Africa

That other continent

After Nero, which featured Wim Opbrouck, the writer and dramatist Peter Verhelst created a monologue for and with Oscar Van Rompay. Apart from his theatre work at NTGent, Van Rompay also has a personal commitment in Kenya, which he visits for several months each year and where he helps to keep a business running.  In 2012 Peter Verhelst will travel with him.

Their luggage will include: the movie Enjoy Poverty - Episode III by Renzo Martens, which was shown at the 2009 Kunstenfestivaldesarts in Brussels and elsewhere, and Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness (1902), about a difficult journey upstream on the Congo River at the time of Western imperialism. And also about the incomprehensibility of another continent. About the desire to merge with that other continent. About exoticism. About sex.

How does the visual, mythical theatre of Peter Verhelst clash with Oscar Van Rompay’s testimony? And how can you say anything meaningful about your own longing?

• Peter Verhelst has been creating plays at NTGent since 2006. He has worked with Kristof Van Boven (Lex, on Alexander the Great), Aus Greidanus Jr. (Julius Caesar), Wim Opbrouck (Nero) and others. All these plays have been staged in the Kaaitheater or Kaaistudio's. Peter Verhelst is also one of the most acclaimed poets and novelists of his generation.