The Splendor of North Korean Monuments and Architecture

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Photo of Beetle Holloway

Beetle Holloway

18 July 2018


Leaving the etchings of colonialism behind them, nine African nations have looked to celebrate their independence with cut-price authoritarian-style mega-monuments and, naturally, they’ve turned to the market leader, North Korea. Here we take a look at the nine monuments across Africa built by North Korea’s Mansudae Art Studio.

Mansudae Art Studio claims to be the world’s largest art production studio. Taking up a whole district in North Korea’s capital Pyongyang, Mansudae employs 4,000 staff to cater for all of the Hermit Kingdom’s propaganda needs: from banners and posters to statues and sculptures. However, it’s not just the Kim dynasty that has a penchant for imposing artworks.

Angola – President Dr. Agostinho Neto Cultural Center, Luanda.
Where do you lay to rest the ‘Father of Modern Angola’? In a 120-metre (394-feet)-tall monolith, of course. Located in a 12,000 sq km (4,633 sq mile) national park that also bears his name, Dr António Agostinho Neto’s mausoleum is one of the architectural wonders of Africa – shipped direct from North Korea.Mansudae also built the statue of Béhanzin, the eleventh and last king of Dahomey (modern-day Benin). Standing firm in the city of Abomey, the former capital of the Kingdom of Dahomey, Béhanzin’s hand is raised in defiance to imperial rule.Unveiled in 2005, the Three Dikgosi Monument commemorates the leading figures in Botswana’s independence story. The 5.4-metre (17.7-feet)-tall bronze statues depict the three tribal chiefs (‘dikgosi‘) – Khama III of the Bangwato, Sebele I of the Bakwena and Bathoen I of the Bangwaktese – who travelled to London in 1895 to ask if their lands could be separated from South Africa and Rhodesia (Zimbabwe). The British said yes, thus creating modern-day Botswana, although it wasn’t until 1960 that it finally became an independent nation.The statue of former DRC President Laurent-Désiré Kabila directs traffic in the middle of a roundabout in the capital Kinshasa. A former rebel leader, Kabila rose to power in 1997, ending the 32 year-reign of President Mobutu Sese Seko, who had become a poster boy for African dictatorship (think human rights abuses, corruption, embezzlement, nepotism, and Concorde flights to Paris for some retail therapy).The second highest Mansudae monument on the continent, the 50-metre (164-foot) Tiglachin Monument may soon be consigned to the rubbish heap of history. Donated by Mansudae in 1984, 10 years after the overthrow of Hailie Selassie, the star-topped monument commemorates the Ethiopian and Cuban soldiers who fought in the Ogaden war with Somalia, six years earlier.Sitting on a marble slab in the centre of Praça de Independencia in Maputo, the monument supposedly depicts Samora Michel, the former leader of the Front for the Liberation of Mozambique (FRELIMO) who wrestled independence from the clutches of the Portuguese in 1974. Namibia just can’t get enough of Mansudae’s oeuvre, with four major pieces of work popping up between 2002 and 2014. From the pearly white State House to the brutish Independence Memorial Museum, the private Okahandja Military Museum and the 732-acre Heroes’ Acre war memorial, it’s fair to say the Namibian government has developed a taste for North Korean architecture.African Renaissance Monument Senegal