Congo’s past and present interact at Zurich exhibition

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Artist Sammy Baloji reflects on the legacy of Hans Himmelheber and questions how the West manages colonial collections and archives. © Museum Rietberg

Baloji captures the inhumanity of mining practices with poetic words as he embarks on a journey to retrace his roots. © Museum Rietberg/Sammy Baloji

A painting by Monsengo Shula featuring satellites, traditional African art, and Afronauts dressed in colourful textiles. The artist, who lives in Kinshasa, not only refers to the ambitious Congolese space programme of the 1970s, but also paints a new world order with his homeland at the centre of the cosmos. © Museum Rietberg

In EVOLVE the artist Michèle Magema combines the story of her own family with that of Hans Himmelheber. When the German anthropologist was in Belgian Congo, Magema's grandfather, Malongo Isaac Magema, was 20 and worked for the Belgian colonial administration. © Museum Rietberg

Malongo Isaac Magema was an "evolué", a member of the educated urban elite who led a "European" life and believed in education and economic development in the sense of the colonial project. Magema relates her own family history during the colonial period to the photographs of Himmelheber. © Museum Rietberg

The ink strokes seem to penetrate the "paper skin" like scars. The artist, who lives in France, sees her work as a ritual of redemption for the fateful history of her family and country. © Museum Rietberg

Lubumbashi-based musician, composer and artist David Shongo turns to the colonial perspective that permeates Himmelheber's photographs. © Museum Rietberg

Left: X-ray of the Songye power figure, 2019; right: Nkisi (power figure). Hilary Kuyangiko Balu, Kongo, 2017. © Museum Rietberg

Mask from the Pende region seen from a car. Hans Himmelheber, Congo, 1938. © Museum Rietberg, Zurich

Left: the same mask with horns on display at the exhibition. Right: a kambanda mask with a woman's face. Both artists hailed from the Pende region, Congo. The works were made before 1939. © Museum Rietberg

The young artist Fiona Bobo lives and works in Zurich. For her final thesis at the Zurich University of the Arts she grappled with her Congolese roots. She is concerned with questions of identity and interweaves the visual culture of the West and Congo. © Museum Rietberg

Parrots. Steve Bandoma, 2016. Acrylic, ink and collage on paper. Museum Rietberg/Grégory Copitet

A Congolese power figure, also known as "nkishi", made before 1938. The artist comes from the Songye region. © Museum Rietberg

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“Nowhere else in Africa is artistic creativity so diverse, creative, and on the pulse of the times” as in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, says the Rietberg Museum in Zurich, which is currently devoting an exhibition to artists from the African nation.

“Congo as Fiction – Art Worlds Between Past and PresentExternal link” opened on November 22 and continues until March 15. Curated by Michaela Oberhofer and Nanina Guyer, the exhibition places historical works and photographs from Congo alongside the work of contemporary artists.

The starting point for the exhibition is a treasure trove of objects and photographs that the German art ethnologist Hans Himmelheber (1908-2003) brought back from his trip to the then Belgian Congo in 1938-39. The collection includes colourful masks, sculpted figures, and objects from daily life. His photographic legacy also reflects the social upheavals during the heyday of Belgian colonial rule.

For the exhibition, the internationally renowned artist and co-founder of the Lubumbashi Art Biennial Sammy Baloji and the young writer Sinzo Aanza examined Himmelheber’s archive and created their own fictional account of how to tell the story of their homeland.

Paris-based artists Michèle Magema and Fiona Bobo, who was born and raised in canton Zurich, were also commissioned to create works for the exhibition.

The exhibition showcases a total of 13 contemporary artists including Steve Bandoma, Hilary Kuyangiko Balu, Aimé Mpane, Chéri Samba, Yves Sambu, Monsengo Shula and Pathy Tshindele. All of them, whether through form or content, pay tribute to traditional Congolese art and the country’s cultural heritage.