Sammy Baloji's Extractive Landscapes at Salzburg's Stadtgalerie Museumspavillon Examines Colonial Impact on Congo

Sammy Baloji's exhibition Extractive Landscapes ran from July 25 to August 17, 2019 at Stadtgalerie Museumspavillon in Salzburg. The show explored colonial and postcolonial exploitation in Congo's Katanga and Kivu regions through photography, video, and archival materials. Curated by Lotte Arndt and Simone Rudolph, the installation featured works like the 2010 digital inkjet print Mine à ciel ouvert noyéde Banfora #2, which depicted manual mining sites. Geological maps from colonial and post-colonial periods were displayed without explanatory text, emphasizing bureaucratic abstraction. Copper crosses, once currency in Katanga, were shown alongside a 1956 historical review of the Belgian mining company Union Minière du Haut Katanga. A three-channel video titled Pungulume (2016) featured Sanga Chief Mpala describing landscape changes from colonization. The exhibition contrasted with its Baroque surroundings in Mirabell Gardens, highlighting how colonial resource extraction enabled European ornamental landscapes. Baloji, born in Katanga and trained in photography and computer sciences, used artistic interventions to address the invisibility of colonial damage. The show avoided didacticism, instead presenting objects that required viewer engagement to understand the material realities of exploitation.