Kayembe was part of the Hangar workshop in the 1950s.
His work places a central emphasis on the narration of human activity, woven into compositions of remarkable richness.
In the smaller formats presented here, lush vegetation, birds, and snakes with exaggerated proportions appear almost superimposed on the canvas, disregarding any conventional logic of perspective. Fish with bulging eyes hover above the water, seemingly magnetically drawn toward the fisherman’s boat.
Kayembe’s larger formats, by contrast, are distinguished by their explicitly narrative dimension. The composition is organized in registers: at the bottom, the ground, carpeted with tall grasses, shelters men and game in a subtle game of hide-and-seek; above, a sky teeming with geometric motifs evokes traditional textiles.
These scenes convey a sense of transmission: from elders to the young, teaching hunting techniques, ceremonial rituals, the art of driving game, handling spears and machetes, and strategies for camouflage among the tall grasses and foliage.
