3
January - 2 March 2009, EI
Huis
Video screening at the EI window gallery — program curated by Lieve
D'hondt
COMMENT ON SAPE À KINSHASA
How to show your clothes and style in
Kinshasa
Some gestures and movements
Astrid S. Klein 2008
2 x DV Video, French, English subtitels, 4:3
DV Video 1 - with Mamie Claudine Mambu, RDC/Democratic Republic of
Congo
DV Video 2 - with Hubert Mahela Katamba, RDC/Democratic Republic of
Congo
Mamie Claudine Mambu and Hubert Mahela Katamba, from Kinshasa, show in an
improvised dialogue with the artist Astrid S. Klein, how young people present
their clothes and style in the streets of Kinshasa today. The two performers
pretend to wear labeled designer clothes and accessoires like the
Sapeurs1 do, and demonstrate, how they percept actually the Sapeurs
and their inventions of social success.
Astrid S. Klein is a German visual artist, working on longterm artistic
projects. She presents her work in different medias - in film, text, sound,
performance and installation. Actually she lives in Stuttgart/Germany and
Paris/France.
The video work Comment on sape à Kinshasa is part of the project Briller et s’envoler, Astrid S. Klein started 2005 on contemporary
processes of re-invention of oneself in an African and European urban cultures.
She researches the oscillating elements between the continents, related to the
colonial past and the contemporary now.
(see Violente Question, Installation 2008, Rue Gutenberg,
Filmproject 2008, with the journalist Solo Soro, and her text contributions in
„Les Histoires Communes“ Kuenstlerhaus Stuttgart 2007)
Mamie Claudine Mambu is a musician and performer from Kinshasa, RDC, member
of the women theatre group Ngoonâ, the band Nsumenu and in the team of the
cultural center Espace Masolo in Kinshasa.
Hubert Mahela Katamba is storyteller and performer from Kinshasa, RDC, member
of the TamTamTheatre and co-founder of the cultural center Espace Masolo in
Kinshasa.
Astrid S. Klein: a.s.k@t-online.de
(1) LA SAPE
Société des Ambienceurs et Personnes élégantes
The Society of Ambience and People of Elegance
The SAPE was invented at the end of the 1970s in Congo-Kinshasa
(Zaire) and Congo-Brazzaville (République du Congo) with the intention to be
successfull in Paris and Brussels and then return to Kinshasa or Brazzaville in
a glorious way.
Young Congolese people, mainly men, started to develop a complex
system of codes concerning their appearance. They created their own distinctive
image by wearing expensive European and Japanese designer clothes and
transforming them into a special look.
As the SAPE is connected to the emergence of new Congolese music
styles - Papa Wemba is the famous icon - the Sapeurs staged theatrical battles
(la danse des griffes - the dance of labels) to show off their outfits in
concerts, clubs and in the streets.
3
January - 2 March 2009, EI
Huis
Video screening at the EI window gallery — program curated by Lieve
D'hondt
COMMENT ON SAPE À KINSHASA
2 x DV Video, French, English subtitels, 4:3 DV Video 1 - with Mamie Claudine Mambu, RDC/Democratic Republic of Mamie Claudine Mambu and Hubert Mahela Katamba, from Kinshasa, show in an Astrid S. Klein is a German visual artist, working on longterm artistic The video work Comment on sape à Kinshasa is part of the project Briller et s’envoler, Astrid S. Klein started 2005 on contemporary (see Violente Question, Installation 2008, Rue Gutenberg, Mamie Claudine Mambu is a musician and performer from Kinshasa, RDC, member Hubert Mahela Katamba is storyteller and performer from Kinshasa, RDC, member Astrid S. Klein: a.s.k@t-online.de
(1) LA SAPE Société des Ambienceurs et Personnes élégantes The Society of Ambience and People of Elegance The SAPE was invented at the end of the 1970s in Congo-Kinshasa Young Congolese people, mainly men, started to develop a complex As the SAPE is connected to the emergence of new Congolese music |
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