Jean-Michel Kibushi Ndjate Wooto was born in 1957 in Zaire (Democratic Republic of the Congo). He began his studies in drama and cinematography at Kinshasa’s National Institute of the Arts, and in 1988 he was introduced to animation during a workshop by the Belgian production company Atelier Graphaoui. In the same year, in collaboration with Atelier Graphaoui, he created the first local mobile studio for animation, Studio Malembe Maa, which means “slowly but surely” in Lingala. In 1990, he completed the first Congolese animated film: The Toad Who Visits His In-laws (Le Crapaud chez ses beaux-parents), a local Tetela oral tale from his own childhood. This was followed by his documentary animation Black September in Kinshasa (Kinshasa, septembre noir – 1991), a collaboration with school children from Kinshasa. This film acts as a testament to the children’s memories and experiences of the 1991 military coup, framed by Kibushi’s political voice. Another one of his celebrated films is Muana Bwoka.
Jean-Michel Kibushi’s role in CongoConnect is to experiment with the medium of “documentaire animé” to represent Congolese experience of the history of encounters and confrontations in north-east Congo, more particularly men’s associations centering on self-defense and the regeneration of society.