Copenhagen Architecture Festival: Tales from Paradise

Artist Søren Lose explores the architectural landscapes of St. Croix.

Danish w/ English subtitles.

COLONIAL HISTORY REVISITED
Did you know that great parts of central Copenhagen where financed by the Danish slave trade in Ghana and the West Indies? Or that you can still find buildings in India that testify to the history of Danish colonial rule?

2017 marks the 100th anniversary of the transfer of the Danish West Indies to America. This is our occasion to seek out the architectural traces of colonialism and slavery in Copenhagen and in the former Danish colonies.

Through performances, film screenings, tours, and discussions, we want to open a debate on the built heritage of the colonial era. The fact is that the story of the Danish colonialism is also a story about conflicts in space, place, and identity: About thousands of bodies crammed together while crossing the Atlantic. About the Paradise of the West Indies which was not Paradise for everyone. About the failed export of welfare architecture in Greenland, and about fancy mansions in Copenhagen. And it is a story about generations of human lives torn between different cultures, nations, and continents.