In 2018, Polish artist Ludomir Franczak visited the Hrdlicka Museum of Man, which is run by the University of Prague, where he discovered an exhibit displaying human bones. According to the description of these objects, they were the mortal remains of "Dahomey Amazon Gutta", who was put on display as part of an “ethnographic show” in the Czech capital in September 1892, where she later died from pneumonia or typhoid fever. This discovery became the starting point for intensive research: backed by an interdisciplinary team of artists and scientists, Ludomir Franczak searched archives and museums throughout Europe to find mentions of Gutta’s biography. He asks how to come to terms with colonialism in Poland and the Czech Republic, how to responsibly handle human remains kept in European collections with responsibility, how racist practices of representation persist, and how he, as a white artist, can address these issues.

The performance of “Gutta” will be followed by a discussion, which will provide the opportunity to examine the topics and questions of the evening in greater depth. This includes addressing the contested collections of human remains in Berlin museums, aesthetic choices of the performance, and current discourses surrounding representation and commemoration.

Guests: Isabelle Reimann, Ludomir Franczak, N. N.

Isabelle Reimann is an ethnologist at the Humboldt University in Berlin. She is the author of the “Scientific report on the presence of human remains from colonial contexts in Berlin“ commissioned by Decolonize Berlin.

Notes on accessibility: Information about the accessibility of the venue in structural terms can be found here. The performance and subsequent discussions will look at topics of human remains, the “Völkerschau”, colonialism and racism.