(W)ailing Curses — body

(W)ailing curses is a performance-intervention-ceremony that unfolds a collective somatic-making of curses. The curse is taken by a political conjuring, that is, a reclaiming of our collective agency and power to curse what oppresses us, denies our humanity and life, restricts our freedom or deadens us.

You are invited to curse with your flesh, your senses, and your erotic self.

You are invited to curse with your flesh, your senses, and your erotic self.

Short video documentation of live performance intervention “wailing curses” performed at Kulturhuset Oceanen, Gothenburg

poster designed by Filip Gronning

This is a curse to the EU

Eu te repudio UE

I curse the rampant fascism penetrating the fortress from the inside

A fortress built on 500 years of colonial blood, theft, erasure of indigenous black and brown lands and bodies

Return hubs,

These are European deportation centers that hold deported or soon to be deported people in captivity

These are deportation centers that hold those without papers

Those with irregular status

Those who can be dragged by the police out of your home into the streets

Those often poor, melanated, marginalized, criminalised

I curse the Og’s that birthed American ICE

This week we saw our own ICE arise with the stamped approval of the return hubs

Return hubs

Let that become an echo after you fall asleep

Your Denmark is complicit

Our Scandilândia vouched for it

I curse the 418 casted votes from the extreme and mainstream rightwingers that made this now a reality

Our reality

“Send them back”, they echoed in parliament

“Send them back”, they professed victorious

Let the curse become exalted

Excessive

Unhinged

Let your eyes do the cursing

Your breath

The tingling sensation in your arm

The fuzzy feeling in your stomach

What would you say?

Let your curse be danced

Let your curse be yours

Let the curse melt into your body

Invite the curse to be spoken even if you whisper

Let it be spoken at last

In whatever language

Let us hear all of our curses

All of them at once

All of them

Keep repeating them

See if you can be even louder

More honest

More determinate

Less performative

Breath in slowing down

Sense the resonance of your curses and being touched by other people’s curses and their beloved ones

Walk backwards slowly dragging your feet

Sensing the memory of what we have done as you move backwards

Breathe in and out

Excerpts from (W)ailing curses performed at Basement with Vio Lino and Siham Zahna Benamor curated by Joachim Friis and Filip Gronning

A cross-disciplinary, 1-day performative event taking place at Basement on Vesterbro. The project functions as a temporary artistic laboratory, inviting the audience into a sensory exploration of how sound can act as a shared meeting point across literature, performance, and visual art.

The artists present today on the 25th June 2026 an intertwined work, bringing their individual practices and separate pieces into direct dialogue during the residency, allowing them to merge within the space for the final presentation open to the public:

“Se havet som ansigt” by writer and performer Siham Benamor, blending spoken word and rhythm within a ritualistic, electronic sound universe.

“Sound Traps” by visual artist and musician Vio Rossi, activating Basement’s architecture through site-specific sound sculptures.

(W)ailing Curses by performance artist body_hacker (aka Sall Lam Toro), unveiling a glitchy, ceremonial, universe of sonic curses through voice and theremin.