From 24 October to 1 November 2026, Aguas Internacionales, located in the En Corts neighbourhood of Valencia, will host the international exhibition Performing Colonial Toxicity by historian and researcher Samia Henni.
The exhibition Performing Colonial Toxicity explores what Samia Henni describes as colonial toxicity, referring to French counterinsurgency operations in Algiers and nuclear testing in the Sahara Desert. It examines the legacy of the French nuclear programme in the Algerian Sahara between 1960 and 1966, highlighting how atomic tests left behind radioactive contamination whose consequences persist to this day. Through a multimedia installation, the exhibition brings together archival documents, testimonies, and audiovisual materials to reconstruct this historical episode and expose the environmental and political consequences of nuclear colonialism. It also examines the infrastructures that supported the programme, including workers' housing complexes that introduced models of European architectural rationalism into the Sahara Desert, revealing how architecture was implicated in the colonial project.
Performing Colonial Toxicity was first presented in Amsterdam in 2023 and has since travelled to Zurich, London, Providence, Paris, Ottawa, and Montreal. The exhibition now comes to Valencia.
