FILM: KOLONIAL

Commissioned by Baryshnikov Arts Center, Kolonial is the final product of a three year of research project between installation artist Conrad Quesen and Stefanie Batten Bland. An installation based dance cinematic work, Kolonial is centered inside performative transparent spaces – cages that reveal colonial foundations and mythology.

Inspired by the ethnic exposition parks primarily of Europe, North America, and colonial Caribbean during the 1810s-1940s, this dance cinema piece examines how we create definitions to justify systems that exploit and oppress. Kolonial’‘s physical posturing and gesture interrogate identities suppressed through human zoos and how it relates to our viral cages of today.