Lot 72: TSHIBUMBA KANDA MATULU (DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO, BORN

TSHIBUMBA KANDA MATULU (DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO, BORN 1947) Colonie Belge: 1. ‘La Marche d’Esclaves’, 47.5 x 71cm 2. ‘La Marche d’Esclaves II’, 39 x 73.5cm 3. ‘Colonie Belge 1885-1959’, 40 x 55cm 4. ‘Colonie Belge II, Culture Obligatoire’, 39.5 x 68cm 5. ‘Colonie Belge 1941, Gouverneur Marron dans Martyrs de l’U.M.H.K a Lubumbashi’, 44 x 71.5cm 6. ‘La mort de Bodson tué par M’siri’, 71.5 x 45cm 7. ‘Le fils du Chef Katanga tué par M’siri l’ami de son père’, 38.5 x 59.5cm 8. ‘La tete historique de M’siri, Msiri fut coupe la tete’, 46 x 72cm 9. ‘La victoire de la force publique sur les Envahisseurs italiens du Kenya 1940-45’, 38 x 60.5cm 10. ‘(Simon) Kimbangu’, 39 x 76cm all signed ‘TSHIBUMBA/ K.M’, and inscribed with titles (to lower edge) acrylic on canvas -10

Provenance Acquired directly from the artist by Mr Etienne Bol in the Republic of Zaire in the mid-1970s. Exhibited London, Sulger-Buel Lovell Gallery, 53 Echoes of Zaire: Popular Painting from Lubumbashi, DRC, 2015. Cat. nos. 1, 2, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 47, 48. This group of paintings makes up the first part of Tshibumba Matulu’s history series. It documents the early years of Belgian colonial rule. This became a common subject amongst the Congolese Popular Painters of the 1960s and 70s. The genre came to be known as Colonie Belge, and tends to emphasis the cruelty and oppression of the Belgian colonialists. Immaculately dressed in their white starched linen, the Belgian administrators look on whilst the native people perform forced labour in the fields. Another painting depicts an African policeman whipping a prisoner having been found guilty by the colonial court. These brutal unadulterated scenes are rare in depicting the life in the Colonie Belge from the Congolese perspective. During the regime, any voices that opposed colonial rule were quickly silenced. Even after independence was granted to the nation in 1960, the European’s sanitized version of events continued to be taught in Congolese schools. The Popular Painters sought to challenge this historical bias, giving a voice to the oppressed. The result is unsettling but profoundly moving. As Susan Hiller has commented: “The ‘Congo Belge’ paintings convey powerful feelings that arouse empathy, horror and shame in the viewer, alongside admiration for the skill of the artists.” Bibliography S. Diop, ed. 53 Echoes of Zaire: Popular Painting from Lubumbashi, DRC, (2015) pp.7, 10.