Excursion to Documenta 15: collective to the collectives

"Collective" is written on the black pillars of the Fridericianum, an arrow marks that a "me" and a "them" should go with it.

But what about participation in the collective when you spend a day walking through the Documenta?

In the Ruru house, a group sits in a closed circle behind a door in an adjoining room, but when you enter, you are not invited to join in;

apparently a closed event.

Otherwise there are no collectives to be seen on this day.

In many of the exhibition rooms, too, one has the impression of being left out as a viewer (“me”) and looking at the others (“them”) due to their design.

In the Fridericianum, the Rojava Film Commune, a collective of filmmakers from the autonomous region of the same name in northern Syria, is showing films that give women, ethnic and religious minorities a voice.

One admires the high-pitched singing of the old woman in the mountains or the impressively staged dance formation, which is filmed from below so that one looks up at the dancers.

And yet you don't feel comfortable in your own perspective.

Even in the act of looking, global north and global south do not mix.

In any case, the presentation is not designed for that.

A hero named Rumeniger

White writing on a light background in the stairwell of the Fridericianum: "White Lies Matter".

Black on a blueberry curd-colored wall: "All Time Is Local" in a pedestrian underpass.

In the Museum für Sepulchralkultur black on beige: “The Past Is Terrible.

Not To Forget.

The Present Is Past”.

There are many sentences like clubs or of disarming triviality at the documenta.

A jam of meaning.

As if there were more to read than to see, although seeing is also a form of reading.

A few so-called works and more objects, things, things, whereby a work is always an object.

And while you're wondering why just Foucault's book "Les mots et les choses", the words and things, is called "The order of things" in the German edition, you're standing in front of stone sculptures depicting food in the Britto's shop Arts Trust from Bangladesh.

In addition to sentences and things, there are many moving images from distant countries in classic museum rooms.

From Müküs on the Turkish-Iranian border.

From Australia.

Or from the autonomous region of Rojava in northern Syria.

And $200 budget movies from Wakaliga, a slum in Kampala, Uganda.

"Wakaliwood" is blood, kung fu, action from Isaac Nabwana, the "Tarantino of Africa", as some call him.

The main characters of his new film “Football Commando”, co-produced by the Documenta, are the kicker “Rumeniger” (also “Ruminiger” or “Ruminniger”) and his black woman, who deals out powerfully.

And a thirteen-year-old, who has often played in Nabwana, explains in a video how he shot a music video with the simplest of means and then pimped it on the computer.

His name sounds like past and future rolled into one: Isaac Newton Kizito.

Does that make sense, Kassel?

Yes, claims the black-and-white slogan of a Kassel department store on Friedrichsplatz, and in fact many social images of ourselves and others that have been nurtured over the years have come about from little more than mere assertions.

At Documenta 15, too, wild claims are made, attributions are made and, for the sake of simplicity, everything from Indonesia to Algeria is lumped together.

One looks in vain for polysemy, actually a strength of art, in the colorful monotony of the Documenta.

The Cuban collective INSTAR remains one of the few that aesthetically challenges the existing instead of simply presenting it or giving the impression of affirmation even when criticized.