archive

western/modern understandings of the world don't see art or poetry in this way, as forms of knowledge

Audre Lorde speaks on this...

in Poetry Is Not a Luxury, she writes:

"I speak here of poetry as a revelatory distillation of experience, not the sterile word play that, too often, the white fathers distorted the word poetry to mean - in order to cover a desperate wish for imagination without insight"

talking about Audre Lorde's ideas in the introduction of Sister Outsider, Nancy K. Bereano writes:

"We have been told that poetry expresses what we feel, and theory states what we know; that the poet creates out of the heat of the moment, while the theorist's mode is, of necessity, cool and reasoned; that one is art and therefore experienced "subjectively," and the other is scholarship, held accountable in the "objective" world of ideas. We have been told that poetry has a soul and theory has a mind and that we have to choose between them.

The white western patriarchal ordering of things requires that we believe there is an inherent conflict between what we feel and what we think - between poetry and theory. We are easier to control when one part of our selves is split from another, fragmented, off balance."

the importance of archiving

some first thoughts after visiting the exhibition and open archive "Re/Assembling Anti-Racist Struggles" at FHXB Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg Museum in Berlin (October 17, 2025)

> now more than ever do we need to learn about past resistance movements against injustice; knowing what has been done before and with what effects can help us see that/what we can do now

> the individualism that characterizes neoliberal capitalist societies makes us feel that we have no power to bring about change, but we can't allow ourselves to just comply with an unjust system

> there have been, and are, so many people and initiatives that 'resist'

> however, we don't usually see or realize this because historical anti-racist struggles are largely rendered invisible

"active forgetting"

this is an active practice by modern/colonial governments and agents

for example: "the British government only admitted in 2013 that when it withdrew from Kenya in 1963, extensive records of the colonial administration had been moved to England and stored in secret archives...it was only due to a transnational alliance of NGOs, lawyers and historians that an admission of the existence of the archives was forced through and more than 5000 Kenyan citizens were compensated for the violence and suffering they had endured" (from the curatorial text of the exhibition)

> but, a new anti-racist ecology of remembering is emerging

"a politics of voice"

we are making things visible, finding new ways to do so

this is where archiving can be meaningful, as a practice of remembering and activating

some notes I took during a public lecture with Lilah V, organized by CLiP at Kunstinstituut Melly (March 13, 2026)

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about Lilah V and her practice:
- Lilah V is a community archivist and organizer in the Filipino diaspora in the Netherlands
- she is the archivist for the JMS Legacy Foundation
- the JMS Legacy Foundation aims to promote and share the legacy of Jose Maria Sison for all revolutionaries, activists, scholars, and seekers of a just society
- Jose Maria Sison, popularly known as JMS or Ka Joma (Ka is short for kasama, the Filipino word for comrade), was a revolutionary leader, a political theorist, an internationalist, and a poet, whose writings have guided the resurgence and development of the Filipino people’s revolutionary struggle for national and social liberation

about CLiP:
- CLiP stands for Collective Learning in Practice
- it is an educational program organized by Kunstinstituut Melly where 10-14 young participants come together over the span of six months
- for this year's edition, the participants explore collective survival in times of global crisis
- from October 2025 to March 2026, the participants have been developing skills and tools for collective survival through a mix of creative and practical methods, including discussion, movement, LARPing, food preservation and mutual aid

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attacks on history & knowledge
= attacks on the self
= attacks on the people and their resistance

history of struggle

when historical efforts of resistance (against oppression) are erased from knowledge domains, your ability to see a different (more liberated) future for your people is robbed from you because you are unaware of what generations before you have already done and accomplished

so archives (where histories of struggle are remembered) are not just places of history, but more so places for future

but: remembering is nothing without action

in order to keep knowledge alive, the sources of that knowledge need to be kept alive; the people, the land

it's therefore not enough to fix information in space; archiving needs to go hand in hand with activism (transforming) in order to truly bring about change

how can archival institutions (but also, for example, museums) contribute to transforming?
- by making visitors care
>>> speak to emotions
>>> close the distance between the present and the past by allowing visitors to touch things in the archive

- by being part of the community for which they are archiving
>>> become aware of the needs of the community
>>> organize political education and practical training

yesterday my friends and I ended up in a conversation about the meaning of art in this capitalist world (February, 2026)

we talked about the standardization of music, how many songs nowadays are molded into an easily digestible, consumable and reproducible format. we said that in this way, music seems to lose its artistic meaning. it becomes more of a product, focused on the consumer, rather than something that comes out of the artist’s urge to give shape to...

their feelings and thoughts;

the experience that is unique to them and their community;

the practice of cultural traditions or the exploration of new ones;

the transmission of knowledge.

in other words, creating to reflect on the human experience, more so than to satisfy the consumer experience

it is for this reason that I am rethinking how I want to listen to music. again, I recognize here that for a long time I have been practicing a habit that, without my awareness of it, is rooted in neoliberal, capitalist logic. especially in the last couple of years, with spotify increasingly using algorithms to inform listening behavior, I have become less and less intentional with what music I am consuming. I want to change that!

for other reasons as well (spotify underpaying artists, running ICE recruitment ads and its former CEO investing in weapon production), I want to quit spotify and find other ways of listening to music

I am aware that this change will probably require patience and perseverance, at least in the beginning. that is because this fast-paced logic that has been characterizing my consumption of music (among other things) has inevitably infiltrated my desires

chances are that diving into something deeply, listening to a music production that is not formatted to instant gratification, will not satisfy at first...

but I'm determined!

update (March, 2026):

- I quit spotify and subscribed to qobuz instead (fairer pay of artists; less algorithmic recommendations)

- I started listening to radios more (club carter radio by Sagid Carter; worldofjazz; operator)

- I started listening to sets more (on soundcloud and youtube)

- I keep track of what music I am listening to in my notes app, by making a new note every month where I write down the albums and songs that I am not just listening to but engaging with on a deeper level; this stimulates me to be more intentional with experiencing music and to enjoy it as a work of art that can bring me something more than just pure entertainment or the filling of time/space; and going back to these notes brings me so much joy which helps with the reprogramming of my desires, away from capitalist logic

lauryn hill in her song superstar (1998)

“You are what you watch. We have to be very conscious of what we feed to our eyes and our ears”.

Lindiwe Dovey, Professor of Film and Screen Studies at SOAS, reflects on the importance of intentional viewing - challenging us not to be led by the algorithm. She also shares her favourite film, an inspiring quote, and why her office feels like home.

it is May 20, I am back in London and I just attended a public conversation between curator Ben Broome, artist Josiane Pozi and Peckham resident Yvette Francis at South London Gallery

this conversation took place in the context of Rooms of Neighbours, an evolving exhibition curated by Ben Broome, which unfolds across twelve households on his street in Peckham. each household is paired with an artist to develop a body of work that is relevant to their life and home

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about Rooms of Neighbours (from the SLG website):
"Taking inspiration from Jan Hoet’s landmark exhibition Chambres d’amis (Ghent, 1986), Rooms of Neighbours reimagines the domestic exhibition as a living, social process. Rather than centering existing art-world networks, this project takes place within the homes of residents who, by and large, do not regularly visit arts spaces, and whose lives span multiple generations, diasporas and social backgrounds.

Each participating household is matched with an artist whose practice reflects a sensitivity to domestic, social and relational environments. Artists responded to the specific dynamics of each home, creating works that sit within lived spaces far removed from a traditional white-cube context. Beyond its curatorial inquiry, Rooms of Neighbours has had a tangible social impact: neighbours who had lived on the same street for decades met for the first time through taking part."
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in today's world, what is considered and presented as 'good art' is often a reflection of power

in Rooms of Neighbours, I recognize an intention to shift away from traditional structures surrounding art and exhibition making, towards an approach that shows that art is everywhere and that anyone can be an artist

the conversation between Ben, Josiane and Yvette - who, above all, seem to have developed a warm friendship throughout the process of this exhibition - confirmed this feeling

during the conversation, Ben explained that when he first came up with Rooms of Neighbours, he started knocking on doors in his street to introduce the idea. one of the households that expressed enthusiasm was that of Yvette, who was then paired with artist Josiane

Yvette used to paint and dance, until she became a mother and her attention was demanded by other, more pressing matters. "life happens," she said during the conversation at South London Gallery

when she became part of Rooms of Neighbours last year, many of her friends were dealing with all sorts of heartbreaking problems in their lives. she knew: now that I am going to make art again, I want my artworks to relate to the issues that my friends, and the world at large, are going through

indeed, isn't it an artist's duty to reflect the times?

Josiane thinks so. art and creativity, she argued during the conversation, are vessels for communication, reflection and release and have been for thousands of years. the idea that art can only be found in 'established spaces' and understood by 'knowledgeable people' is very specific and exclusionary. at the end of the day, whoever you are, you have to give yourself permission to create, she said. if the art you create is meaningful to you, then that is the biggest win

Ben and Josiane's favorite artwork of Yvette for Rooms of Neighbours? the one that she was ready to throw in the bin because at the bottom of the paper, below her drawing of doves, she had used some open space to quickly write a to-do note to herself. Ben and Josiane liked this "reflection of life" and encouraged Yvette to see it as part of the art piece rather than something that is not supposed to be there. in the end, it became one of the artworks they collectively decided to include in the exhibition

hearing the three of them talk about this process at South London Gallery and bearing witness, in that moment, to the trust and familiarity that has unfolded between them left me feeling so joyful, hopeful. it reminded me of what life is really about, something which everyone is capable of but which many hierarchical (art) spaces lack: human connection. while the world seems to drift further and further away from what it means to be human, Rooms of Neighbours takes us right back. seeing it being presented at South London Gallery was a beautiful experience, one that I am happy to have encountered as I start defining my own practice and position in the world

from left to right: Yvette Francis, Josiane Pozi and Ben Broome

left on the screen: Ben and Josiane's favorite artwork of Yvette

what Emma Dabiri writes about beauty in her book Don't Touch My Hair changed my life

"Our society places a huge emphasis on physical beauty. It teaches us that [...] beauty is a universal norm. This is not necessarily accurate.

We hear a lot about the male gaze, but the very concept of 'the gaze' requires further scrutiny. The gaze itself is the invitation to differentiate bodies first and foremost based on visible features.

Reality is always only a culturally specific arrangement that we have been conditioned to perceive. Other realities exist. And some of these have privileged senses beyond that of sight" (171).

"Talking about the Ashanti, Anthony Appiah argues that it is not typical within an indigenous African worldview to isolate a purely aesthetic dimension. Fe, which is an Ashanti Twi word for someone or something beautiful is also used in the evaluation of social behaviour. A child who misbehaves is told that what they are doing is not fe. Our European cultural tendency to see something from a single aspect - 'its fineness', 'its beauty' - and to isolate this dimension, represents a movement away from the wholeness of vision that existed in many African cultures.

Appiah explains that viewing something as beautiful as the only important way of assessing it would be puzzling to indigenous thinkers. [...] To look at physical beauty entirely isolated from any context made little sense. Beauty was more contextual, and value judgements of what was beautiful couldn't be made in an entirely superficial way. As other senses were privileged as much as sight, there was no need for the old adage about not judging a book by its cover: it was already a given! The beauty standards that emerged from such a world-view were subsequently very different; less standardized, less homogenized and more inclusive" (172-3).

"As stated, amongst the Yoruba a person would not be considered attractive or not based on anything as arbitrary as height or complexion. A short person who was attractive might be described as a kúrú yë jó (one who is short and perfectly elegant when dancing) but equally they might be ènìyàn kúkurú bìlíísì (a short devil). While an arched foot was considered a thing of great beauty for a woman, not having an arch was not enough to preclude one from beauty. Those with lighter complexions were not perceived as more beautiful than those who were darker. Both light and dark skin could be attractive but equally both could be unattractive. Even smallpox scars might be deemed beautiful, on the right person: uni-sàsá-sojú-e-lewà-ferefere (a person whose facial beauty is enhanced by smallpox spots).

Appiah describes the aesthetic movement in Europe during the latter part of the nineteenth century as one that taught us to see visual art 'for art's sake'. The tendency to imagine that every single thing in existence is quantifiable and can be subject to measurement, the urge to measure things in isolation from their context, is a Western European imperative. It's the logic of dividing, naming and categorizing things [...]. Each living being becomes distinctly separated from its relation to everything else. Reciprocity is destroyed and replaced by competition. Beauty becomes oppressive and competitive, an abstract, isolated quality" (173).

"I'm grateful for the different cultures I've lived in and the different positions I have occupied on the spectrum of beauty, in certain times and places beautiful, in others not; and I saw the difference in treatment based on whether or not I was judged as possessing this thing called 'beauty'. I understood then that beauty was not the space for my salvation. It is far too fragile, and my worth as a human being cannot be given, or withheld, based on something so arbitrary.

Yet so much of our identity is invested within the beauty regime. It occupies a huge percentage of our thoughts and social interactions. When we are perceived to possess it, it provides us with a fleetingly enjoyable feeling. Thus, we interpret beauty as a benevolent, positive force within our lives.

In our desire to see our own beauty acknowledged we forget that the beauty regime is an oppressive construct designed to keep women in a state of heightened insecurity. This doesn't stop at the 'white gaze'. The idea of 'the gaze' itself is Eurocentric and its origins are implicitly white and implicitly patriarchal" (174-5).