5 Dec – Film Screening: Day With(out) Art 2026: seeds in a dying colony

Join us for a weekend of drop-in film screening of Visual Aids for Day With(out) Art 2026 by presenting seeds in a dying colony.

Ages 16+
Saturday 5 & Sunday 6 December
12-5 PM

Registration is not necessary, just drop in!
Films will be screened on a looped schedule all day.

There is an addtional day of screening on Sunday 6 December

Esker Foundation is proud to partner with Visual Aids for Day With(out) Art 2026 by presenting seeds in a dying colony, a program of four newly commissioned videos that move through the afterlives of colonialism and the ongoing HIV epidemic. Across fractured histories and landscapes marked by extraction, the works trace how systems of power shape the body, memory, and experiences of care.

Day With(out) Art 2026: seeds in a dying colony

Esker Foundation is proud to partner with Visual AIDS for Day With(out) Art 2026 by presenting seeds in a dying colony, a program of four newly commissioned videos that move through the afterlives of colonialism and the ongoing HIV epidemic. Across fractured histories and landscapes marked by extraction, the works trace how systems of power shape the body, memory, and experiences of care.

seeds in a dying colony will feature four newly commissioned short videos by artists from across the world: Edgar Hudson (Tanzania), Bruna Kury and Matheus Mello (Brazil/Spain), Sido Lansari (Morocco/France), and Micaela Cyrino (Brazil).

The program responds to a moment marked by deepening neocolonialism and mass desensitization to violent, preventable death, including recent spikes in HIV cases and deaths. Driven by cuts to international aid programs like USAID and PEPFAR, this resurgence reveals how access to care remains shaped by broader systems of U.S. and Western power that determine whose lives are protected and whose deaths are allowed to pass in silence.

seeds in a dying colony is an exploration of how systems organized around abandonment and premature death produce disconnection from the self and disruptions of memory, history, and cultural continuity. At the same time, movement, ritual, and beauty emerge as forms of recalibration, methods of reclaiming the body and reorienting toward life within conditions designed to constrain it.

The title of the program draws from the work of psychiatrist and political philosopher Frantz Fanon, whose writings on colonial violence and the racialized psyche have been taken up by some AIDS historians and theorists to understand how global health systems, formed through colonial rule, ultimately determine the order, quality, and conditions under which people receive healthcare, while also overwriting indigenous knowledge of healthy, embodied living. Rather than isolating HIV as a singular issue, seeds in a dying colony gestures toward the tension between systems of domination that appear enduring and the latent power and ancestral knowledge that remains in their undoing.

The artists in this program were selected by a jury of filmmakers who each selected an artist to mentor through their production process. The mentors of the 2026 program include Amil Shivji, Hiura Fernandes, Ésery Mondesir, and J Triangular.

Visual AIDS is a New York-based non-profit that utilizes art to fight AIDS by provoking dialogue, supporting HIV+ artists, and preserving a legacy, because AIDS is not over.

Images:

• Micaela Cyrino, How to project your voice without causing an earthquake, 2026. Commissioned by Visual AIDS for seeds in a dying colony.
• Bruna Kury and Matheus Mello, Viral Borders: The Geopolitics of a Pandemic, 2026.
  Commissioned by Visual AIDS for seeds in a dying colony.
• Edgar Hudson, There is an Elephant in the Room, 2026. Commissioned by Visual AIDS for seeds in a dying colony.

Respect and Inclusion

By registering for this Program you agree to co-create, in collaboration with Esker Staff, Artists and Volunteers, an atmosphere of mutual inclusion and respect for all persons. This includes speaking, acting and behaving in a way that is absent of violence, harassment, racism, intimidation, bullying or discrimination of any kind regardless of, and not limited to gender, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity, culture, age and ability. This includes in online/digital forums.

Media Consent

By participating in a program or event at Esker Foundation you consent to having Recordings taken (images, photographs, videos, audio recordings or other media) of yourself and/or your dependent(s) to be included in Esker Foundation’s Recordings Bank. This is a collection of Recordings intended to showcase the gallery’s activities, primarily for archival and reporting purposes. They may also be used for promotional purposes: on Esker Foundation’s website, social media or marketing materials. Esker Foundation will not use these Recordings for commercial purposes. Participants will be notified when Recordings are being taken, and may always opt out on the day of the program.

Should you require any support, or have any questions, please reach out to: programs-@-eskerfoundation.com