Collecting, arranging and displaying, rather than making, constitute the core of Rokko Miyoshi’s artistic practice. His collection spans families of objects, amongst them a vast number of vintage press photographs and archival documents. For Art Brussels, he proposes a new installation that builds upon this long-standing practice of critically reframing found materials.
T.W.I.B. (The World is Bananas) extends Miyoshi’s ongoing research into the origins of modern propaganda, viewed through the lens of the history of the United Fruit Company (present-day Chiquita) – a multinational corporation whose aggressive banana monopoly at the turn of the 19th century exerted a lasting, detrimental impact on the economic and political situation in Central and South America. Under the influence of Freud’s grandson and the self-proclaimed ‘propagator of propaganda’ Edward Bernays, the U.F.C’s state-of-the-art public relations strategy helped to legitimise neocolonial violence in favour of the United States’ commercial interest.
A selection of objects, photos, and archives – amongst them lavish menus distributed on board of the U.F.C-owned cargo-liners of the Great White Fleet – are displayed within an imposing frame, which represents yet another in Miyoshi’s long line of experiments with exhibition devices. Engaging with the aesthetics and politics of redaction, this structure simultaneously supports and sabotages access to the materials on display.
Image caption: United Fruit Company T.S.S. ULUA menu, 1935
