The origins
SAPE stands for Société des Ambianceurs et Personnes Élégantes. Not really a society, but a group of clubs sharing the same taste for showing off, prestigious labels and self-display. In the writings and testimonies of the Portuguese, there are already references to the taste for finery of the inhabitants of the Kongo kingdom. This attention was to find new ground with the arrival of the complex, luxurious fabrics worn by Portuguese dignitaries: velvet, silk, coats, capes and hats impressed the Kongo elite, who incorporated these objects, synonymous with refinement, opulence and power, into their wardrobes. The second social and cultural shock came with French settlement and colonization. The Congolese elite quickly adopted the attributes of French elegance which, for a country under domination, also meant sharing in the occupier's fearsome power. In this respect, the fact that sape is still today a Lari and more generally a "southern" phenomenon can be explained by the occupier's penetration, which took place from the ocean to the north, with the Bakongo populations naturally serving as intermediaries for the colonist. With this historical background in mind, today's sapeurs generally recognize the existentialists as their spiritual fathers. On their return to Brazzaville, students on scholarship in Paris brought back, in magnified form, evidence of the teeming nightlife and intellectual life of Paris in the 1950s. Brazzaville's Existos clubs soon sprang up, asserting a taste for freedom and individualism, including in clothing. This period was also marked by the opening of numerous nightclubs and bars, and the arrival of cinema as a breath of fresh air. From Existo to Sapeur, the taste for showing off, eccentricity and creativity were radicalized.
Paris, every sapper's dream trip
Today, the sape still feeds on life in the French capital. The trip to Paris is part of the Brazzaville sapeur's initiation, and the journey is an adventure in which many young people, through legal channels or otherwise, are ready to invest. From Paris, you bring back clothes, but also the prestige of having passed through the looking glass. You earn the label of "Parisian": someone who has seen, lived and occasionally or permanently returned home. The
sapologie is centered in Bacongo, in the south of Brazzaville, although Poto-Poto, Moungali and even Talangaï have their own sapeurs' clubs. The high season for sapology is the European summer, the Congolese dry season, starting in mid-May and crescendoing to early September when the Parisians return to the Congo. Avenue Matsoua becomes the nerve center of all the raids, and the terraces are packed at weekends. Apart from these moments when the sape spontaneously takes center stage, parties and soirées are organized by the various clubs. Many of these festive occasions are based on the implicit notion of challenge and competition, where the art of dress is coupled with the art of speech to belittle the opponent. Direct confrontation is forbidden, and the greatest form of violence tolerated is the crushing of the competitor's shoe toe - a violence that is symbolic, but certain, given the economic and emotional investment that "basses" represent for the entertainer... In their quest for visibility, sappers don't hesitate to squat at any event that ensures them an audience, such as funerals, and the funeral of one of them is always a great and unmissable moment of sapology.
Excessive spending for overdone show-offs
In the Congo itself, the sapeur phenomenon is perceived in many different ways. Futile for some, the sapeur's expenses are considered obscene as the vast majority of them earn their daily living through odd jobs. In this context, the purchase of a Gucci suit or a pair of Weston shoes, even taking advantage of the "brothers" established in Europe, represents a colossal sum. But this reasonable judgment often fades in the face of the ostentatious audacity of the sapeurs, their taste for play and challenge. The Parisian enjoys a double regard from his fellow citizens: he earns his living in foreign currency, so we envy him. The sapeur in action is a kind of codified show-off: after adjusting his clothes, the sapeur sets off on his "descent". When he arrives at the tribe's common ground, he decides when to "point" (show off), depending on the competition and available spectators. A successful "pointage" is met with a "crowd-success", while a "pointage" accompanied by indifference or, worse, criticism from the spectators, will soon see the sapper, all ashamed of himself, go home to change or perfect his set-up. Empirically speaking, two trends can be discerned in today's sapology. The sapper with classic elegance: Weston®, silk or Scottish socks, double-breasted suit with silk tie, etc. Perfectly cut, rigorously color-matched and often with a touch of flamboyance, this is the quiet force of the sapeur, and the price of the pieces that make up the clothing is quite telling. Dignitaries of the regime can be seen dressed in this way, it's sapologie-prestige. The other branch is more radical and creative, flirting with cabaret and burlesque: superimposed ties, pirate headbands, canes and vests adorned with diodes. The "pointing" of these sappers becomes a kind of theatrical parade, with slow-motion gait, sprawling gestures and outré mimicry. The canons of elegance disappear behind a saturation of signs. Unbeknownst to them, these sappers are perhaps the last heirs of the Incroyables - or rather the "Incoyables", as this tribe of eccentric aristocrats deemed it elegant to omit the "r" and sometimes even all consonants - who, after the Terror, strolled the Tuileries gardens in the most improbable outfits, with no other aim than to attract attention and surprise.
