Christian Guerematchi: Loved2Death
Loved2Death is a powerful dance performance that reflects on the delicate balance between nurturing and strangling forces within the racial embrace. Drawing from personal experiences as a child of color in Slovenia choreographer Christian Guerematchi unravels the complexities of double consciousness, cultural erasure, and the coldness of exclusion.
Guerematchi undertook a residency at MGLC (International Centre for Graphic Arts) in Ljubljana. Inspired by the book On Cuddling – Loved to Death in the Racial Embrace by Phanuel Antwi, he searched for a unifying factor in his dual heritage. He discovered connections with animism — a philosophy rooted both in Slavic and in central African cultures. Animism speaks to the idea that the soul or spirit resides in all things. In Loved2Death Guerematchi reflects on how both African and European animists underwent an imposed ‘civilization process,’ which stripped away their cultural identity.
For Forum on European Culture, Guerematchi explores the perception of someone who went down in recent history as the archetype of the tyrant: Robert Mugabe. Drawing on contemporary media warfare and the manipulation of power dynamics, Guerematchi presents an exploration of racial paradoxes. Using Robert Mugabe’s complex legacy as a case study – a fighter for the rights of Africans in Africa, but at the same time known as an extremist dictator because of his attack on white farmers in Zimbabwe. Guerematchi challenges us to confront the contrasting realities of white African rights and the stigmatization of Black Europeans. The performance seeks to disorient and provoke, leaving the audience to question who controls the narrative and to what extent we are complicit in shaping our collective truths. What happens when everyone takes the liberty to manipulate reality?
Choreography/concept/performance: Christian Guerematchi
Music: Aurélie Nyirabikali Lierman & Julius Eastman
Visuals/scenography: Jeisson Drenth
Kostuum: Jacob Kok
Christian Guerematchi is a Slovenia born performance artist coming from classical ballet and creating in contemporary dance. His work is strongly artivistic and is defined by the philosophy of the historic as well as the artistic Non-Alignment. Being born in Yugoslavia as a queer person of color he is seeking to redefine the borders of black vs. white; male vs. female; East vs. West and North vs. South. Guerematchi has lived in the Netherlands since 2006 and he is embedded in the artistic/cultural questions of Dutch society. This due to the insight he acquired from theater studies at the University of Amsterdam and the Institute for Somatic Movement Coaching. In 2021 he received a two year development grant from the Dutch Performing Arts Fund (FPK). During this trajectory he created the trilogy Epistemologies of the Body in partnership with ICK Amsterdam. The trilogy includes the solo performance NAM – Non Aligned Movement, the trio Hissy Fit (Echo Between Bodies) and the group performance FUNK (A Cosmic Horizon). In it Guerematchi focuses on forgotten histories, codes of the black body and the black European identity. In 2022 he created the artistic intervention Blaq Tito Addressing the Parliament of Ghosts – a short dance film, which was part of the 2023 Ljubljana Biennale of Graphic Arts under the curatorship of Ibrahim Mahama.
Joy Mariama Smith is a native Philadelphian currently based in in Amsterdam, NL, Joy Mariama Smith’s work primarily addresses the conundrum of projected identities in various contexts. A sub-theme, or ongoing question in their work is: What is the interplay between the body and it’s physical environment? Rooted in socially engaged art practice, they are a performance/installation/movement artist , activist, facilitator, curator, researcher, dramaturg and architectural designer. They have a strong improvisational practice spanning over 20 years. When they choose to teach, they actively try to uphold inclusive spaces.
