“Sènsa” is the collaboration between Ashbel, artist Paul Maheke and musician Nkisi. Playing with motifs of presence and withdrawal, the performance insists on the sensorial. A blurring of the field of vision is at the heart of Sènsa, a Bantu word that translates as “coming to visibility,” “to appear from far away,” or “to reveal itself.” Informed by Dr. Kimbwandènde Kia Bunseki Fu-Kiau’s 1991 book African Cosmology of the Bantu-Kongo: Principles of Life and Living, Sènsa positions the cosmology of the Bantu-Kongo as a point of entry which grounds the performance in a diasporic imaginary. Sènsa brings to the fore voices often marginalized in Western-dominated history. The performance oscillates between visibility and erasure with a lighting system conceived by Ariel Efraim Ashbel while Nkisi’s music alternates between atmospheric waves and forceful musical spasms to create a disorienting sonic environment generated and treated live by sound. Ghostly shadows appear and disappear, mumbled words akin to spells are being cast, and echoes of the building’s vibrations build an intoxicating performance.
DATES:
2019: Pre-premiere: Block universe festival London, UK
2019: Pre-premiere: Triangle France Marseille, France
2019: Pre-premiere: Volksbühne Berlin, Germany
2019: Premiere: Performa Biennale NYC, US
2019: Venice Biennale, Italy
2019: Museum Ludwig Cologne, Germany
2021: Bourse de Commerce Paris, France
2022: MDT Stockholm, Sweden
2023: HAU Hebbel am Ufer Berlin, Germany
