In this first on-line exhibition for the Historical Body project, the three invited artists investigate the topic of commemoration and remembering, exploring peculiar strategies for the preservation of delicate and reluctant memories.

 

Tania El Khoury, Nathalie Mba Anguezomo Bikoro and Jelili Atiku put at the centre of their works a body that can be ephemeral or highly tangible, sometimes present, sometimes lost, still able to be vehicle for the reconstruction of forgotten narratives and hidden histories.

 

In the pieces presented the moment of speculation and rumination about the past inspires a necessary reconsideration of the present, and foster a change in the perception of future. Weaving narratives, negotiating with dark spots in official History, the artists engage themselves in very recognisable performative researches, which aim to spur awareness, while having a concrete political impact.

 

If the body is the site for private and collective memories, the moment of encounter and recognition between subjectivities (the artist/performer/witness and the audience) has to be considered the place where Future’s reconfiguration begins. Cherish and recount stories that the World History has obscured, forces a change in approach, inspiring a movement that points straight to the yet-to-come.

 

Future commemorations are shaped by the gestures of today: what has to be depends on how we will look at past, tomorrow.

 

[about the artists]