For the Painted Bride Art Center’s multi-part project, Re-PLACE-ing Philadelphia, Congolese choreographer and dancer Faustin Linyekula created Philly Files, examining North Philadelphia through a performance inside an abandoned warehouse in the neighborhood. Linyekula says he is “constantly trying to find ways of being in dialogue with the city,” and considering how we can create work that “exists in the public space, for everyone.”
Congolese dancer Faustin Linyekula is a leading contemporary African choreographer. He is the founder of Studios Kabako, a dance and visual arts center in the Democratic Republic of Congo that provides dance training and performs Linyekula’s work in Africa and abroad. In 2005, Linyekula and Studio Kabako participated in a MAPP residency, in which they traveled to the US to perform at such venues as the Bates Dance Festival, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, and Portland Institute of Contemporary Art. Linyekula has collaborated with international artists from France, Morocco, Ethiopia, and Sweden, and is the recipient of a 2007 Principal Award from the Prince Claus Fund for Culture and Development.
