Anawana Haloba

Anawana Haloba’s experimental opera is part of an ongoing sound research on different Southern African oral traditions. Her work focuses on voice as the primary instrument of storytelling—tragedies, dramas, and the celebration of life—and how these forms of orality might expand our understanding of opera beyond the western tradition. Haloba uses the drivers of regular speakers and produces eight sculptural forms that function as reverberation cases. Some of these sculptures borrow their form from marriage or initiation ceremonies, others are invented by the artist for our present time.

The characters of this operatic sculpture are a mix of legendary and historical figures: Mukamusaba, Alice Lenshina, and Lucy Sichone—whom she refers to as her “female Fanons.” Mukamusaba, which means “You shall fear her/them” or “the one who embodies greatness” in siLozi language, is the central character. Lenshina was a self-appointed prophetess, she founded the Lumpa Church which stood against colonial injustice and carried out political activities, clashing with the Zambian government under President Kenneth Kaunda. Sichone was a Zambian civil rights activist and educator, who founded the Zambia Civic Education Association and was part of the United National Independence Party.

Haloba recovers their lives from memories embedded in songs and oral transmission, using the masquerade and opera as myth-making grounds to reimagine and make their stories accessible. Spatially staged as a threshold, Haloba gives voice to the spirits of contemporary struggles, to reimagine a concept of community and solidarity, harmonizing collective anger, as she writes, “into a loud song of resistance.” These voices call and respond to each other to tell stories of grief and tragedy from different parts of the world.

Text: Valentina Viviani