Image: Centro de Arte Moderna Gulbenkian, Lisbon
Sammy Baloji will present ‘Missa Utica’ at 20:00 on 19 September at the Anfiteatro ao Ar Livre in Jardim Gulbenkian, Lisbon. The 90-minute programme comprises the concert-performance followed by a conversation in English with Baloji, Alexandra Balona and Rita Fabiana.
Presented in partnership with Contemporânea, ‘Missa Utica’ (2024) moves between live performance, concert and artistic staging. The work revisits early contacts between Europe and the Kingdom of Kongo, bringing together colonial memory, spirituality and music.
The performance draws on Baloji’s research into Congolese objects held in European collections and returns to encounters between Western Christianity and central Africa around the end of the 15th century. Its title refers to Utica, an ancient Roman city in present-day Tunisia, where Dom Henrique, son of Afonso I, King of Kongo, was consecrated as the first African bishop of Black descent.
‘Missa Utica’ incorporates the ‘Missa Luba’, a liturgical composition created in the Belgian Congo in the 1950s by Franciscan missionaries using traditional Congolese musical styles. The work combines this history with Congolese rumba, recited verse and improvised sounds.
Baloji is responsible for the research, concept and staging; Fiston Mwanza Mujila wrote the text, and Bwanga Pilipili performs. Pytshens Kambilo and Barbara Drazkov provide musical composition and performance. ‘Missa Utica’ is part of the performance programme ‘My Center is Not in the Solar System’, artistically directed by Celina Brás and curated by Alexandra Balona.
