I Spy with My Little Eye:
Racism, Resistance and Empowerment
CityLab Exhibition
1 October 2020 - 28 March 2021
From October 2020 until March 2021, the Historisches Museum Frankfurt showed the CityLab exhibition "I Spy with My Little Eye: Racism, Resistance and Empowerment". Together with the participants we took a look at postcolonial continuities and ruptures in Frankfurt. The CityLab comes to life as a participatory exhibition format, from the participation of the city's citizens. Therefore, the aim of the exhibition was to take a multi-perspective look at the network of relationships between the colonial past and the postcolonial present. 1 October 2020 - 28 March 2021
In public discourse, the topics of racism, colonial history and their continuities are only marginally addressed and often negotiated without the involvement of formerly colonized people and countries. Historiography has been written predominantly by people from the mainstream society, therefore important perspectives are missing. The CityLab aimed to create a space in which the current effects of unequal power relations are made visible. This concerns above all narratives of marginalized people, such as Black People, People of Color, Sinti and Roma, as well as people with migration and refugee biographies. The CityLab exhibition focussed on these narratives, perspectives, and experiences.
The contributions were created in close cooperation between the museum and experts from the city. The exhibition addressed residents as well as scientists, artists, researchers and other interested parties. People from various activist and migrant initiatives and associations in Frankfurt were participating in the CityLab exhibition. From November 2019 to May 2020, we discussed and worked out contents for the exhibition together with the city lab participants in the workshops. These contributions were very diverse: postcolonial city tours, podcasts on everyday racism, interviews on marginalized narratives, but also empowering installations and much more.
