The Humboldt Forum: a space for claiming the African colonial heritage

The Humboldt Forum: a space for claiming the African colonial heritage In the wall text of the exhibition dedicated to African heritage “Appropriating objects and colonial fictions of Africa”, the curators state that “the current projects aim at the decolonization of collections through cooperation with partners from the societies of origin”. However, is this premise really being put into practice?

I'll visit

30.03.2022 | by Ana Temudo

Seeing Being Seen: Territories, Frontiers, Circulations 2022 Colectivo Los Ingrávidos

Seeing Being Seen: Territories, Frontiers, Circulations 2022 Colectivo Los Ingrávidos In the collective’s prolific and extensive filmography, the gesture of deconstructing the audiovisual and cinematic grammar is inseparable from the disarticulation of the hegemonic perceptive, cognitive, representative and scopic regimes. Los Ingrávidos’ work shifts indeed to a theoretical reflection, formalised in a correlative film praxis, focusing on the intersection between different domination categories related to the capitalist-colonial-patriarchal system. Their films aim, precisely, to disarticulate the perceptive-cognitive models and the audiovisual and cinematic forms resulting from domination categories.

Games Without Borders

21.03.2022 | by Raquel Schefer

“Institutions change, in a slow and tedious way, but it happens”. Interviewing Philipp Schramm and Katharina Fink from Iwalewahaus

“Institutions change, in a slow and tedious way, but it happens”. Interviewing Philipp Schramm and Katharina Fink from Iwalewahaus I think we always have the responsibility of looking into the ghosts of these colonial dreams and taking the ideas further. For example, we must rethink what are artwork features and what exactly defines them? Institutions change, in a slow and tedious way, but it happens. If we also think about the thesis and how it is configurated, how free can we be about the aesthetic part of it? Now we can offer “decolonize art studies” as a course. All the reconfigurations are a very long process to be achieved. A very important thing I would like to highlight is that where you are you must do your work and contribution. We should try to influence others with our work, inspiring them and trying to change what we know is wrong.

Face to face

18.03.2022 | by Arimilde Soares

Covering Ukraine: A mean streak of racist exceptionalism

Covering Ukraine: A mean streak of racist exceptionalism The conflict raging in Ukraine between Russian and Ukrainian Slavs, the latter with the support of a tribal coalition of nations across sub-Scandinavian Europe, has exposed much more than the fragility of peace on the disease-ravaged subcontinent. It has also revealed a mean streak of racist exceptionalism with which many Europeans, and people of European heritage, tend to regard themselves. It has been impossible to miss the shock among Caucasian journalists covering the war, sparked by Russia’s invasion under the pretext of supporting ethnic allies in the eastern tribal enclaves of Donetsk and Luhansk, which it has recognised as independent states, at the idea that this could happen in Europe.

Games Without Borders

04.03.2022 | by Patrick Gathara