GEORGES SENGA
Georges Senga (full name Georges Senga Assani, b. 1983, Lubumbashi) is a Congolese photographic artist whose work moves between documentary and fiction, using the image to probe history and the narratives that surface through memory, identity and heritage. He graduated in human sciences from the University of Lubumbashi (UNILU) in 2009, having already begun photographing the year before.
His trajectory is inseparable from the artistic scene of his home city. He was discovered during the first edition of the Picha Biennale in Lubumbashi in 2008, at a workshop led by Marie-Francoise Plissart and Sammy Baloji, and in 2010 joined the Picha art centre, where he became one of its core photographers. His first sustained series, "Empreintes", was selected by curator Simon Njami for the 2010 Lubumbashi Biennale and subsequently travelled to Tarifa, Brussels, Nairobi and Bamako. He took part in Goethe-Institut masterclasses in Bamako, Lubumbashi and Lagos between 2011 and 2013.
In 2012 he produced two further series, "Une vie apres la mort" - a meditation on Patrice Lumumba, on the passage of time and on the persistence of what Lumumba continues to signify - and "Kadogos", on child soldiers. The Lumumba series was shown at the Musee national de Lubumbashi in 2013 and later at the Kampala Biennale, Addis Foto Fest and MuZee in Ostend. A Pro Helvetia research grant took him to Zimbabwe in 2014 for the project "Transit", and in 2015 he undertook a residency at WIELS in Brussels. He has also worked with the Market Photo Workshop in Johannesburg and Akademie Schloss Solitude in Stuttgart, and in 2019 participated in "Rebel Lives" at FOMU in Antwerp.
In 2020 he was awarded a fellowship at the Villa Medici, the French Academy in Rome, where he developed "How a Little Pagan Hunter Becomes a Catholic Priest". The project reconstructs the life of Bonaventure Salumu, a Catholic priest who died in 1989 and who, despite his vocation, fathered a child; Senga's encounter with Salumu's daughter set the work in motion. Positioned at the crossroads of Congo's pre- and post-colonial eras, it was presented at the 7th Lubumbashi Biennale (2022) and published as a book, later shown at WIELS.
Senga now lives and works between Lubumbashi and Europe, most recently based in Rotterdam.
GEORGES SENGA
Georges Senga (full name Georges Senga Assani, b. 1983, Lubumbashi) is a Congolese photographic artist whose work moves between documentary and fiction, using the image to probe history and the narratives that surface through memory, identity and heritage. He graduated in human sciences from the University of Lubumbashi (UNILU) in 2009, having already begun photographing the year before.
His trajectory is inseparable from the artistic scene of his home city. He was discovered during the first edition of the Picha Biennale in Lubumbashi in 2008, at a workshop led by Marie-Francoise Plissart and Sammy Baloji, and in 2010 joined the Picha art centre, where he became one of its core photographers. His first sustained series, "Empreintes", was selected by curator Simon Njami for the 2010 Lubumbashi Biennale and subsequently travelled to Tarifa, Brussels, Nairobi and Bamako. He took part in Goethe-Institut masterclasses in Bamako, Lubumbashi and Lagos between 2011 and 2013.
In 2012 he produced two further series, "Une vie apres la mort" - a meditation on Patrice Lumumba, on the passage of time and on the persistence of what Lumumba continues to signify - and "Kadogos", on child soldiers. The Lumumba series was shown at the Musee national de Lubumbashi in 2013 and later at the Kampala Biennale, Addis Foto Fest and MuZee in Ostend. A Pro Helvetia research grant took him to Zimbabwe in 2014 for the project "Transit", and in 2015 he undertook a residency at WIELS in Brussels. He has also worked with the Market Photo Workshop in Johannesburg and Akademie Schloss Solitude in Stuttgart, and in 2019 participated in "Rebel Lives" at FOMU in Antwerp.
In 2020 he was awarded a fellowship at the Villa Medici, the French Academy in Rome, where he developed "How a Little Pagan Hunter Becomes a Catholic Priest". The project reconstructs the life of Bonaventure Salumu, a Catholic priest who died in 1989 and who, despite his vocation, fathered a child; Senga's encounter with Salumu's daughter set the work in motion. Positioned at the crossroads of Congo's pre- and post-colonial eras, it was presented at the 7th Lubumbashi Biennale (2022) and published as a book, later shown at WIELS.
Senga now lives and works between Lubumbashi and Europe, most recently based in Rotterdam.
