PRESS RELEASE
POST-COLONIAL GOLD — A Counter-Archive of Value
An immersive exhibition by Annelies Nuy
Pre-launch during miart Milan, 19–26 April 2026
Launch during Milan Design Week, 20–26 April 2026
Milan, 20 April 2026 —
Post-Colonial Gold is an immersive exhibition and research project by Dutch artist, designer, and curator Annelies Nuy. The project examines how value is constructed — and how it can be redefined — by revisiting the cultural and symbolic meanings of gold prior to colonial systems of extraction.
Rather than approaching gold as a material of power, ownership, and capital, the project repositions it as a carrier of memory and knowledge-based value. In doing so, Post-Colonial Gold addresses a historical rupture: colonial and religious systems that reshaped law and society not only extracted material resources, but destabilized and displaced entire knowledge systems.
In many pre-colonial contexts, women held equal — and often central — positions within social, economic, and spiritual structures. Their roles were embedded in systems of transmission, authorship, care, and continuity. Through the imposition of colonial power and institutionalized religion, these positions were systematically redefined. Women were increasingly placed in subordinate roles, while the knowledge systems they sustained were marginalized, obscured, or removed from circulation.
The project begins at this rupture.
At the core of the exhibition is a series of wearable sculptures: rings made from post-colonial gold. Each ring functions as an interface, connecting body, material, and narrative within a distributed system. Through wearing, the objects are activated, moving beyond the static exhibition context into the public sphere, where they operate as carriers of meaning.
Each ring contains a unique QR code linked to its own identity. By scanning the code, the wearer gains direct access to the knowledge, histories, and narratives embedded in the object. In this way, a direct form of transmission is created, translating complex cultural memory into an accessible and contemporary mode of circulation.
The project engages in dialogue with artists such as Kara Walker, Ana Mendieta, Doris Salcedo, Otobong Nkanga, and Louise Bourgeois, whose practices have revealed and visualized the political, emotional, and historical dimensions of disrupted value systems. Post-Colonial Gold extends this lineage into a new format: intimate, mobile, and embedded in the public domain.
By shifting from object to system, the exhibition proposes an alternative model of artistic circulation. The moving individual becomes a site of transmission, and the work evolves into a distributed network that reactivates marginalized knowledge across physical and digital environments.
Presented in an immersive format, Post-Colonial Gold is accessible both on-site and globally via the Anasaea platform. At the same time, the wearable sculptures circulate through public space, appearing in everyday life as active interfaces — embedding knowledge directly into the social fabric, where it can circulate, confront, and transform.
Press & Image Material
High-resolution images are available and copyright-free for editorial use.
For press inquiries and image requests:
[link to the collection]
The exhibition can be experienced online via the immersive environment:
[link to Anasaea exhibition]
