Lizza May David

WHOSE TEARS? (Homage to Fred Wilson)
Charlottenburg Palace, July 4, 2023 - October 31, 2023

Prussian Palaces / Colonial Histories
Colonial practises and structures can be traced throughout earlier centuries, before German colonialism of the 19th and early 20th centuries, as well as afterwards. In this light, the special exhibition is looking to explore the connection between Germany’s longer colonial history and how they persist today.

The exhibition themes were developed together with various experts in a joint process over the course of five workshops. An artistic intervention in the courtyard of Charlottenburg Palace by Nando Nkrumah brings further positions to the exhibition, while the artists Emeka Okereke, Lizza May David, Patricia Vester, the interpreter and cultural scientist Marianne Ballé Moudoumbou und the art historian Dr. SinhaRaja Tammita-Delgoda offer important and critical counter perspectives to the historical objects displayed in the exhibition rooms.

For the exhibition, Lizza May David produced a painting with dimensions that correspond to the surroundings of porcelain figures in SPSG's storehouse. This piece is a sensitive response to the exhibition process: it conveys what David felt while visiting the depot, as well as participating in the workshops. The teardrops are a reference to the work of the American artist Fred Wilson, who has been questioning the Western canon in museum collections since the 1980s.