SAFOU LOVER
performance
(2020)
performance
(2020)
Within Ngomboa's insides, we could wander, stretch, regenerate ourselves. Full of strength, we had the power of her intuition.
Enough to prepare her for what would happen beyond the seas, over there under the clear sky...
With 𝑺𝒂𝒇𝒐𝒖 𝑳𝒐𝒗𝒆𝒓 , Anna Tje continues to explore healing music through a performance where Safous/Bitotos (fruits widely cultivated in Cameroon) claim their narrative, their propagation, their erotic powers, their own reparation.
Inspired by her research on so-called "exotic" fruits and on R&B Slow Jams, the artist tells the story of a character named Ngomboa by offering a vocal and poetic composition involving matrilineal stories and magic realism.
By eating these unmuzzled fruit-bodies, Anna Tje uses her voice as sound material to experiment with notions of Queer Temporalities (E. Freeman) and the Power of the Erotic (A. Lorde), while exploring themes of migration, coming of age, ancestrality and twinning.
Performance first presented in Bétonsalon for the Bivouac “Breathing out of school” with the Raw Academy (Raw Material Company, Senegal).
Enough to prepare her for what would happen beyond the seas, over there under the clear sky...
With 𝑺𝒂𝒇𝒐𝒖 𝑳𝒐𝒗𝒆𝒓 , Anna Tje continues to explore healing music through a performance where Safous/Bitotos (fruits widely cultivated in Cameroon) claim their narrative, their propagation, their erotic powers, their own reparation.
Inspired by her research on so-called "exotic" fruits and on R&B Slow Jams, the artist tells the story of a character named Ngomboa by offering a vocal and poetic composition involving matrilineal stories and magic realism.
By eating these unmuzzled fruit-bodies, Anna Tje uses her voice as sound material to experiment with notions of Queer Temporalities (E. Freeman) and the Power of the Erotic (A. Lorde), while exploring themes of migration, coming of age, ancestrality and twinning.
Performance first presented in Bétonsalon for the Bivouac “Breathing out of school” with the Raw Academy (Raw Material Company, Senegal).
I am peeling off my own skin
now stripped from these unacceptable desires
I am eating my own immigration
swallowing this trauma and condition
believing the devine flavor of my own fruit
will digest itself and flush guilt from my system
believing that acidic benefits flowing in its flesh
will overpower the bitter taste of my tied up existence
I am peeling off my own skin
I am peeling off my own skin
I am peeling off my own skin
skin of the Safou
crazy I am fou of the safou
like I love you
I am a lover
I am a Safou lover
now stripped from these unacceptable desires
I am eating my own immigration
swallowing this trauma and condition
believing the devine flavor of my own fruit
will digest itself and flush guilt from my system
believing that acidic benefits flowing in its flesh
will overpower the bitter taste of my tied up existence
I am peeling off my own skin
I am peeling off my own skin
I am peeling off my own skin
skin of the Safou
crazy I am fou of the safou
like I love you
I am a lover
I am a Safou lover
Safou Lover - First raw experimental version created during the early stages of the pandemic.
(c) Mathilde Assier, Anna Tje