Paul Maheke, Nkisi, and Ariel Efraim Ashbel, Snsa (2019)

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Performance sketches presented at Museum Ludwig on November 29th, 2019 as part of "Here and Now: Transcorporealities" curated by Leonie Radine -- Video: Nathan Ishar
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Paul Maheke, Nkisi, and Ariel Efraim Ashbel
Sènsa (2019)

Combining sound, light, and movement, Sènsa⁠—Paul Maheke, Nkisi, and Ariel Efraim Ashbel’s most recent collaboration⁠—traverses diasporic geographies and ancestral knowledge. 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; one that is “in-between.” 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 captors installed on the theatre’s walls and floor.

Ghostly shadows appear and disappear, mumbled words akin to spells are being cast, and echoes of the building’s vibrations serve as strategies to build an intoxicating performance.

Movement: Paul Maheke
Sound: Nkisi
Lights: Ariel Efraim Ashbel
Costume: Firpal Jawanda
Styling: Curtly Thomas

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