Europe

Decolonizing the World Through Art

The festival Postcolonial Poly Perspectives is designed to strengthen the visibility of black perspectives through art

May 13th, 2019
Kristina Bör, News from Berlin
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The Ballhaus Naunystraße Theater, owned by the district office Friechrichshain-Kreuzberg, organized a festival in Berlin to promote the understanding for postcolonial countries through the arts.

The Festival puts an emphasis on everyday activities as well as artistic, activist and theoretical approaches to the decolonization of the present. It opens the stage for the people who continue to be affected by (post-)colonial power structures and gives them a platform to make their voices heard.

Presenting black perspectives in the arts, including performances, choreography, video and literature, it aims to show and, subsequently, can break the colonial heritage that remains engrained in these areas until today.

The festival’s purpose is to broaden the unilateral way of creating meaning that colonialism entails and it’s doing so by showing the diversity of viewpoints. It also intends to raise awareness of the power monopoly the colonizing world still has over most areas in the life of people in postcolonial countries.

Visiting the events of the festival presents a chance to open one’s own eyes to the continued struggles of postcolonial societies and gain deeper insight into their perspectives. It offers a way to build and strengthen intercultural relationships and to create a diverse foundation moving forward.

The festival, which started on April 27th 2019, will run until December 2019 and is held at Berliner Ballhaus Naunystraße. The next event will be the premiere of a performance by Bishop Black called “Becoming my Body.” In this, he is searching to counter Colonization and moves through parts of video, sound and dance to a space where different power relations are in effect. It takes place on 30th May 2019 at 8pm.

Another event of the festival will be a four-part series of panels, starting June 1st with „Buna Hour / Kitchen Table.“ In this series, a diverse collection of people will talk about discursive and artistic strategies to decolonize daily life, including its objects and practices connected to them. The first discussion will focus on food as a form of individual and collective resistance within a global system of production and consumption.

More information can be found on the websites below.

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News from Berlin