Image: Taxispalais – Kunsthalle Tirol, Innsbruck
Marwa Arsanios’s first institutional solo exhibition in Austria presents all five parts of her film series ‘Who is Afraid of Ideology?’ and is open at TAXISPALAIS Kunsthalle Tirol in Innsbruck until Sunday, October 4, 2026. The exhibition addresses ecological, decolonial and feminist forms of resistance. The exhibition is curated by Nina Tabassomi.
‘Who is Afraid of Ideology?’ is a long-term project in which Arsanios pays tribute to communities including the Kurdish Autonomous Women’s Movement in Iraq and northeastern Syria and Grupo Semillas in Colombia. Across the films, these communities seek to reclaim a life of collectivity and togetherness with the land, practicing resistance in ways that respond to their specific contexts and geographies.
In Part 4, Arsanios documents her attempts, together with a group of people, to rehabilitate and communalize a former quarry area in Lebanon. The work addresses questions of usership versus ownership through both the film and the real-life project.
Part 5 uses speculative fiction to reflect on the history of animalization and dehumanization in capitalist colonialism. The film was co-produced in 2025 by Artium Museoa, Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo and Fundació Joan Miró, together with curators Agustín Pérez Rubio and Carolina Jiménez.
Across the film cycle, Arsanios searches for cinematic means suited to each struggle and its specific topography, drawing an aesthetic from those conditions rather than filming according to a preconceived idea. The film series is accompanied by drawings, textile works and silkscreens that translate elements of the film narratives into another visual language.
