The heart of a giraffe in captivity is twelve kilos lighter is the title of the exhibition at the pavilion of the Czech Republic at the Venice Art Biennale 2024. The show has been created by Eva Koťátková in collaboration with Himali Singh Soin, David Tappeser, the collective Gesturing Towards Decolonial Futures, children, educators and older people.
Pavilion of the Czech Republic at the Venice Art Biennale 2024. Venice (Italy), April 19, 2024.
Official description: The heart of a giraffe in captivity is twelve kilos lighter tells the story of Lenka the giraffe, drawing on the history of Czechoslovakia’s acquisition of animals from the Global South. Interpreted through contemporary ecological and decolonial perspectives, the project builds a space for imagining a different way of relating to nature.
Lenka was captured in Kenya in 1954 and transported to Prague Zoo to become the very first Czechoslovak giraffe. She survived only two years in captivity, after which her body was donated to the National Museum in Prague and exhibited until 2000. Eva Koťátková’s collaborative project employs a transformative educational practice that re-imagines Lenka’s story as a poetic, embodied encounter, and as a place of critical intervention in the relationship between institutions and the natural world. Alongside collaborations with artists and composers Himali Singh Soin and David Soin Tappeser and the collective Gesturing Towards Decolonial Futures, Lenka’s story is interpreted by children, educators and older people, with the installation facilitating multiple forms of storytelling. The heart of a giraffe in captivity is twelve kilos lighter stages belonging formed through emotions, touch and ecological relations, instead of fixed notions of identity, borders and nation.
Eva Koťátková in collaboration with Himali Singh Soin, David Tappeser, the collective Gesturing Towards Decolonial Futures, children, educators and older people.
Pavilion of the Czech Republic at the Venice Art Biennale 2024. Venice (Italy), April 19, 2024.
Official description: The heart of a giraffe in captivity is twelve kilos lighter tells the story of Lenka the giraffe, drawing on the history of Czechoslovakia’s acquisition of animals from the Global South. Interpreted through contemporary ecological and decolonial perspectives, the project builds a space for imagining a different way of relating to nature.
Lenka was captured in Kenya in 1954 and transported to Prague Zoo to become the very first Czechoslovak giraffe. She survived only two years in captivity, after which her body was donated to the National Museum in Prague and exhibited until 2000. Eva Koťátková’s collaborative project employs a transformative educational practice that re-imagines Lenka’s story as a poetic, embodied encounter, and as a place of critical intervention in the relationship between institutions and the natural world. Alongside collaborations with artists and composers Himali Singh Soin and David Soin Tappeser and the collective Gesturing Towards Decolonial Futures, Lenka’s story is interpreted by children, educators and older people, with the installation facilitating multiple forms of storytelling. The heart of a giraffe in captivity is twelve kilos lighter stages belonging formed through emotions, touch and ecological relations, instead of fixed notions of identity, borders and nation.
Eva Koťátková in collaboration with Himali Singh Soin, David Tappeser, the collective Gesturing Towards Decolonial Futures, children, educators and older people.
Category
🦄
CreativityTranscript
00:00♪♪
00:10♪♪
00:20♪♪
00:25♪♪
00:35♪♪
00:45♪♪
00:55♪♪
01:05And last year, all this out of the body when touched.
01:12It would cost a lot of money to get Lenka back into service.
01:22Meanwhile, Lenka is signing a new contract.
01:29The rules of eternal life are as follows.
01:34No brood, no mutations, and no diseases.
01:40Except for typhus and colitis,
01:45which the materials must occasionally elastinate.
01:55She has a dream.
02:14She's being taken back to Kenya where they caught her.
02:21They bring her back to the traps.
02:27Even though she's tough, Lenka's very bad.
02:34Lenka hates her.
02:39Lenka plays her favorite songs.
02:46♪♪
02:56♪♪
03:36♪♪
03:46♪♪
03:56♪♪
04:06♪♪
04:16♪♪
04:26♪♪
04:36♪♪
04:46♪♪
04:56♪♪
05:06And this story, like so many others, doesn't stop being told.
05:16How do you get out of your throat and bring out the messages?
05:24Leave us your story.
05:29There's a main box over there where you can read it.
05:47Who wants...
05:50Who wants to drink and discuss together your life for a week?
06:00Take your time and stay.
06:15Thank you.
06:19Thank you.
06:22Thank you.
06:26The world, my new friend, a large, sobering, the connective side of the myth, slowly, the
06:55world of the free, for the first time. The world is the most striking, separated by rivers
07:15and deserts. It does not migrate far. It is impossible. The eyes of the landscape, water,
07:31water everywhere, the black earth, the thick, sticky ponds. I will spend hours here. Please
07:57subscribe to my channel.