Samson Kambalu

9 rooms in Performer and Participant

This display features Samson Kambalu’s short, improvised videos, which he calls ‘Nyau cinema’

Kambalu made the five videos in this room while travelling in Europe. Creating these scenes was a way for him to interact with other people. He invited strangers to film him as he performed spontaneous actions and posted the results on social media. Kambalu’s sense of the absurd and deliberately unpolished editing have an affinity with early silent comedy.

All the videos follow self-imposed guidelines around factors such as duration, acting style and audience engagement. Kambalu was inspired by the films he watched while growing up within Chewa culture in 1980s Malawi. Projectionists would re-edit films for local audiences, removing anything boring and sometimes suddenly cutting to an entirely different film.

The phrase ‘Nyau cinema’ relates to the Chewa people’s practice of ritualised masking, performance and play. ‘Africa is a place of improvisation’, Kambalu has said, ‘and this is what I’m bringing in my work, taking Malawi everywhere with me’.

Tate Modern
Blavatnik Building Level 3
Room 6

Getting Here

Ongoing

Free