Photographer: Lamote, Carlo (1928 – 2017).
Title: untitled (Danse Matambu).
Date: 1959.
Country: Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Medium: unmounted gelatin silver print.
Size: 18,1 x 24,1 cm.
Condition: very good.
Reference: CLIV1127/1.
Provenance: French collection.
Extra: typed note with identification in French on verso. Congopresse 31.406/35.
Matambu dance performed by the Basal Mpasu (Salampasu). In fact, Matambu dances were only held for headhunters.
In the fifties, the Salampasu lived in Luiza territory, in high altitude savannahs. They are known in the litterature as fierce fighters and head-hunters, for whom ritual suicide by hanging was frequent (Jobart 1925). This territory is also inhabited by southern Kete, Mbala and Lwalwa (Pruitt 1973). Together with other such decentralized groups as Lwalwa, Kongo-Dinga and Mbabane, they are globally called Akawaand (people living downstream).
Location: Mukasa.
Territory: Louiza.
Province: Kasaï (current name = Kasaï-Central). 
Photographer and cameraman Carlo Lamote (1928-2017)) left for Congo in 1950 to work for the colonial information service. For ten years, he travelled to every corner of the Congo, Rwanda and Burundi to highlight the colonial achievements. Propaganda is the name of the game, but he turned out to be an excellent photographer. Together with his colleague Henri Goldstein, Lamote has shaped our image of the Belgian Congo. Open any book about the 1950s in the colony and you will find their names under the photos.
After independence, he set up his own film production company and news agency, with Visnew, ABC and CBS as regular customers. He was also the founder of Congovox, the news service of the Congolese state broadcaster.