His paintings almost always include text in French and Lingala, commenting on life in Africa and the modern world.
He learned the languages of the countries of Black Africa: the Lingala, the kigwandi, the Tshiluba and Dioula.
In the 19th century, before the creation of the Congo Free State, the Bangala, (literally: 'river people'), were a group of similar Bantu peoples living and trading along the bend of the Congo River that reached from Irebu at the mouth of the Ubangi River to the Mongala River.
•
In the last two decades of the 19th century, after the forces of Leopold II of Belgium conquered the region and started exploiting it commercially, Bangi came into wider use.
Lingala |
Bowane rose to prominence in the late 1940s Leopoldville African music scene, in which Cuban style music combined with Lingala and pan-Congolese styles.