Lecture given during the "Considering Monoculture" conference, deBuren, Brussels. February 28, 2020.
Revisiting ‘Decolonial Variations’, a short essay in the form of an interview with Joachim Ben Yacoub, published in May 2019, that pointed to strategies of absorption of Black bodies by Western art institutions, Olivier Marboeuf will share diverse feedback and interpretations, sometimes unexpected, concerning the piece. Readings of the text that sometimes expressed the confusion as well as the tensions that emerged in recent years around identity politics for those who hoped to invent a common culture, in which the racial foundations of capitalism would be forgotten in favour of a politics of surface reconciliation. If ‘Decolonial Variations’ pleads notably for an escape from identity as a market value and a distancing from the desire for recognition, it is with the objective of establishing minority bodies as sites of the particular and invisible history of the West and as matter(s) capable of disturbing, via their transformative power, the economy and ecology of cultural institutions.
The views and opinions published here mirror the principles of academic freedom and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of the L'Internationale confederation and its members.
Related contributions and publications
-
Hauntological Relations of Monocultures
Florence ChevalMonocultureM HKA -
A walk-through the exhibition ‘MONOCULTURE – A Recent History’ at M HKA (Antwerp), with Nick Aikens and Nav Haq in conversation
Nick Aikens, Nav HaqMonocultureM HKA -
Decolonial Suites
Olivier MarbœufMonoculture -
Offsetting Sameness: Notes Towards Artistic and Institutional Polysemy and Practices of/on Monocultures and Multicultures
Luísa Santos, Ana Fabíola MaurícioMonoculture -
Panel Discussion with Luísa Santos, Ana Fabíola Maurício and Olivier Marboeuf, moderated by Nav Haq
Nav Haq, Olivier Marbœuf, Luísa Santos, Ana Fabíola MaurícioMonoculture -
Constituting the Ummah – أم
Haseeb AhmedMonoculture -
Do thriving democracies need to be monolingual and monocultural?
Philippe Van ParijsMonoculture