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Draft:Sinzo Aanza

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Sinzo Aanza
Sinzo Aanza in 2021
Born1990 (age 35–36)
Goma, Democratic Republic of the Congo
Known forLiterature, theatre, photography, installation, performance

Sinzo Aanza (born 1990 in Goma) is a Congolese writer, playwright and visual artist whose practice encompasses literature, theatre, photography, installation and performance.[1]

His work explores fiction, the construction of narratives, memory and forms of representation.[2][3] The Democratic Republic of the Congo constitutes a recurring historical, political and imaginary context in his work.[4][2][5]

Biography

[edit]

Aanza published his first novel, Généalogie d'une banalité, with Vents d'ailleurs in 2015.[6]

The novel takes the collapse of a mine in a working-class neighbourhood of Lubumbashi as one of its starting points.[7] It develops a polyphonic structure in which different forms of memory and representations of social reality confront one another.[7]

Critical responses to the novel have focused on the relationships between memory and history, imaginaries associated with the mining economy, and the use and transformation of political, social and media discourses.[7][8]

Work

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Theatre

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Aanza's dramatic writing addresses relationships between language, power, violence and institutions.[8][9]

Que ta volonté soit Kin, directed by Aristide Tarnagda, was created on 26 October 2018 during the 10th edition of the Récréâtrales festival in Ouagadougou.[10][11] The production was subsequently presented at venues including the Odéon-Théâtre de l'Europe in Paris.[10][12]

Le Jour du massacre was presented at Les Praticables in Bamako in a production directed by Aristide Tarnagda.[13] It was later presented in Kinshasa as part of the Ça se passe à Kin festival, directed by Philip Boulay.[14]

Histoire générale des murs, directed by Philip Boulay, was presented in Kinshasa as part of the Ça se passe à Kin festival.[15][16]

Plaidoirie pour vendre le Congo, directed by Aristide Tarnagda, premiered at the Récréâtrales festival in Ouagadougou in 2020.[17][18] It was subsequently presented at venues including Théâtre Jean-Vilar in Vitry-sur-Seine and the Comédie de Reims.[19][20]

The play centres on a council charged with determining financial compensation for the families of people killed by the army.[19] The monetary valuation of human life constitutes one of the central devices of the drama.[19][17]

La Nature de la loi, commissioned by the africologne festival, was presented in Cologne in 2021.[21][22]

Visual art

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From the second half of the 2010s, Aanza developed a visual art practice combining photography, installation, performance, text and artistic research.[1][2]

Sinzo Aanza, Projet d’attentat contre l’image, 2017

In 2017, he was an artist-in-residence at WIELS in Brussels, where he worked on Projet d'attentat contre l'image ?.[1]

His exhibited projects include Épreuve d'allégorie, presented at the Rencontres d'Arles in 2018;[23][24] Le Piédestal est un pot de fleurs, presented in Ljubljana;[25] Pertinences citoyennes, presented at Galerie Imane Farès in Paris and WIELS in Brussels;[26][27] The Lord is dead, long life to the Lord, presented at the Museum Rietberg in Zurich and the MuCAT in Abidjan;[28][29] Une esquisse de la ville pour Manzambi, presented at Les Magasins Généraux in Paris;[30] The Improbable Memorial, presented at Galerie Imane Farès and Kunsthaus Zürich;[31][32] The Uninterrupted Song for the City, presented at the Free Flow Festival and Museum Rietberg in Zurich;[33] La cohue des petites utopies, presented at the Musée national de la République démocratique du Congo in Kinshasa and at ACUD MACHT NEU in Berlin;[3][34] and The Irregular Line, presented at the 36th Ljubljana Biennale of Graphic Arts in 2025.[35]

His installations frequently combine images, objects, texts and documents.[4] His work creates tensions between document and fiction, memory and speculation, and historical and possible narratives.[3]

The Lord is dead, long life to the Lord was presented in connection with the exhibition Fiktion Kongo at the Museum Rietberg in Zurich.[36] The project explores the history of European collections of African objects, their imagery and the narratives associated with them, as they have contributed to shaping identity assignments. It uses the art market as a site for constructing narratives through materials related to the research of art dealer and ethnologist Hans Himmelheber.[36]

Artistic practice

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The movement between literature, theatre and visual art is a characteristic feature of Aanza's practice.[4][37] Related concerns circulate across writing, performance, images and installation.[37][4]

Fiction occupies a central position in his work.[3][38] It functions as a way of questioning reality and producing narratives, images and possible situations.[3][38]

Memory, archives, history and collective narratives recur throughout his projects.[39] The Congolese context supplies historical, political and social material for his work.[2][39] His practice also addresses questions concerning images, the construction of narratives and political forms of the imaginary.[2][39]

Critical reception

[edit]

Aanza's work has been examined in scholarship on contemporary African and Francophone literature, postcolonial studies and ecocriticism.[7][8][40][41]

A significant part of this research has focused on Généalogie d'une banalité.[7][8] Studies of the novel have addressed its polyphonic structure, the relationship between individual and collective memory, overlapping historical temporalities and the confrontation of political, economic and social discourses.[7][8]

Other studies have examined the novel through questions of vulnerability and social hierarchy, focusing on the relationship between individual and collective experience and on the rhetorical strategies used to represent marginalized urban communities.[42]

The novel's critical function has also been examined within the context of contemporary Francophone Congolese literature, particularly in relation to fiction, social transformations and discourses of power.[43]

Other studies have approached the novel through the persistence of colonial history and its inscription in urban spaces and contemporary imaginaries.[40]

Ecocritical approaches have highlighted extractivism, the subsoil and relationships to place.[41] Mineral extraction has been examined as a process transforming spaces, living conditions and imaginaries.[41]

Research has also examined relationships between extractivism, urban space and writing, as well as the possibilities of recomposition opened by fiction.[44]

Critical work has also addressed the movement of Aanza's writing beyond a strictly literary space and its circulation between text, theatre, performance and visual art.[37]

Awards and recognition

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Publications

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  • Généalogie d'une banalité. Vents d'ailleurs, 2015.[6]
  • Que ta volonté soit Kin. Éditions Nzoi / Éditions Passages, 2018.[48]
  • Plaidoirie pour vendre le Congo. Éditions Nzoi, 2023.[49]
  • Histoire générale des murs. Éditions Nzoi, 2026.[50]
  • “Pan Africanism in Katanga”, The Chimurenga Chronic, Cape Town, 2015.[30]
  • “The Papers”, The Chimurenga Chronic, Cape Town, 2016.[30]
  • “La rivière sans fin”, in Or, exhibition catalogue, Mucem / Éditions Hazan, 2018.[51]
  • “We saw you on TV”, The Chimurenga Chronic, Cape Town, 2019.[30][52]
  • “Jour de malédiction”, in Dominique Malaquais (ed.), Kinshasa Chroniques / Kinshasa Chronicles, Éditions de l'Œil, 2019.[53]
  • “Le capital de l'imaginaire. Ce qu'il y a et ce qui n'est pas”, Multitudes, no. 81, 2020/4, in the section Kinshasa Star Line.[54]
  • “Sinzo Aanza's Poetic Prose”, Versopolis, Festival of Hope, 29 April 2020.[55]
  • Contributor to Timescapes – aller-retour: Erzählungen aus afrikanischen Kontexten, C. W. Leske Verlag, Düsseldorf, 2022; the trilingual anthology includes two short stories by Aanza.[56][57]
  • Contributor to Recaptioning Congo: African Stories and Colonial Pictures, edited by Sandrine Colard, Lannoo Publishers, 2022.[58]
  • Plädoyer für den Verkauf des Kongo, German translation of Plaidoirie pour vendre le Congo by Francesca Spinazzi, in SPUREN – Zeitgenössische Theatertexte aus afrikanischen Ländern und der afrikanischen Diaspora, Theater der Zeit, Berlin, 2025.[59]
[edit]

References

[edit]
  1. 1 2 3 "Sinzo Aanza". WIELS. WIELS Contemporary Art Centre. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 "Sinzo Aanza". KADIST. KADIST. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 "Sinzo Aanza". Laboratoire Kontempo (in French). Laboratoire Kontempo. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  4. 1 2 3 4 Azimi, Roxana (19 October 2021). "Sinzo Aanza, « poète de la ville » et plasticien de la mémoire congolaise". Le Monde (in French). Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  5. ↑ "Sinzo Aanza, inspiration démocratique au Congo". Radio France Internationale (in French). RFI. 10 March 2017. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  6. 1 2 "Généalogie d'une banalité". Vents d'ailleurs (in French). Vents d'ailleurs. 2015. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  7. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Bertho, Elara (2019). "Cacophonies de la mémoire et éblouissements impériaux (Sinzo Aanza, Généalogie d'une banalité)". Francofonia (in French) (76): 83–97. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  8. 1 2 3 4 5 Desquilbet, Alice (2023). "Polémiques congolaises : les armes discursives de Sony Labou Tansi et Sinzo Aanza". Revue des sciences humaines (in French) (351). Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  9. ↑ Gahungu, Céline (2018). "Débords – Sinzo Aanza". Continents manuscrits (in French) (10). doi:10.4000/coma.1154. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  10. 1 2 "Que ta volonté soit Kin". Odéon-Théâtre de l'Europe (in French). Odéon-Théâtre de l'Europe. 2021. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  11. ↑ "Que ta volonté soit Kin". Le Grand T (in French). Le Grand T – Théâtre de Loire-Atlantique. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  12. ↑ "Aristide Tarnagda – Que ta volonté soit Kin de Sinzo Aanza". Festival d'Automne à Paris (in French). Festival d'Automne à Paris. 2020. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  13. ↑ Riva, Silvia (2020). "Global Congo. Politiques et esthétiques d'une littérature (et d'une critique) mondiale". Continents manuscrits (in French) (15). doi:10.4000/coma.6373. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  14. ↑ "Ça se passe à Kin : le théâtre se donne rendez-vous en RDC". Le Courrier de Kinshasa (in French). ADIAC. 2018. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  15. ↑ "Rendez-vous 2017 – Jeune création internationale" (PDF). École nationale supérieure des beaux-arts de Lyon (in French). ENSBA Lyon. 2017. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  16. ↑ "« Ça se passe à Kin », un autre visage de la République démocratique du Congo". Africalia (in French). Africalia. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  17. 1 2 "Sinzo Aanza – Prizewinner, Next Generation Prize 2018". Southnorth Foundation. Von Brochowski South North Foundation. 2018. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  18. ↑ "Plaidoirie pour vendre le Congo". Les Archives du spectacle (in French). 2020. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  19. 1 2 3 "Aristide Tarnagda – Plaidoirie pour vendre le Congo". Festival d'Automne à Paris. Festival d'Automne à Paris. 2020. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  20. ↑ "Plaidoirie pour vendre le Congo". Comédie de Reims (in French). Comédie de Reims. 2023. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  21. ↑ "Sinzo Aanza". Theater der Zeit (in German). Theater der Zeit. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  22. ↑ "africologne Festival 2021 – Programm" (PDF). africologne (in German). africologne. 2021. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  23. ↑ "Sinzo Aanza". Les Rencontres d'Arles (in French). Les Rencontres d'Arles. 2018. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  24. ↑ "L'artiste congolais Sinzo Aanza, d'Arles à Avignon". Radio France Internationale (in French). RFI. 16 July 2018. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  25. ↑ "Sinzo Aanza". Galerie Imane Farès. Imane Farès. 2025. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  26. ↑ "Pertinences citoyennes". Centre national des arts plastiques (in French). CNAP. 2018. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  27. ↑ "Multiple Transmissions: Art in the Afropolitan Age". WIELS. WIELS Contemporary Art Centre. 2019. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  28. ↑ "In Bewegung versetzt". Zeithistorische Forschungen (in German). 2025. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  29. ↑ "Zusammenarbeit in der Côte d'Ivoire". Museum Rietberg (in German). Museum Rietberg. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  30. 1 2 3 4 "Sinzo Aanza". Galerie Imane Farès (in French). Imane Farès. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  31. ↑ "The Improbable Memorial". Afterall. Afterall. 30 January 2024. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  32. ↑ "Time. From Dürer to Bonvicini". Kunsthaus Zürich. Kunsthaus Zürich. 2023. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  33. ↑ "The Uninterrupted Song for the City" (PDF). Museum Rietberg (in French). Museum Rietberg. 2023. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  34. ↑ "Laboratoire Kontempo Kinzonzi". ACUD MACHT NEU. ACUD MACHT NEU. 2021. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  35. ↑ "Sinzo Aanza". 36th Ljubljana Biennale of Graphic Arts. International Centre of Graphic Arts. 2025. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  36. 1 2 "Fiktion Kongo" (PDF). Museum Rietberg. Museum Rietberg. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  37. 1 2 3 Gahungu, Céline (2020). "Poétiques des bas-fonds : Fiston Mwanza Mujila et Sinzo Aanza". Penser le roman francophone contemporain (in French). Les Presses de l'Université de Montréal. pp. 58–67. doi:10.1515/9782760641600-005. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  38. 1 2 Congo as Fiction: Art Worlds between Past and Present. Scheidegger & Spiess. 2020. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  39. 1 2 3 "Sinzo Aanza". PinchukArtCentre. PinchukArtCentre. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  40. 1 2 Fraiture, Pierre-Philippe (2022). "Tracking the Potholes of Colonial History: Sinzo Aanza's Généalogie d'une banalité and Fiston Mwanza Mujila's Tram 83". Unfinished Histories: Empire and Postcolonial Resonance in Central Africa and Belgium. Leuven: Leuven University Press. pp. 359–379. doi:10.11116/9789461664914. ISBN 9789462703575. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  41. 1 2 3 Garnier, Xavier (2022). Écopoétiques africaines : Une expérience décoloniale des lieux. Lettres du Sud (in French). Karthala. ISBN 978-2-8111-2994-1. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  42. ↑ Bisanswa, Justin (2020). "Généalogie d'une banalité de Sinzo Aanza. Le roman des moins-que-rien et des héros médiocres". Présence Francophone: Revue internationale de langue et de littérature (in French). 94 (1). Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  43. ↑ Kavwahirehi, Kasereka (November 2017). "La fonction critique du roman francophone : À propos de Congo Inc. de Jean Bofane, Tram 83 de Fiston Mwanza Mujila et Généalogie d'une banalité de Sinzo Aanza". Congo-Afrique (in French) (519): 931–947. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  44. ↑ Brezault, Éloïse (2025). "Suturing the City: Poetics of Extractivism in the Congolese Novels of Sinzo Aanza and Fiston Mwanza Mujila". Journal of the African Literature Association. 20 (1): 133–154. doi:10.1080/21674736.2025.2531309. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  45. ↑ "PinchukArtCentre announces artists shortlist for the 7th edition of the Future Generation Art Prize". Future Generation Art Prize. 2024. Retrieved 2 August 2026.
  46. ↑ "Sinzo Aanza receives the Audience Award of the 36th Ljubljana Biennale of Graphic Arts". MGLC. 13 October 2025. Retrieved 2 August 2026.
  47. ↑ "Prix Sony Labou Tansi : lauréate 2026 et sélection pour 2026/2027". ARTCENA (in French). 15 June 2026. Retrieved 3 August 2026.
  48. ↑ "Sinzo Aanza, Que ta volonté soit Kin". Éditions Nzoi (in French). Éditions Nzoi. 19 October 2018. ISBN 978-2-36949-015-9. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  49. ↑ "Sinzo Aanza, Plaidoirie pour vendre le Congo". Éditions Nzoi (in French). Éditions Nzoi. 24 January 2023. ISBN 978-2-36949-025-8. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  50. ↑ "Bio & Biblio". Sinzo Aanza (in French). Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  51. ↑ "La Rivière sans Fin". Schloss-Post (in French). Akademie Schloss Solitude. 22 May 2019. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  52. ↑ "Chimurenga in Paris". Chimurenga Chronic. Chimurenga. 2019. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  53. ↑ Malaquais, Dominique, ed. (2019). Kinshasa Chroniques / Kinshasa Chronicles (in French). Éditions de l'Œil. ISBN 978-2-35137-260-9. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  54. ↑ Aanza, Sinzo (2020). "Le capital de l'imaginaire. Ce qu'il y a et ce qui n'est pas". Multitudes (in French) (81). Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  55. ↑ "Sinzo Aanza's Poetic Prose". Versopolis. Versopolis. 29 April 2020. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  56. ↑ "Sinzo Aanza". C. W. Leske Verlag (in German). C. W. Leske Verlag. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  57. ↑ "Booklaunch /Timescapes – aller-retour/". Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf. Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf. 1 September 2022. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  58. ↑ Colard, Sandrine, ed. (2022). Recaptioning Congo: African Stories and Colonial Pictures. Lannoo Publishers. ISBN 978-94-014-8623-1. Retrieved 5 August 2026.
  59. ↑ SPUREN – Zeitgenössische Theatertexte aus afrikanischen Ländern und der afrikanischen Diaspora (in German). Berlin: Theater der Zeit. 2025. ISBN 978-3-95749-546-4. Retrieved 5 August 2026.

Category:1990 births Category:Living people Category:People from Goma Category:Democratic Republic of the Congo writers Category:Democratic Republic of the Congo dramatists and playwrights Category:Democratic Republic of the Congo artists Category:Democratic Republic of the Congo novelists Category:Contemporary artists

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