Where do I come from? "Why do you desire to establish an exact definition of my difference? Why do you assume I desire, and am able, to define this difference to you?" In reference to the work of Harshbrowns. January, 2013. In collaboration with Verena Melgarejo Weinandt.
This was the first work where Verena and I collaborated alone. We had met in the working group Platform Geschichtspolitik at the Academy of Fine Arts and had quickly shared a longing for a collective that would worked with issues around the Latin American diaspora in Vienna. We met in her place and she told me of this character she had developed: "Pocahunter" a wordplay around the Disney figure of Pocahontas, created as an anticolonial rebel that instead of marrying John Smith, decapitates him and carries his head around. I drew Pocahontas and came up with the phrase "Where do I come from? From up South" which later I reworded into "Where do I come from? This way". Verena then printed the illustration files, bought the materials and serigraphied them one by one. Later that year I co-organized the second edition of the AAAAR A(u)ction and we donated one copy for auction which sold for 200 Euros. Not long after, Verena incarnated Pocahunter in a street performance organized by MAIZ.