CATPC and Renzo Martens’s solo exhibition at KOW marks a new stage in their longstanding collaboration, in which they delve deep into both colonial relations and the mechanics of the art world, in order to understand and alter them. The show features six-part series Plantations and Museums (2022), Martens’s widely discussed film White Cube (2020), and the launch of an NFT as a new instrument of decolonialization in the form of digital restitution (2022).
On February 11, 2022, CATPC minted an NFT to take digital possession of the Balot sculpture and reclaim their heritage. NFT technology, a digital tool designed to create private property rights in works of art and other materials, is repurposed in order to demand the return of a privatized communal cultural asset into the hands of the people who produced it, who need it, and who want to share it with others.
The Balot sculpture—the spirit of the Belgian officer exorcised decades ago—once again serves the community’s purposes. Anchoring it on the blockchain and later disseminating it as a series of NFTs will enable them to reactivate the sculpture’s powers and buy back land that was stolen and despoiled in order to reintroduce sustainable forms of management and land use and provide financial support for the rebuilding of communities. An NFT’s value of 0.1 Ether is enough to buy one hectare of land in Lusanga.
For more info about the Balot NFT, visit balot.org.
