A Blue Print for Toads and Snakes

The exhibition features several new works by Sammy Baloji. “Central“to these new pieces is the theatre play Chura na Nyoka (“The Toad and the Snake”), written by Joseph Kiwele, a Congolese born statesman who later served as minister in the Katanga Region. The play, which holds a metaphorical message of ethnic segregation, was commissioned by the Belgian colonial regime as an “educational tool” for the population. Baloji relates Kiwele’s theatre script to the colonial urban planning of the “indigenous city” of Lubumbashi, which was also structured according to a politics of segregation. Traces of this segregation are still visible today, for example in the shape of the “cordon sanitaire” (sanitary corridor), a buffer zone inscribed in the landscape meant to effectively separate the black and white population. It is also reflected in the street names, which refer to different ethnic populations. In addition, the aftermath of this colonial segregation resonates in Congo’s contemporary society, which is rife with struggles and ethnic tensions, intensified by economic interests. Both are now used as input for the works in Baloji’s solo exhibition.