Berlin Exhibition Honors Hubert Fichte's Radical Travels with Over 170 Works

The exhibition 'Amor e Etnologia: A Dialética Colonial da Sensibilidade (segundo Hubert Fichte)' opened in Berlin, curated by Diedrich Diederichsen and Anselm Franke. It honors the German author's 19-book series documenting his travels, sexuality, and spirituality between 1969 and 1972, particularly in Brazil, Portugal, and Chile. The show features over 170 works, blending pieces from prior editions in Lisbon, Salvador, Rio de Janeiro, Santiago, and Dakar with new additions. Artists include André Pierre, Canute Caliste, Camille Billops, Owen Dodson, James Van Der Zee, Michael Buthe, Virgínia de Medeiros, Ayrson Heráclito, Miguel Rio Branco, Alair Gomes, the Coletivo Bonobando, Alvin Baltrop, and Tione Nekkia McClodden. The opening featured the performance 'Preta Jardim / Omindarewa (2017)' by Bonobando, presented by Lívia Laso, Vanessa Rocha, and Adriana Schneider. While the exhibition critiques the European gaze on underrepresented cultures, it has been noted for softening Fichte's recurrent themes of love and sex, with only a few works like Rio Branco's 'Nada Levarei Quando Morrer' and Bonobando's 'Peep Show I-III' depicting intimacy directly. Supported by the Instituto Goethe, the project is seen as an interesting effort in shared curatorship but has been critiqued for lacking the social sense Fichte experienced in his travels and for not deeply investigating the term 'etnologia' beyond a religious-cultural sense.