SPAfrica

SPAfrica is a performance about empathy and extractivism. The project explores how capitalism is connected to racism.

Julian Hetzel and Ntando Cele join forces to explore the boundaries of empathy – the ability to understand what another feels and experiences. What if empathy does not dismantle or change existing power structures, but instead reinforces existing privileges? SPAfrica exposes the problematic functioning and hidden racism of empathy.

SPAfrica introduces a twofold gesture in which 'liquid empathy' is extracted. The project builds on the transaction of resources between Europe and Africa – water for tears and tears for water. On one hand, drinking water from Sub-Saharan Africa is imported to Europe: SPAfrica – the world’s first empathy drink. On the other hand, tears are harvested in the heart of Europe and transported back to the source of the water in Africa. The project combines the exploitation of both natural and emotional resources to reveal neoliberal strategies in the search for alternative raw materials.

With this new performance, Hetzel and Cele question how immaterial goods, such as identity and cultural background, play a role in our capitalist society. In the international art world, the cultural background and identity of creators have become valuable assets. Is trauma the new gold of the arts?