Bâ Simba

Bâ Simba was born in the village of Kindu, the heart of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, in 1997. An artist from birth, Simba’s mother fostered in him an appreciation for native Bantu and Congolese culture and traditions nearly erased by centuries of brutal colonialism. Simba’s curiosity was wide-ranging and immediate; before he was old enough to be accepted into school, young Simba would follow his older siblings on the eight-mile walk from their home in the village to the schoolhouse, where he sat outside and listened to the lessons through the open windows. By age fourteen, Simba won had twice won the Congolese national competition for his essays and speeches, the same award won by legendary Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba. It was at this age that Simba created his first artworks – traditional weavings made of dried banana leaves which depicted ancestral village life. Only one of these works survives today.

That same year, Simba was brought from his home in Goma to Southern California by a Christian missionary organization for the stated purpose of continuing his education in America; in reality, the young man and his heroic story was used by the group as a fundraising tool. When he pushed back, the organization abandoned their ties, leaving Simba homeless in a new country. But his resolve only grew stronger. He graduated from university in 2020 and officially began his art career with a solo show, “Global Migrations”, in Los Angeles in Spring 2021. He held his second show, “Beyond Bantu Knots” in September, 2022 in Los Angeles.

Simba’s work is the epitome of contemporary story-telling, deeply rooted in pan-African history. His story-telling techniques include the use massive, deeply intricate geometric patterns inspired by his research of ancient designs. His “found-art” mediums include massive plywoods he found while living on the streets, which he carried from place to place as he worked, as well as canvases his created through the collaging of hundreds of layers of tissue paper. A prolific creator, Simba’s catalog simultaneously celebrates Africa’s natural beauty and rich ancestral heritage and forces viewers to shift their perspective on how we interact with the legacies of those histories.