How to see the spots of the leopard: An interview with Quinsy Gario and Jörgen Gario

In this interview, artists Quinsy Gario and Jörgen Gario reflect on the recognition of complicity as grounds for political engagement and action. Their performance How to See the Spots of the Leopard in Kuldiga, Latvia (August 2020) explores the relationships between difficult pasts, colonial as well as state socialist, and their influences in the Baltic States today through the perspective of shared histories. Reflecting on their Dutch Caribbean heritage, the artists pick up on Latvia’s connection to European colonialism, more specifically the Baltic German-dominated Duchy of Courland’s involvement in the colonial endeavours in Tobago which has been presented uncritically to the general Latvian public particularly since the the fall of the Iron Curtain. Their attempt to critically engage with and trouble Latvian colonial complicity opens up new ways of thinking how the colonial mode of power still endures in Europe and beyond.