Within the frame of SWICH, the RMCA chose to host an artist or member of an originating community to contribute to the planning of the new permanent collections. The topic of the residency was “Le musée comme lieu de mémoire” (The museum (building) as a place of memory).
In 2016, Freddy Tsimba Mavambu and Eddy Ekete Mombesa stayed at the museum as artist in residence.
The objective of the residency was to collect information and material, visuals, visit the construction site, meet with the scientists and produce a work of art in a workshop. The residency also offered the opportunity to discuss the future installation with the artist. The MRAC Tervuren is under construction until 2017. For this reason, the instalment will be at a later date. At the end of his residency Freddy Tsimba Mavambu has proposed two works of art that relate to the ancient building, OMBRE for the memorial room and monumental sculptures partly made of construction material left on the building site that integrate the RMCA into his series “closed centre, open dreams”.
The objective of the residency was twofold: First, to conduct interviews among the Congolese diaspora, Belgians, of various generations, with reference to the archives of the museum and what has been termed by the artist as “a different place of memory”; the living memory, the immaterial heritage in custody of each of us. Second: Each person interviewed was invited to remain in contact with the museum, to come and see the video-sculpture and to participate in the performance. At the end of his residency Eddy Ekete Mombesa had interviewed 80 people. They were asked the same 5 questions:
- Do you know the Museum in Tervuren?
- If so, which memory do you have of this Museum? And which object do you remember specifically? - Do you think that this museum communicates sufficiently and how did you learn about the museum? About its renovation?
- If the DRC demanded to restitute/restore the collections, what would you think of this?
- If you were the director of the museum, what would you change in the museum? This material is currently edited for making an artistic production using film as a medium.
Finally, in line with the “art” of listening, the RMCA has acquired a monumental sculpture of a third artist with Congolese roots, working/living in Belgium and DRC, Aimé Mpané. This sculpture will be on display in one of the most emblematic exhibition halls commemorative of Belgian colonization.
