For Faustin Linyekula theatre is a question of body and presence. This is what he learned during his initial training in the drama workshops at the Centre Culturel Français in Kisangani, his home city in the north-east of the Democratic Republic of Congo. His studies were disrupted by the war in his country so he went to Kenya, and developed his work with Opiyo Okach, mime artist and dancer, turning more towards dance and choreography. In 1997, together with Opiyo Okach and dancer Afrah Tenambergen, he formed the Gàara Company, the first ever contemporary dance project in Nairobi. From 1998 until today, Faustin Linyekula launched many projects and diversifed his research, working as a dancer, choreographer and trainer in Europe, South Africa and Reunion Island. In 2001, he decided to return to DRC where he set up a dance and visual theatre production, the Studios Kabako. Since then, he has created his own pieces such as Spectacularly Empty (2001), Triptyque sans Titre (Triptych without Title) (2002) whether for the stage or other performance locations which become installations, evolving performances, such as Radio Okapi (2003 to 2006) or all-night gatherings, like Le Festival des Mensonges (The Festival of Lies). Today he lives in Kisangani.
At the Avignon Festival, Faustin Linyekula was scheduled with Sylvain Prunenec to present Si C'est un Nègre/ Autoportrait (If it's a Negro/Self-Portrait) in the Vif du Sujet in 2003.
Chilean novelist Luis Sepulveda recounts the Patagonian farmers' annual tradition of spending an entire night in a lie-telling competition. Choreographer Faustin Linyekula transposes this practice and places it in the bars of the capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo, Kinshasa. He imagines Le Festival des mensonges (The Festival of Lies) in a convivial setting, in popular music concerts in Congo, listening to nostalgic Rumbas or Ndombolos, people dance, eat and drink and tell stories.
It's essential, as far as Faustin Linyekula is concerned, to remember and to keep on asking questions of History. “I was born in 1974 in a country which was called Zaire. At the age of five, I leaned that there was only one person who could be at the head of that country, President Mobutu. However, on 17th May 1997, I woke up to learn that Zaire no longer existed, that overnight it had become the Democratic Republic of Congo. That Mobutu no longer existed. That day, the whole question of History was revealed to me. I had the impression that they'd lied to me, that my fathers had lied to me all my life,” he says. Surrounded by musicians, dancers and writers like Marie-Louise Bibish Mumbu, whose accounts of daily life in Kinshasa are one of the main threads of this gathering, Faustin Linyekula shares his personal memories and anecdotes, but also the broader history of a country which has been re-written so many times under different names (Democratic Republic of Congo, former Zaire, former Belgian Congo, former Independent State of Congo etc.) along with archival sound and images.
In order to change the frontal rapport which he thinks may mean either you like it or you leave, the choreographer's project uses an approach promoting movement between things and beings.
Distribution
direction artistique :Faustin Linyekula
avec :Papy Ebotani, Djodjo Kazadi, Faustin Linyekula, Marie-Louise Bibish Mumbu et cinq musiciens :(distribution en cours)
les textes de :Marie-Louise Bibish Mumbu
les dessins de :Papa Mfumu'eto 1er
administration :Virginie Dupray
assistée de :Jean-Louis Mwandika
Production
production :Studios Kabako
en coproduction avec :le Centre chorégraphique national de Caen - Basse - Normandie dans le cadre de l'Accueil-studio - ministère de la Culture et de la Communication, le KVS Theater (Bruxelles), le Parc de la Villette (Paris) dans le cadre des Résidences d'artistes 2006
avec le soutien du :Centre national de la danse (Pantin), de la Halle de la Gombe - Centre culturel français de Kinshasa, de l'Organisation internationale de la Francophonie, de la DRAC Île-de-France - ministère de la Culture et de la Communication et de CulturesFrance dans le cadre du programme Afrique en créations