About COKO Happenings
By weaving Fairuz’s Yalla Tnam with Syrian mourning rituals from the Syrian Revolution, Mallah’s chant becomes a hypnotic expression of care and pain, while Lillich // Krüger moves through a series of charged gestures. Aesthetically mythical in nature, they present the scene as a mourning ceremony, in which they explore their divergent and sometimes conflicting relationships, their heritage, and the diversity of their migration experiences in their new home, the Netherlands.
Short bio
Ahmad Mallah & Rebecca Lillich // Krüger are an Amsterdam-based performance duo that intertwines the personal and the political. Through open symbolism, they create work that invites reflection, introspection, and connection.
Their debut works The Ladder (2023) and The Price of Bricks (2024) make use of single objects that are deployed via various media in action-oriented performance art.
Their new works, pulling blood from stone (2025) and Yalla Tnam (2026), explore surrealism and heteronormativity through song, gesture, and costume, as a further development of their artistic process.
The duo has performed at the Oerol Festival (Terschelling, NL), the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, the Sismógraf Festival (Olot, ES), and the Van Gogh Museum (Amsterdam), among others, and recently presented their first solo exhibition following a residency at Nieuwe Vide (Haarlem, NL).
