Somewhere between restoration and reappropriation, this session explores the past: what are we looking at when we look at a work of art? Who is speaking, who is being looked at, and who has the power to tell the story? In 1958, Paul Haesaerts filmed the art of the Belgian Congo in Sous le masque noir. His gaze remains shaped by the colonial representations of his time: the objects are shown and interpreted, but never given a voice. More than sixty years later, Matthias De Groof reverses this approach in Sous le masque blanc: le film qu’Haesaerts aurait pu faire. Using the original footage and the words of Aimé Césaire, spoken in Lingala by Maravilha Munto, he gives the Congolese masks a voice.

The screening will be followed by a conversation with Matthias De Groof (filmmaker) and Véronique Clette-Gakuba (researcher at the Metices research centre at ULB on coloniality and postcoloniality in arts and culture).

 + GUEST