Coco Fusco. Tomorrow, I Will Become an Island

About

Tomorrow, I Will Become an Island is the first major retrospective of Cuban-American artist Coco Fusco (b. 1960, USA). For more than three decades she has participated as an authoritative voice in discourses about the representation of race , feminism, postcolonial theory and institutional criticism. The exhibition traces the profound influence that Fusco's work has on contemporary art discourses in the Americas and Europe. It also shows a comprehensive selection of videos, photographs, texts, installations and live performances by the artist from the 1990s to the present day.

In her multidisciplinary artistic work, Fusco investigates how intercultural dynamics influence the construction of the self and notions of cultural otherness . In her works she takes up multicultural and postcolonial discourses as well as feminist and psychoanalytic theories. Her investigation of intercultural dynamics has resulted in artistic projects on ethnographic exhibitions, animal psychology, sex tourism in the Caribbean, working conditions in free trade zones, suppressed colonial documents on indigenous struggles and military interrogation methods in the war on terror.

Her more recent work explores the relationship between poetry and revolutionary politics in Cuba. The structure of the exhibition is roughly based on these various interrelated themes. In this respect , Tomorrow, I Will Become an Island shows the range of Fusco's artistic work, which is of great importance in view of the political and cultural debates currently taking place not only in Germany.

Parallel to the exhibition, KW is dedicating a diverse accompanying program to Fusco's complex and multidisciplinary work as an author, activist and performer. In addition to a series of talks, some of which are organized jointly with the ICI Berlin, a performance of Fusco's new multimedia performance Antigone Is Not Available Right Now , commissioned by KW, will take place in early December 2023 in cooperation with the Sophiensæle.

At the same time as the exhibition at KW, Thames & Hudson will publish an extensive monograph on Fusco's work with contributions by Julia Bryan-Wilson, Anna Gritz, Jill Lane, Antonio José Ponte and the artist herself.

Co-curators: Anna Gritz, Léon Kruijswijk
Assistant curator: Linda Franken