Coco Fusco

Coco Fusco: Tomorrow, I Will Become an Island

Coco Fusco, Bare Life Study #1, performance, 2005. Courtesy of Videobrasil.

24 January 2024

Magazine América Latina

1 min read

Contemporary art

Visual art

Coco Fusco

Retrospective of Cuban-American artist’s work traces her influence on contemporary art.

Co-curated by Anna Gritz and Léon Kruijswijk, and with curatorial assistance by Linda Franken, Tomorrow, I Will Become an Island presents the work of Cuban-American artist Coco Fusco, spanning over 30 years, with videos, photographs, texts, installations, and performance pieces.

In her work, the artist reflects on intercultural and social dynamics and the ways the Other is constructed, based on post-colonial discourses and psychoanalytic theories. Along these lines, Fusco developed artistic projects on various topics, such as ethnographic exhibitions, animal psychology, sexual tourism in the Caribbean, working conditions in free trade zones, suppressed colonial records of indigenous struggles and military interrogation techniques used in the war on terrorism. Her most recent works focus on the relationship between poetry and Cuban revolutionary politics.

Tomorrow, I Will Become an Island was on display from September 14, 2023 to January 7, 2024 at KW in Berlin (Germany).

https://www.kw-berlin.de/en/

Installation view of the exhibition “Coco Fusco – Tomorrow, I Will Become an Island” at KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin 2023. Photo: Frank Sperling. Courtesy the artist.

Coco Fusco. Your Eyes Will Be an Empty Word, 2021. Video still. Courtesy the artist.

Archive material of: Coco Fusco, Two Undiscovered Amerindians Visit the West, 1992-1994. Courtesy the artist (back); Coco Fusco with Paula Heredia, The Couple in the Cage: A Guatinaui Odyssey, 1993 (front). Installation view of the exhibition “Coco Fusco – Tomorrow, I Will Become an Island” at KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin 2023; Photo: Frank Sperling

Coco Fusco, Mexarcane, 1994-1995. Coco Fusco and Guillermo Gómez-Peña. Photo: Kim Kozzi

Coco Fusco with Guillermo Gómez-Peña, Mexarcane International, 1994-1995. Courtesy the artist (back left). Coco Fusco with Nao Bustamante, Stuff, 1996-1999. Courtesy the artist (right). Installation view of the exhibition “Coco Fusco – Tomorrow, I Will Become an Island” at KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin 2023; Photo: Frank Sperling

Coco Fusco, Message in a Bottle from María Elena (English Title), 2015. Video still: Courtesy the artist.

Coco Fusco, TED Ethology: Primate Visions of the Human Mind, 2015. Courtesy the artist (right); Coco Fusco, Bare Life Study #1, 2005. Courtesy Videobrasil Historical Collection (left); Coco Fusco with Dan Turner, A Field Guide for Female Interrogators, 2006/08. Courtesy the artist (back); Installation view of the exhibition “Coco Fusco – Tomorrow, I Will Become an Island” at KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin 2023. Photo: Frank Sperling

Coco Fusco, Message in a Bottle from María Elena (English Title), 2015. Video still: Courtesy the artist.

Coco Fusco, Antigone Is Not Available Right Now, performance at Sophiensæle, commissioned by KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin 2023. Photo: Frank Sperling