Christian names were banned while Faustin Linyekula was growing up. Then the name of his country (Zaïre) changed (to Democratic Republic of Congo). His artistic mentor Kabako died of the plague far from home, buried by a villager whose family "had been eaten by death". His friend Vumi was thrown into prison after President Kabila's assassination and languishes on death row where "torture has become another organ in my mind".
Raw material doesn't get much rawer. But how do Linyekula, barely 30, and his dance and visual theatre collective even scrape the surface of their country's successive agonies on stage?
