UNTIL 3 May 2026 | The Nieuwe Instituut in Museumpark is showing Another Island, a new video installation by Rotterdam-based researcher and audiovisual artist Janilda Bartolomeu. The work traces the shared dreams of Cape Verdean communities in Rotterdam and Dakar, linking untold histories to possible futures.
Video installation connects Rotterdam and Dakar
At the Nieuwe Instituut, the national museum for architecture, design and digital culture, visitors can now experience Another Island, a video installation by Rotterdam-based artist and researcher Janilda Bartolomeu. The work reflects on the shared heritage and imagined futures of the Cape Verdean islands and the communities that settled in Rotterdam and Dakar.
The installation presents a personal, poetic perspective on migration, memory and belonging, seen through the eyes of someone who has lived between these places. Rotterdam, with one of the largest Cape Verdean communities outside the archipelago, acts as a central reference point in the work.
Researching Cape Verdean diaspora in Rotterdam
Born in Cape Verde, Bartolomeu has been investigating the largely undocumented history of the Cape Verdean diaspora (Kaapverdische diaspora) for many years. In 2020 this research led to the film The Eleventh Island: Activating Silent Histories Through Video, a title that refers to Rotterdam’s nickname as the “eleventh island” because of its long-standing Cape Verdean community since the 1960s.
By collecting stories that have rarely entered official archives, she builds an alternative record of everyday life, work and family ties. Rotterdam’s streets, docks and neighbourhoods appear as places where global trade routes, migration and local urban life intersect.
Residency in Dakar and the making of Another Island
For the next phase of her research, the Nieuwe Instituut and Dakar-based organisation RAW Material Company invited Bartolomeu for a residency in the Senegalese capital. During spring 2025 she studied the largely unknown history of Cape Verdean migrants in Dakar, talking with members of the community and tracing the routes that brought them there.
The stories collected in Dakar form the basis for the film Another Island: As We Surrender To The Tides, which sits at the heart of the installation in Rotterdam. The work links harbour cities on both sides of the Atlantic and shows how dreams of home, work and dignity circulate between them.
Figures, folklore and future visions
In the year that Cape Verde and its diaspora mark fifty years of independence, Bartolomeu uses the installation to look both fifty years back and fifty years ahead. A central figure in Another Island is San Jon, or Saint John the Baptist, who appears as a symbol of the distinct Cape Verdean imagination that has grown around traditional religious figures.
The work explores four different aspects of Cape Verdean Sint Jans folklore, moving in an associative way between historical, social and cultural meanings. From there, room opens up for future scenarios that take survival, togetherness, the inner worlds of outsiders and their dreams as starting points rather than side notes.
Visiting Another Island at Nieuwe Instituut
Another Island can be seen until 3 May 2026 in Gallery 1.2 of the Nieuwe Instituut in Rotterdam. The installation offers a quiet, concentrated space within the museum to sit with the images and voices collected in Rotterdam and Dakar.
The project is supported by the Creative Industries Fund, the Amarte Fund and the Municipality of Rotterdam. More information about the work, Bartolomeu’s wider research and related public events is available via the Nieuwe Instituut website: https://nieuweinstituut.nl/projects/another-island.
How to get to Nieuwe Instituut
The Nieuwe Instituut is located at Museumpark 25 in Rotterdam, in the cultural cluster that also includes Kunsthal Rotterdam, Depot Boijmans Van Beuningen and the Erasmus MC campus. The museum sits on the edge of the Museumpark, within walking distance of the city centre and the Witte de Withstraat area.
Visitors can reach the Nieuwe Instituut by metro and tram via Eendrachtsplein or Leuvehaven, and by tram via Museumpark or Westzeedijk, followed by a short walk through the park. From Rotterdam Centraal, the museum is about fifteen minutes on foot or a few minutes by bike using the main routes towards Westzeedijk and the Maas.
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