ABSTRACT
Tate Modern’s annual Live Exhibition, Our Bodies Our Archives, was scheduled to open 20 March 2020 – two days after the gallery was forced to shut its doors in anticipation of the UK’s first lockdown due to the COVID-19 pandemic. On the eve of closing, Tate’s live team adapted quickly to video-record Faustin Linyekula’s performance, My Body, My Archive – not yet fully rehearsed – to share with online audiences one of the first performances to respond to the pandemic. Only a month before we, the curatorial team behind the exhibition, had started to consider the seemingly remote possibility that COVID-19 – not yet declared a pandemic – could affect the exhibition. As one of the curators, I reflect on our decision-making during this rapidly evolving and unprecedented environment. I also examining Linyekula’s dance-based methodology which presents the body as a challenge to colonial value systems in Western museums, a strategy which became increasingly urgent in the context of the Black Lives Matter protests in the 2020 Northern Hemisphere Summer. In considering the recording of Linyekula’s performance, I reflect on how the themes it raises around fragility, social connection and the environment have resonated and amplified during the pandemic.
