Black Thoughts Now – Chefferie

Gintersdorfer/Klaßen

Only leaders, no underlings: ‘chefferie‘ is a political and administrative model of a meeting of many equal chiefs, practiced before the colonization of sub-Saharan Africa, that continues to exist until today parallel to the official government institutions. And it is the vision of Monika Gintersdorfer’s und Knut Klaßen’s performance practice, who expanded their Ivorian-German core group by performers and comedians from Kigali and Kinshasa.
They play with controversial interpretations and representations of an African self-conception and provokingly undermine every homogeneous image of Africa that is often represented in the media and daily life with humor and nonchalance. They compare examples from real life with failed attempts and oppressed drafts. Are the current political and cultural movements expressions of a pan-African way of thinking? And is it possible to translate that for a European audience?
All those on stage are masters of their styles – and still they speculate in foreign competences, they sing as dancers, dance as comedians, text as singers and translate as actors. Verbally and physically, they’re not avoiding any confrontation, they claim the stage as room for debates, in which contradictions are not smoothed, blanks are not closed, political incorrectness among individual members of the group, national identities and continents are not covered up.

ON

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