Dawoud Bey

Dawoud Bey (b. 1953, New York) is an American photographer, artist, and educator whose work explores questions of visibility, power, race, and historical memory. C/O Berlin presents his first major monographic exhibition in Europe, bringing together significant bodies of work such as Night Coming Tenderly, Black and The Birmingham Project, alongside the premiere of Berlin / Africa, a new series developed over the past two years. Through large-scale diptychs and multi-panel compositions, Bey juxtaposes Berlin’s historical architecture and monuments with African objects held in the city’s museum collections. This work explores the intertwined histories of Berlin’s emergence as a modern metropolis and European colonization in Africa following the Berlin Conference of 1884–1885. In doing so, Bey casts new light on the city’s colonial past, tracing its lingering echoes and the ways in which history continues to shape the present. His work opens a space for reflection on collective memory, remembrance, and our responsibility towards the histories we inherit.