The Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art is celebrating its 10th anniversary under the title “We Don’t Need Another Hero.” Yvette Mutumba of the curatorial team speaks about postcolonialism and contemporary art.
The 10th Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art is directed by a black curatorial team. They include Gabi Ngcobo of South Africa, Serubiri Moses of Uganda, American Nomaduma Rosa Masilela, Thiago de Paula Souza of Brazil and Yvette Mutumba of Germany. They are clear about one matter: they will not tolerate cliches. DW spoke with Mutumba, who is founder of the website Contemporary And (C&), which focuses on contemporary international art productions.
DW: The first Berlin Biennale took place in 1998 and was led by Klaus Biesenbach, along with curators Nancy Spector and Hans Ulrich Obrist. It was dominated primarily by white Europeans. This time, Gabi Ngcobo is joined by four other curators with an African background. Is this a statement?
Mutumba: It’s a statement on the part of Berlin Biennale that they chose Gabi Ngcobo as curator. I think that is part of the trend of global art that goes beyond Europe and the US. There has been an intense reaction to there being five “Afro-” curators. But it’s really important to us to stress that “being black” is not our expertise. Of course, the selection of artists will be a different one than during the other Biennale festivals. But that has more to do with the fact that we are interested in debates and artistic positions that are connected with our realities.
We are all very experienced curators and art teachers and work in the art field, so of course we are not focused solely on being black. These intense reactions show there is still a lot of hierarchies and perceptions at play — even if those in the art world would not admit to that because it considers itself so international. We are consciously resisting that. We have deliberately chosen not to use words such as Africa, postcolonialism, colonialism and diversity. Even if there are important political topics involved, we are still trying to take a step forward and define our own language.
Processing the colonial legacy is an important subject, in Berlin and elsewhere. The Ethnological Museum has faced demands for the return of artifacts, and the Humboldt Forum is also explicitly addressing the issue. Does that topic also play a role at the Biennale?
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