Museum Rietberg in Zurich has opened "A Kind of Paradise," an exhibition featuring twenty international artists who rework and reclaim colonial-era photographs. The show is organized into four thematic sections—Shapeshifters, Confrontation, Care, and In the Photo Fantastic—each exploring different strategies for challenging the historical narratives embedded in colonial archives. Artists such as Wendy Red Star, Cédric Kouamé, Omar Victor Diop, and Sasha Huber use techniques like cutting, stitching, collage, and critical fabulation to transform photographs that once defined and distorted non-European cultures into new works about memory, identity, and resistance.
This exhibition matters because it addresses the ongoing impact of colonial visual archives on contemporary identity and historical understanding. By treating colonial photographs as malleable material rather than fixed records, the artists demonstrate how art can unsettle entrenched power structures and create space for marginalized perspectives. The show also highlights the role of museums in holding contested collections and the potential for collaboration between institutions and artists to reimagine difficult histories. It contributes to broader conversations about decolonization, representation, and the politics of image-making in the art world.