Coco Fusco, Paula Heredia

The Couple in the Cage: Guatinaui Odyssey

1993

Standard-definition video (black and white and color, sound)

On view MoMA, Floor 2, 208 The David Geffen Wing

In 1992, Fusco and Guillermo Gómez-Peña toured the United States, Spain, England, and Australia as representatives of the fictional, “undiscovered” island of Guatinaui. Confined within a gilded cage, the duo performed made-up “traditional tasks,” such as lifting weights and watching television. Although the performance was intended as a satirical reenactment of ethnographic exhibitions of humans—a practice that reached its peak during nineteenth-century world’s fairs—many viewers believed they were real captives. Viewer responses, documented in this film, ranged from debates over the performance’s authenticity to calls to the Humane Society. Fusco later recorded some of the responses as engravings (also on view here), which reference early forms of mass media that popularized images of exoticized “others.”

Gallery label from

2024

Medium Standard-definition video (black and white and color, sound)
Duration 31 min.
Credit Gift of Mario Cader-Frech through the Latin American and Caribbean Fund
Object number 205.2020
Department Media and Performance

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Coco Fusco

Coco Fusco

Cuban-American, born 1960 2 works online

The interdisciplinary force of Coco Fusco is as raw as it is necessary. Born in New York City in 1960, the Cuban American artist’s relationship with Manhattan, Cuba, and the world forms a transformative and critical dialogue.

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