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Fracture (i)

I find performance art as confusing as it is fascinating. To capture the work on film is a challenge and you’ve got only one shot to get it right. Knowing and understanding the artist’s personality and their story is key.

At the opening of the exhibition ‘Body Talk’ at WIELS, center for contemporary art in Brussels, the Kenyan artist Miriam Syowia Kyambi performs her work ‘Fracture (i)’. 

The performance discusses the question of how people can pile up the pieces and continue their lives after all the horrors they have been through. What will happen to humanity if people cannot process those abhorrent experiences or mourn the beloved they have lost? People living in the middle of violence and fear need an opportunity to be themselves. They need a permission to feel, mourn, and carry on. The desire for justice is universal.

In this short documentary, the artist shares her ideas about this piece of work, she explains the meaning of the different elements in the performance, and we follow her closely in her preparations.