Staying Visible! Black Lesbian Women Archives Matter vol. II
Body as Archive Expanded by Technology
The exhibition conceived and realized by Oxana Chi explores a performative perspective on the archive, reminding us that archives are produced by bodies, in line with Jamie A. Lee’s concept of the "archival body" (Producing the Archival Body, 2021). Lee proposes understanding archives as a living corpus of memories that emerge in relation to storytelling. In her multimedia presentation, Chi places the archive in a dialogical relationship with live performance, thereby questioning dominant Western cultures of remembrance.
As part of the project, the Living Mosaic Installation — consisting of 31 dance improvisation films (Mini DV, 2005–2007) and 11 experimental and documentary films (Mini DV, DVD, HD, VHS, 1995–2005)—was digitized and processed at the Medienwerkstatt/Kulturwerk BBK at Künstlerhaus Bethanien in Berlin.
For the exhibition, 12 installation films were selected (solos: cinematic self-portraits, and pas de deux: for one dancer and one camera operator), along with 10 additional archival films that trace Chi’s artistic career. Oxana Chi took this a step further by performing a passage of the trilogy Psyche (Uferstudios/Studio 1), a work developed over eight years, which engages with body memories and thus with the body’s own archive and processes of archiving.
@ Uferstudios Berlin: Heizhaus/PSR Kollektiv and Uferstudio 1
Tour History includes:
@ Uferstudios – Berlin 2024
