledge that refuse to abdicate.

Decades after decolonization, that persistent hold is made explicit by an imposing and intact map of the Belgian Congo hung high on the wall, and by all the remaining rusty machines, labelled test tubes and rotting reports and specimens, dusty instruments of measure, and laboratories. Against the crumbling of these infrastructures, a devoted population of Congolese clerks seem to assist the preservation of the collected data and methods, in a choreography of gestures that the montage reveals to be inherited from the colonial decades. Amidst images of farmers burning trees to make the charcoal sold at surrounding markets, or those of clerks’ motivational posts proudly professing the exactitude of their pursuit, the atavism of colonial ecology seems apparent. (Excerpt from: Sandrine Colard, “From The Equator, I Have Seen The Future”.)

Biography

Since 2005, Sammy Baloji has been exploring the memory and history of the Democratic Republic of Congo. His work is an ongoing research on the cultural, architectural and industrial heritage of the Katanga region, as well as questioning the impact of the Belgian colonization. He touches upon a variety of media to translate his research into artefacts. His use of photographic archives allows him to manipulate time and space, comparing ancient colonial narratives with contemporary economic imperialism. His video works, installations, sculptures, and photographic series highlight how identities are shaped, transformed, perverted and reinvented. His critical view of contemporary societies is a warning about how cultural cliches continue to shape collective memories and thus allow social and political power games to continue to dictate human behavior.

His recent personal exhibitions include: “Sammy Baloji”, Goldsmiths CCA, London (2024), “Unextractable: Sammy Baloji invites”, Kunsthalle Mainz, Mainz (2024), “Style Congo: Heritage & Heresy”, CIVA, Brussels (2023), “K(C)ongo, Fragments of Interlaced Dialogues. Subversive Classifications”, Palazzo Pitti, Florence (2022).

He has recently participated in the 35th Bienal de Sao Paulo (2023), the Architecture Biennale of Venice (2023), the 15th Sharjah Biennial (2023), the Sydney Biennial (2020), documenta 14 (Kassel/Athens, 2017)

Sammy Baloji co-founded in 2008 the Rencontres Picha/Biennale de Lubumbashi. In September 2019 Sammy Baloji started a PhD in Artistic Research titled “Contemporary Kasala and Lukasa: towards a Reconfiguration of Identity and Geopolitics” at Sint Lucas Antwerpen.

Laura Horelli, Simon Tjimbawe: In the Beginning There Was Cultural Identity | Exp. documentary | hdv | colour | 0:08:00 | Finland / Germany | 2023

"Ombazu yaKouHerero yazikama okuza kororowa." A studio in Berlin-Kreuzberg. Simon Tjimbawe has chosen this location to answer questions sent by a museum in Braunschweig. The museum is exhibiting Chief Kahimemua’s belt, which will be soon given back to Namibia. Kahimemua was an Ovambanderu leader, who was executed by Germans in 1896. His descendants are related to Tjimbawe’s family.

Biography

Laura Horelli is a visual artist and filmmaker living in Berlin. She has been researching the historical relations between Namibia and Germany since 2016, particularly the relationship of the liberation movement SWAPO and the East German state during the Cold War. Horelli was born in Helsinki, grew up partly in Nairobi and London.

Her work has been shown in solo exhibitions, among others at the Photographic Gallery Hippolyte, Helsinki; John Muafangejo Art Centre Gallery, Windhoek; Neue Gesellschaft für bildende Kunst, Berlin; Muu galleria, Helsinki; Berlinische Galerie, Berlin; Ludlow38 Curatorial Residencies, New York.

She has participated in various group exhibitions and workshops, including in the frame of the Neue Dauerausstellung zur Ethnologisches Sammlung des Städtischen Museum Braunschweig; Sprengel Museum Hannover; Albertinum, Dresden; Kleine Humboldt Galerie, Berlin; 68. Berlinale, 13. Forum Expanded; Istanbul Modern; Galleria D’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea, Bergamo; Whitechapel Gallery, London; Momentum 7, Nordic Biennial of Contemporary Art; Galerie für Zeitgenössische Kunst, Leipzig; The 53th Venice Biennale (the Danish and Nordic Pavilions); Göteborgs konsthall, Göteborg; Centre for Art and Media Karlsruhe (ZKM); Nobel Peace Centre, Oslo; Bozar Centre for Fine Arts, Brussels; The 6th Gwangju Biennale, Gwangju; Rencontres Internationales Paris/Berlin; University of Namibia, Windhoek / Swakopmund Museum; HKW, Berlin; Sinema Transtopia, Berlin; Kino Arsenal, Berlin; 69. Berlinale, 14. Forum Expanded; Transmediale, Berlin.

Simon Tjimbawe is a Herero born in West Berlin. His father was a member of the liberation movement SWANU who studied economics in Leipzig in the 1960s. He is a film sound mixer and lives and works in Berlin.

Broersen & Lukács: I Wan'na Be Like You | Exp. fiction | hdv | colour | 0:12:40 | Netherlands | 2024

Walt Disney’s film “The Jungle Book” (1967) and the 1894 book by Rudyard Kipling on which it is based are emblematic of Western imperialism, not only othering nature and animals, but also bearing colonial traces. This film by Broersen & Lukács, “I Wan’na Be Like You”, is named after the song of the same name from Disney's film. A ghostly figure appears and seduces the viewer with a dance and a song reminiscent of the song from “The Jungle Book”. The scene is set in a dilapidated glasshouse, a composite of several Western botanical gardens, a place where ‘exotic’ nature is tamed and studied for the scientific needs of mankind. A place where plant and tree species from colonised countries are othered and externalised. After its song and dance, the ghostly creature disappears to make way for the avatars of the Dutch Afro-Surinamese music group Black Harmony. They walk towards the greenhouse and confidently sing “Na mi”, “I am”, in their native language—a song that is their version of the Disney song.

Biography

Margit Lukács and Persijn Broersen are an Amsterdam-based artist duo whose practice explores the intricate entanglements between nature, culture and technology. Their practice includes films, digital animations, and spatial installations that explore how media shapes perceptions of the natural and constructed worlds.

Graduates of Graphic Design at the Gerrit Rietveld Academie, they went on to complete their MFA at the Sandberg Institute and were artists-in-residence at the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam.

Broersen & Lukács’ artistic inquiry is rooted in a deep engagement with media theory, art history, and mythology. Drawing from cinematic, scientific, and historical sources, they reimagine landscapes and natural phenomena through digitally layered environments. Their work often reflects on the politics of representation and the appropriation of nature—reconfiguring dominant narratives through fragmented, multi-perspective storytelling.

Their installations and films have been widely shown at major institutions and international biennials, including the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam (NL), Centre Pompidou (FR), FOAM (NL), MUHKA (BE), Centraal Museum (NL), MacKenzie Art Gallery (CA), WRO Biennale (PL), Biennale of Sydney (AU), Rencontres Internationales (HKW Berlin, Louvre and Grand Palais Paris), and Wuzhen Biennale (CN). In 2024, they represented the Netherlands at the Gwangju Biennale in South Korea. Their film I Wan’na Be Like You was nominated for the Tiger Award at IFFR 2024.

Victor Missud, Marina Russo Villani: Blooming | Exp. documentary | 4k | colour | 0:45:00 | France / Italy, Benin | 2024

In Benin, the water people, who once fought against colonisation, are now facing water hyacinth, a colonising plant that reproduces at breakneck speed, suffocating the lake. Realism and imagination intertwine, as if one were only understandable or tolerable because of the other.

Biographies

Victor Missud's work takes a poetic interest in people marginalised from a territory and society, who become non-professional actors and actresses in his works. Blending documentary, fiction and genre cinema, his works have been presented and awarded prizes in France and abroad - Visions du Réel, IFF Rotterdam, Hors Pistes - Centre Pompidou, Rencontres Internationales Paris/Berlin, Etats Généraux du Documentaire de Lussas. In 2024, he joined Le Fresnoy - National Studio of Contemporary Arts.

Italian and a graduate in Art Economics from Bocconi University, Marina Russo Villani trained in cinema and screenwriting in France, at the Sorbonne Nouvelle and Paris Nanterre. A screenwriter and director of fiction and documentaries, she co-wrote ‘À qui le monde’ (To Whom Does the World Belong), a fantastical political fable that paints a fantastical and ironic portrait of how the world works. In parallel with her work as an author, she founded her production company, Filibusta, in 2023.