Walk of Mourning - Durational performance

Part of Wa(l)king Copenhagen Festival, hosted by Metropolis - Copenhagen International Theatre. Summer 2020

12 hour walk with a live, digitally transmitted performance happening every hour. Recorded with an iPhone 11 and transmitted through Facebook. 13 videos in total. Duration: 1 minute - 20 minutes. Akinyi walked from 10am to 10pm on July 12th 2020

This work was created as a response to the lack of conversation about racism in Denmark. Akinyi took to the streets to embody the spirits of the enslaved ancestors who built the country but have been forgotten. She visited pivotal spaces in regards to Danish slavetrade history, and continued into the present by protesting in front of the Danish Parliament as well as the American Embassy. This was an attempt of showing unity with our brothers and sisters getting killed in the Mediterranean Sea and on U.S. soil (as well as the cruel actions against Black and Indigenous peoples in Latin America). Akinyi also wanted to pay tribute to her paternal grandmother, whom she buried in 2016 in Kenya.

While planning the performance a heinous murder happened on the Danish island Bornholm, where two White extremist brothers tortured and killed a Danish-Tanzanian young man in a forest. The fear and pain are still to be found in the Afro-Danish community and in Akinyi’s body.

This was the introduction text:

Mourning.
I’m mourning.
We’re mourning.

I’m mourning the ancestors upon whose forced labour much of this land’s wealth was built.
I’m mourning my brothers and sisters dying across the pond.
I’m mourning my family in the Mediterranean Sea.
I’m mourning the relatives that didn’t go viral..

I’m mourning.
I’m mourning.
I’m mourning, I’m mourning so hard I can barely breathe.
I’m mourning my baby brother in Bornholm.
Bornholm.
Bornholm.
Born..

I’m mourning the fact that mourning is a part of being me.
It comes with this body.
It comes with this world.

I’m tired. So tired.

For 12 hours l will walk with the spirits that I’m mourning.

Will it heal something? I don’t know. Will it change something? Probably not. Will I reach exhaustion? Definitely. Will I keep going? Until I die.

If you are tired, keep going
If you are scared, keep going
If you are hungry, keep going
If you want to taste freedom, keep going

– Harriet Tubman