Kwetu (Wor series, 2024)

Kuba velvet, fire, dyed, embroidery thread, rattan, kekele, nails

This series of works is a continuation of the Kwetu project that Melisa Kayowa began as part of Laboratoire Kontempo’s residencies for young artists, and which was presented at the Black Rock Residency in Senegal. Melisa Kayowa is interested in the family as a social unit and its stability/fragility. She examines traditions and cultural practices in terms of their topicality and role in contemporary Kinshasa society. Her artistic work “Kwetu” is a spatial installation combining different weaving practices. The main work, “Lumuenu”, is woven using the traditional “kekele” (rattan) weaving technique of the Losa tribe of Lomami. This work is traditionally reserved for men, but the artist appropriates the practice, claiming a new role for women in today’s society. As a working process, weaving is therefore a way of overcoming limits, and thus an invitation to consider fragility in its malleability as a possibility for change. “Wabende” means ‘stranger’ in Tshiluba and is a portrait of the artist’s father. The portrait has two sides, showing two facets of perception: the face that society has drawn of him, and the person’s true face. An image in the making. The work is painted in indigo, a color used as a traditional technique in West Africa. In the 5 abstract works on paper entitled “Ndi Sanka Neba”, the artist seeks balance in form. The working technique is Kuba and Kekele weaving. As a fragile medium, paper is an unusual choice for this weaving technique. The superimposition of different geometric shapes gives rise to new symbols. The search for new forms, symbols and balance in the meeting of differences, is at the same time a search for identity: between tradition and modernity, between different family lines and origins. Hence the title “Kwetu”, which means “home” in Tshiluba.