Va-Bene Elikem Fiatsi: Performance as an Act of Radical Resistance

WORM Pirate Bay guest Va-Bene Elikem Fiatsi is a multidisciplinary artivist, mentor, curator and a shapeshifter. On 5th of October Va-Bene will share sHits practice as an Act of Radical Resistance, empathy and an embodied solidarity.

For the past 4 years, Va-Bene has expanded sHits artivism by creating a community and an artist residency in Kumasi /Ghana/ that hosts between 50 to 64 artists, curators, activists, researchers and many others each year. sHit is determined to bridge the gap between the queer community and the non queer local and international communities as an opposition to the censorship of LGBTQIA persons in Ghana.

sHits community work aims to dismantle misrepresentations of transwoman and queer communities at large in Ghana and to challenge the assumptions and myths that suggest queerness being foreign to Africans and Western Culture.

We see Va-Bene as a pioneer in the field of performance, community building and art organising and are very excited to learn from sHits practice with you! What challenges & opportunities are rooted in her context? What can we learn from Va-Bene’s DIY approach to hosting? How does performance and activism inform each other? and much more!

If the topics above spark your interest, don’t miss the talk! It will be a good one!

ABOUT: Va-Bene Elikem Fiatsi
Pronoun: ‘sHit’ if not ‘she’.
Born in 1981 in Ho, Ghana, Va-Bene Elikem Fiatsi [crazinisT artisT] works internationally but lives in Kumasi, Ghana. sHit is a multidisciplinary ‘artivist’, curator, founder and artistic director of perfocraZe International Artists Residency (pIAR) which aims at promoting exchanges between international and local artists, activists, researchers, curators and thinkers.

As a performer and installation artist, crazinisT investigates gender stereotypes, prejudices, queerness, identity politics and conflicts, sexual stigmas and their consequences for marginalized groups or individuals.

With rituals and a gender-fluid persona, sHit employs sHits own body as a thought-provoking tool in performances, photography, video and installations. sHit ‘life-and-live-art’ confronts issues such as: disenfranchisement, social justice, violence, objectification, internalised oppression, anti-blackness, ‘systemic indoctrination’, and more.