Art for Politics: The Spanish Pavilion at the Venice Biennale as a reflection of its international standing during the Franco dictatorship
International events sometimes highlight the connections between art and politics. Art and culture play a key role in defining and legitimating the narratives at such gatherings – and shaping the imaginary map of the contemporary world. For example, the Venice Art Biennale was launched in 1895 with the goal of restoring the city’s past cultural…
Ukraine + Russia = Love? If Countries Were People
When I think about the current relationship between Ukraine and Russia, a certain conversation comes to mind. In 2007 in a university canteen in St Petersburg a former friend interrogated me over a cup of tea: Alexandra: Why do you call yourself a Ukrainian? Why are you being such a nationalist? You live in Russia….
“Those Who Are Poor, Die Poor”: Notes on the Chilean Elections
Premature obituaries of Chilean neoliberalism abound on the heels of the December 19 run-off presidential election.1 Gabriel Boric, of Apruebo Dignidad (Approve Dignity, AD) – a coalition of the Frente Amplio (Broad Front, FA) and the Partido Comunista de Chile (Communist Party of Chile, PCC) –, secured a surprisingly robust victory over his far-right opponent….
Bringing the state closer to people: 25 years of Kerala’s ‘People’s Plan’
This August marked the 25th anniversary of Kerala’s iconic People’s Plan Campaign, which institutionalized community participation in decision-making at the local administrative level
A Big Victory for India’s Farmers
On November 19, almost a year to the day when hundreds of thousands of farmers began to converge on the national capital of New Delhi in what turned out to be a year-long protest, the Bharitiya Janata Party (BJP) government announced that it would rescind the 3 farm Acts that had precipitated the protests. No…
100 Years of the CCP
According to official accounts, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was formed on 1st July 1921, when 12 people met in a small room in Shanghai’s French concession. Western accounts differ, insisting the date was the 23rd July, and that there were 13, not 12, people in the room. Western and Chinese accounts have pretty much…
HONG KONG: THE DECOLONIZATION THAT NEVER HAPPENED
In this brief article, we attempt to demonstrate how a historic compromise between British colonial power and an affluent local Chinese social class created fertile ground for the emergence of another “Chineseness”, different to and separate from the Chineseness of mainland China, or that of the Nationalists who fled to Taiwan in 1949. This historical…
Cuba: A Protest Anticipated by Art
The protests that took place on July 11 in Cuba were neither convened by artists nor led by intellectuals nor conceived by a laboratory of aesthetic drives. They were popular demonstrations that evinced an extreme situation marked by political immobility, economic inefficacy, the devastating consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic, growing inequality, lack of liberties and…
“Islamo-Leftism” – Hobby Horse of the Ideologues of French Universalism
The recent and intense attacks on what has been labelled Islamo-leftism, Islamo-gauchisme in the original, is the French iteration of a more global attack on “woke leftism”, or specifically critical race theory, gender studies and postcolonialism, summarized by France’s President Macron as the threat of “certain social science theories from the United States”.[1] Perhaps surprisingly…
Civil Accountability Mechanisms in Mexico After Ayotzinapa
The case of the 43 students was one of the darkest episodes of human rights violations in the recent history of Mexico. Both inside and outside the country, the news about the brutal attacks on 17-18 year-old students of the Ayotzinapa school, in the hands of the local police and the organised crime, led to…
The Second Wave of COVID-19: A Report from India
Thousands dead and the rest pleading for oxygen and medical care, burning funeral pyres and bodies stacked up along public streets, cremation grounds meant for animals used for humans out of lack of space, hospitals running out of beds, families wailing as their relatives gasp for air, ambulances booked for whoever offers the highest price…
THE RISK IS (UN)REAL
In an article published in the New York Times on the 12th of February, David Leonhardt reported on the latest round of restrictions imposed by Berkeley University, which prohibited outdoors exercise, even while wearing face masks, to prevent a further surge in Covid-19 cases. The measures taken were justified by the slogan: “THE RISK IS…
OPEN LETTER TO THE NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL OF THE UNITED NATIONS (regarding the resurgence of violence against social leaders in Colombia)
I am writing this letter in anguish and lament. Yet again, we are suffering the deaths of our social leaders. Yesterday, Francisco Giacometto Gomez was assassinated in the city of Bogota. Today, our communities in the department of Cauca heard tragic news of the assassination of Sandra Liliana Pena, compañera and Governor of Laguna Siberia. As…
#chinesevirus: The Long Racism that Lurks Behind COVID-19
According to a recent study that analysed tweets from 9 March to 23 March 2020, corresponding to the week before and the week after President Donald J. Trump’s tweet with the phrase, “Chinese Virus,” there was a significant increase in anti-Asian hashtags associated with #chinesevirus when comparing the week before 16 March 2020 to the…
Myanmar’s Diverse Revolution Digging in For the Long Haul
Six weeks after Myanmar’s generals staged a coup d’état, all-out civil war is looming over the country while resistance is not abating. Far from it, Myanmar’s Spring Revolution is rapidly transforming into an ever more defiant and unified movement. This is despite – or rather because – of the increasing lethal violence with which the…
Radical Imaginations: Decolonizing Art Institutions Through Practical Actions in the post-COVID Landscape
The museum is in crisis. In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic and social uprising centered around Black Lives Matter, conversations around art institutions have jumped to the forefront of calls for decolonization. Yet one major question remains: What will a decolonized museum look like, especially now? Since beginning this study in the summer of…
