RETRIBUTION

In 2020, Berlin's Humboldt Forum announced plans to open, with collections that included stolen colonial artefacts. In the midst of conversations about the repatriation of similar pieces from other institutions, the announcement was met with controversy. Philipp Groth, Creative Director and Co-Founder of acte tm, commissioned me for a guerrilla film in protest of the opening. 

My approach was to take the conversation away from the often overly academic, legal tight-rope that tends to govern conversations about colonial legacy, museum provenance and repatriation. I wanted to focus on emotive value. I developed a poem called as the script for the film and it became the literal voice and name of the project. Retribution took the symbolic idea of a mother and brutalises her to reflect the colonial legacies that the museum's collection came from. The aim was to solicit unease, empathy and introduce an emotive voice to the conversation.

The film project subsequently got support from Highsnobeity and König Galerie, who both aided in its distribution. You can find the interview with Highsnobeity here.