Event Details

Up to the present day, the Congo serves as a screen for the projection of Western as well as African ideas and fictions. The Democratic Republic of the Congo is famous for its vibrant art scene. Nowhere else in Africa is artistic creativity so diverse, inventive, and at the pulse of time. Still, in the past, too, people in the Congo brought forth impressive masks, figures, and designer pieces, many of which today rank as icons of African art. For the first time, the exhibition presents objects and photographs brought back from the Congo in 1938/39 by the art ethnologist Hans Himmelheber: colourful masks, powerful figures and artfully designed everyday objects. This contrasts with contemporary positions of renowned Congolese artists.