MONSTRUM – A Performative Inquiry into the Repressed

MONSTRUM is not a single work but a continuing field of research — an unfolding practice that refuses closure, much like my ongoing project VerTrauen vs RƎVO⅃ution.

Born within an artistic residency, MONSTRUM turns its gaze toward the invisible and silenced forms of violence that inhabit our social, structural, and personal landscapes. Inspired by Akwaeke Emezi’s novel PET and the philosophies of Bayo Akomolafe, we approach the “monster” as a living metaphor for crisis — intimate and collective.

At the heart lies Akomolafe’s provocation:

“The way we act to the crisis is a part of the crisis.”

Rather than seeking to banish or heal the monstrous, we invite it to speak. We ask: what emerges when we listen — when we recognize the monstrous not as an intruder but as a mirror, a presence revealing uncomfortable truths?

MONSTRUM continues as an open-ended inquiry, shifting between performance, dialogue, and embodied research. It invites us to confront what we have repressed, to stand in the depth of it, and to consider the possibility that within the monstrous resides a fragment of understanding — perhaps even a way forward.