What to expect when Kader Attia curates Kochi-Muziris Biennale

In Venice, a metropolis built connected the ebb and travel of maritime commercialized routes, migration and spectacle, the announcement of the seventh variation of the Kochi-Muziris Biennale (KMB) felt particularly resonant. In the frenzied choreography of the Venice Biennale preview week, Indian gallerists, curators and artists paused successful the day sunshine successful the unfastened courtyard astatine Ocean Space.

There couldn’t person been a much fitting location. Here was a taste arts venue acceptable successful the 16th-century Church of San Lorenzo, fabled arsenic the last resting spot of explorer Marco Polo. Suspended betwixt past and the future, we took our seats. The rumour going circular was that KMB’s adjacent curator was the Ghanaian creator Ibrahim Mahama, who was present.

KMB’s co-founder Shwetal Patel’s instauration — simultaneously live-streamed successful Kochi — reminded america that the larboard metropolis successful Kerala was nary longer a peripheral subordinate successful the planetary creation conversation, but a abstraction actively reshaping it, with its past variation attracting astir 700,000 visitors. The code was softly celebratory with nary hint of its caller troubles (such arsenic the stepping down of Bose Krishnamachari arsenic president of the Kochi Biennale Foundation).

There was a hushed silence. Then creator Jitish Kallat, the recently appointed president, made the announcement: Kader Attia volition beryllium KMB’s adjacent curator. There were cries of surprise, and a congratulatory circular of applause, arsenic the 55-year-old French-Algerian creator and world walked up, dressed casually successful a grey woollen headdress and jeans.

“Kader Attia brings to the Biennale creator depth, curatorial openness, and a beardown pedagogic sensibility. The committee was drawn to the poetic scope and generative imaginable of his proposal, and to the flexible curatorial model it offered for bringing aggregate creator practices, histories, and publics into meaningful narration successful Kochi. Attia had antecedently participated successful the 2014 variation of the Kochi-Muziris Biennale and we look guardant to the ways successful which his curatorial imaginativeness volition instrumentality signifier successful Kochi.”

An outsider of non-Indian origin

I caught up with Attia instantly aft the announcement. We moved to a adjacent vino barroom and, arsenic we chatted, I asked astir his ideas of determination and question because, being a diasporic Indian surviving successful the U.K., the scrutiny of practice and authenticity is ever present. How was he, an outsider of non-Indian origin, with nary Indian connection skills, going to curate what is present recognised arsenic 1 of the world’s starring creation biennales?

The Biennale cannot correspond lone 1 generation, 1 aesthetic oregon 1 societal position. It has to bespeak the complexity of nine itself. I’m precise funny successful creating projects wherever artists and section communities enactment unneurotic collectively.

He was not remotely fazed by this. “For me, a curator is similar a fold betwixt worlds. Artists, communities, artworks, conversations — each of these are antithetic spaces that indispensable someway connect,” helium shared. “During my acquisition moving La Colonnie successful Paris [the now-closed creation abstraction and intelligence hub], I realised that erstwhile discussions go excessively theoretical oregon excessively ideological, radical halt listening to each other. But erstwhile radical bring an object, thing personal, abruptly connections emerge. That is precise important for maine successful Kochi. The Biennale cannot correspond lone 1 generation, 1 aesthetic oregon 1 societal position. It has to bespeak the complexity of nine itself. I’m precise funny successful creating projects wherever artists and section communities enactment unneurotic collectively.”

It was wide that Attia had already started to deliberation astir however helium would framework the 2027-2028 edition, regarding Kochi arsenic an interconnected abstraction — not conscionable done art, but done its streets and markets, wherever helium has intimately observed question and encounters, adjacent however radical negociate the postulation connected the roads. He isn’t a alien to Kochi; Attia participated successful the 2014 variation of the KMB and has talked astir “coming backmost and gathering connections betwixt the galore intertwined influences” successful the multi-layered city. Soon, helium volition beryllium relocating determination with his household to embed himself much fully, and to fulfil his imaginativeness and enactment connected the crushed with the creation ecosystems of Kerala.

Rather than imagining the adjacent Biennale solely arsenic a constellation of accumulation venues, helium described it arsenic a web of in-between spaces or, arsenic helium enactment it, “interstitial spaces of freedom”: the streets betwixt sites, the conversations betwixt strangers, the corporate negotiations that look erstwhile creation collides with mundane life.

‘Audiences bushed of repetitive rhetoric’

“I americium funny successful what exists betwixt the venues,” said Attia. “Venice is similar this, too. You determination done the exhibition, past abruptly [encounter] beingness extracurricular it. When you locomotion done Kochi, you are walking done the dreams of others. These spaces inactive transportation traces of colonialism. I deliberation modern creation tin assistance america reappropriate those spaces and rethink however we inhabit them collectively.”

This prompted maine to inquire him astir however to deliberation astir decolonisation today, peculiarly arsenic determination seems to beryllium an tremendous accent successful Europe connected addressing the guilt and erasure of peoples done empire. In India, however, the absorption is connected moving guardant and gathering the future.

“I deliberation this is simply a precise important question. Decolonial sermon has dominated the creation satellite for galore years now. Of people these histories substance deeply, but I besides deliberation audiences are becoming bushed of repetitive rhetoric,” helium said. “For me, the question is not whether colonialism happened — of people it did — but however we invent caller languages to talk astir its traces today. Colonisation should not lone beryllium understood arsenic thing from the past. We indispensable deliberation critically astir the aboriginal and the caller forms of domination emerging now.”

The cardinal then, rests successful groups coming together. I asked Attia if we tin expect a much corporate exemplary alternatively than a celebrity-driven biennale operation for the adjacent edition, which tin sometimes effect successful hotspots of crowds flocking to spot 1 peculiar artist. “Yes, absolutely. I’m precise funny successful corporate practices. That doesn’t mean removing individuality, but creating situations wherever antithetic voices coexist without 1 dominating each the others. For me, the Biennale should not simply beryllium a spectacle. It should beryllium a spot wherever radical negociate however to unrecorded together.”

Attia’s Venice installation

Reflecting connected his ain installation, Whisper of Traces, astatine the existent Venice Biennale, Attia shared that helium explored the narration of memory, spirituality, exertion and assemblage histories. If 1 compared it to the India Pavilion, the artworks wrong the Arsenale were presented successful a ocular and sensory spectacle — sprawling yet neat and orderly. Whereas visitors to Attia’s installation (also astatine the Arsenale) had to participate done a labyrinth of woven photographs of African masks, past determination into a wood of suspended ropes pressed with shards of breached mirrors. Scattered each astir were mesh containers of dried herbs and African ritual statues, surrounded by aggregate films.

In doing so, Attia blurred the boundaries betwixt the existent and spiritual world, encouraging viewers to deliberation otherwise astir modernity — not simply arsenic a communicative of technological progress, but arsenic thing inactive shaped by inherited memories and unresolved histories. Coming from a textile background, I was struck by the usage of the enactment (multiple strands twisted unneurotic done friction) and however this connects to the coir enactment traditions successful Kerala, and adjacent the ropes you spot successful the sportfishing nets astir the Fort.

“That’s precise absorbing due to the fact that I ne'er thought astir it similar that,” said Attia. “I was reasoning astir fragmentation and repair done the mirrors and rope, but what you picture makes implicit sense. For me, trade is perfectly contemporary. I’m bushed of this thought that modern creation indispensable ever look highly technological oregon detached from the body. We request to reconnect with materials, labour and motion again. The manus matters. The assemblage matters.”

Perhaps successful that way, fixed the forefront of the hand-crafted and earthy materials successful the India Pavilion, we tin spot connections successful Attia’s enactment and possibly speculate however helium is keen to research these successful Kochi. Thus we concluded our conversation, knowing we shared a communal involvement successful theories, philosophies and being, astatine once, an insider and outsider successful these in-between spaces that signifier our worlds.

The writer is an autarkic curator of textiles based successful the U.K.