October 24-27, 2007

The Sharon Disney Lund Dance Series
Faustin Linyekula: Festival of Lies
West Coast premiere

"An ethereal figure with a spirit of steel... the Congolese choreographer is an intellectual and practical force to be reckoned with." The Star (South Africa)

This potent new work from Congolese company Les Studios Kabako is part dance theater, part visual performance and part social gathering. Choreographer Faustin Linyekula’s ground-breaking Festival of Lies begins in a relaxed atmosphere, evocative of a neighborhood bar or a popular music concert in Kinshasa, capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Live music plays as the audience is invited to eat, drink and listen to stories, while a darker undercurrent unfolds. The texts of Marie-Louise Bibish Mumbu document daily life in Kinshasa and the performers reveal personal and political memories that speak to the history of a country that simultaneously seeks to forget and to unearth its past. Eloquent visual elements—fluorescent fixtures, propaganda pamphlets and baby dolls— accumulate, along with archival images and speeches, as Linyekula’s narrative of collective memory and collective loss takes hold.

Funded in part by the National Dance Project of the New England Foundation for the Arts, with lead funding from Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. Additional funding provided by The Ford Foundation, The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, JP Morgan Chase Foundation and MetLife Foundation.

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