Skander Kacem

I'm an engineer by training, a consultant by experience, a curator by passion, and a writer by choice. I co-founded Kitokongo in 2023 and write most of what appears here: essays on Congolese art, music, and history, interviews with the artists making it, and close readings of single works under Meet the Artwork. I write about wider African culture, politics, and history at desifr.com, and live between San Francisco, Berlin, and Kinshasa.

None of it happened alone. Kitokongo exists because people trusted me with their stories, and because what they told me went onto the page as they said it. Trust on one side, plain reporting on the other. I am grateful to every artist who sat down and talked, beginning with Billy Gibula, who has been in this from the start, and to the dealers and students of Kinshasa who answered more questions than anyone should have had to. My wife, Verena Kacem, made all of it possible. Whatever is good here began with these people. The rest is my attempt to keep the door open.