Samdani Art Foundation announces details of Dhaka Art Summit 2016

Press Release
8 May 2015
Samdani Art Foundation announces
details of Dhaka Art Summit 2016

World’s largest platform for South Asian art returns for third edition

New Commissions and major works from Lynda Benglis, Simryn Gill, Haroon Mirza,
Dayanita Singh among many others including emerging names and previously overlooked
South Asian artists active in the 20th century

Curatorial team to include representatives from Tate Modern, Centre Pompidou,
Kunsthalle Zurich and many others

New programmes launch at 2016 edition: architecture, experimental writing and historic
archives from South Asia

Samdani Art Award 2016 will be judged by a panel including representatives from Delfina
Foundation, The New Museum, Kunsthalle Zurich, Centre Pompidou among others
The Samdani Art Foundation is delighted to announce further details of Dhaka Art Summit
2016 from Venice, where the foundation is a donor for the 56th International Biennale di
Venezia, supporting the projects of artists Naeem Mohaiemen and Raqs Media Collective in
the main Biennale exhibition: All the World’s Futures. Both artists previously featured in Dhaka
Art Summit 2014, a pioneering event for South Asian art which brings together artists,
curators, museums, writers and visitors from across South Asia and the world to discover
institutional-quality works in a non-commercial environment.
Dhaka Art Summit 2014 welcomed over 70,000 visitors over three days and registered as one
of the most important events in the region. Projects from the 2014 Dhaka Art Summit have
since traveled to the Berlin Biennale, the Queens Museum, Kochi-Muziris Biennale, the
Kunsthalle Basel, and the San Jose Museum of Art.
Taking place from 5 to 8 February, Dhaka Art Summit 2016 will be held at the Shilpakala
Academy, Dhaka, Bangladesh. The third edition of the bi-annual event will include major
projects by internationally acclaimed artists including: Lynda Benglis, Simryn Gill, Haroon
Mirza, Dayanita Singh; as well some of the most exciting emerging names from the region
such as Ayesha Sultana, Waqas Khan, and Munem Wasif. For the first time, the event will
also incorporate architecture, experimental writing and exhibitions of historical works from the
20th Century as part of a new expanded programme. Once more, leading thinkers from South Asia
and beyond will take part in a talks programme that will address art initiatives in South Asia among other
timely topics.
Led by the foundation’s Artistic Director, Diana Campbell Betancourt, the curatorial team for
the 2016 edition brings together representatives from international museums including: Nada
Raza from Tate Modern, Aurelien Lemonier from Centre Pompidou and Daniel Baumann from
the Kunsthalle Zurich; with a range of South Asian partners. For Dhaka Art Summit 2016, this
artistic team has devised a rich survey of artists, architects, filmmakers and writers from
across South Asia. Around 200 artists will participate from countries including: Afghanistan,
Bangladesh, India, the Maldives, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka as well as those
from the South Asian diaspora. The artists will be presented in tightly curated thematic
exhibitions that break from the traditional country survey model.
Artistic director, Diana Campbell Betancourt, commented:
The positive feedback on DAS 2014 from visiting artists and curators made us realise what a
hub Bangladesh could be for artists from across South Asia to come together and discuss
shared histories, creating a ripple effect across the region for future cross-border and crossgenerational exchange. While it is difficult for Indians to obtain visas to Pakistan (and vice versa),
Bangladesh provides an ideal hub for regional thinkers to come together in person within the region.
Building on Dhaka’s rich festival tradition, DAS 2016 will be a space that celebrates
cosmopolitan histories and looks at very wide definitions of what a South Asia focused art
festival means. Artists and filmmakers from the 2016 programme such as: Merchant Ivory,
Lynda Benglis, John Giorno Gaganendranath Tagore, Lida Abdul, Krishna Reddy,
Rashid Choudhury, and Lionel Wendt; exemplify the longstanding dialogue between South
Asia and the rest of the world. Through the international visiting curator program which brings
curators from all over the world to Dhaka, as well as our Critical Writing Ensembles, we hope
Dhaka Art Summit can support the legacy of these cosmopolitan traditions well into the future.
We are thrilled so many partners from South Asia and beyond have embarked on this journey
with us.
ENDS
Notes to Editors
PROGRAMME HIGHLIGHTS (More to Be Announced in October 2015)
Solo Projects
The 2016 solo projects, curated by Diana Campbell Betancourt, will explore what it means to
be an individual in the context of South Asia, breaking any idea of national representation.
Major solo projects, and primarly new commissions, will include Shumon Ahmed, Lynda
Benglis, Simryn Gill, Waqas Khan, Shakuntala Kulkarni, Haroon Mirza, Amanullah
Majadidi, Prabhavathi Meppayil, Sandeep Mukerjee, Po Po, Ayesha Sultana, Dayanita
Singh, Tun Win Aung & Wah Nu, Mustafa Zaman, and Munem Wasif. Further names will
be announced in October 2015.
Selected Guest-curated exhibitions
Tate Modern’s Nada Raza will present an exhibition exploring the influence of sci-fi and retrofuturism in South Asia including artists from across Pakistan, India, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.
Raza will draw on historical material including one of the first science fiction stories in the
Bengali language, written by the scientist J.C. Bose in 1896, as well as a 1920s watercolour
by Gaganendranath Tagore, which looks skyward to imagine a cosmological vortex in the
heavens. These motifs of astral journeys and alien encounters will be traced through different
generations of South Asian artists who experienced the wonder and hubris of the space age
from a slightly different tilt on the universe.
Aurelien Lemonier, curator of architecture at Centre Pompidou, will present an exhibition on
Bangladeshi architecture from 1947 -2017 as part of a wider research project for the Centre
Pompidou. This will focus on the life and work of Muzharul Islam (1923–2012), the
Bangladeshi architect who called upon Louis Kahn to devise the landmark Dhaka parliament
building. The exhibition will also trace the legacy of Muzharul Islam for third generation
Bangladeshi architects working today, drawing attention to a diverse range of contemporary
architecture practice.
Nikhil Chopra and Madhavi Gore will curate the performance programme and conduct
educational workshops with Bangladeshi performance artists alongside artist Jana Prepeluh.
The performances will be the product of Samdani Seminars, a series of workshops, talks and
masterclasses on performance art held in spring 2015 that acted as an incubator for emerging
performance artists. There will also be workshops at the Heritage Hotel, part of Nikhil
Chopra’s residency programme in Goa. Yasmin Jahan Nupur, Kabir Ahmed Masum
Chisty, and several other key names in the performance art scene from South Asia will
feature in this exhibition.
The Summit will also include an exhibition of Bangladeshi art curated by Mohammad
Muniruzzaman. The exhibition is produced by Emily Dolan (Operations Director, Samdani Art
Foundation) and Eve Lemesle (Associate Producer, Samdani Art Foundation and Founder of
What About Art?).
Samdani Art Award 2016
The Samdani Art Foundation has again partnered with the Delfina Foundation to award an
outstanding young Bangladeshi artist the opportunity to attend a three-month residency at the
Delfina Foundation in London as part of the bi-annual Samdani Art Award. Ten finalists will
be selected from an open call for applications, and their work will be exhibited in a show
curated by Daniel Baumann (Director, Kunsthalle Zurich) in collaboration with ProHelvetiaSwiss Arts Council. Baumann will be assisted by Bangladeshi curators who he will
mentor. The jury panel for the award is comprised of Caroline Bourgeois (Curator, Pinault
Collection), Cosmin Costinas (Director, Para/Site), Catherine David (Deputy Director, Centre
Pompidou), Massimiliano Gioni (Artistic Director, New Museum), and chaired by Aaron
Cezar (Director, Delfina Foundation). The 2014 Samdani Art Award winner was Ayesha
Sultana.
Film Programme
Shanay Jhaveri will curate a film programme that will explore ideas of location and crosscultural experience. A documentary made by Merchant Ivory for the BBC in 1972 on the
writer-scholar Nirad Chaudhari (1897-1999), will form the cornerstone for the programme.
Filmed in London and Oxford, Adventures of a Brown Man in Search of Civilisation, records a
fascinating individual born in Mymensing (now Bangladesh) who witnessed the rise and fall of
empire and courted a distinctly ‘cosmopolitan’ reality for himself. Chaudhari’s opinions were
often controversial, especially the dedication of his autobiography to the British Empire.
New initiatives: Rewind section and Asia Art Archive
Building on the Summit’s identity as a research platform, the third edition will include several
new programme strands reflecting on historical moments in South Asia before in the 20th
Century up to the 1980s. A non-commercial Rewind section, highlighting practices of South
Asian artists active before 1980, will be advised by a team including Beth Citron (Rubin
Museum), Sabih Ahmed (Asia Art Archive) and Amara Antilla (Guggenheim). Highlights will
include a presentation of rarely-seen before works by Sri Lankan photographer Lionel Wendt
(1900 - 1944), early works by Nalini Malani from the late 1960s and early 1970s, as well as
under exhibited Bangladeshi masters such as SM Sultan, Rashid Choudhury and Saifuddin
Ahmed. Many of the works in Rewind will be exhibited for the first time in over 20 years. An
exceptional example is Akbar Padamsee’s much discussed, but previously believed to be lost
film “Events in a Cloud Chamber” from 1973 will debut in a restored version in collaboration
with Ashim Ahluwalia.
The Samdani Art Foundation also announces a new partnership with Asia Art Archive (AAA)
to support the development of scholarship on recent art from Bangladesh will present the first
stage of a planned bibliography of Bengali language writing on art. AAA will have a dedicated
booth at the summit to highlight its work across the South Asian region.
New experimental writing programmes
Drawing on the rich literary traditions in the region and the need for experimental writing
platforms, Dhaka Art Summit will also feature a new section of Critical Writing
Ensembles supported by ProHelvetia Swiss Arts Council and developed
in collaboration with Office for Contemporary Art Norway (OCA), the Samdani Art
Foundation, and TAKE on Art, India, which will provide a platform to explore forms
of experimental writing in South Asia and the rest of the world. This section will include
contributions by leading writers and curators such as: Chus Martinez, Maria Lind, Sharmini
Pereira, Yin Ker, Devika Singh, Quinn Latimer, Aveek Sen, Carlos Basualdo, and twelve
other leading writers. This program is led by Katya Garcia Anton (Director of Office for
Contemporary Art Norway) with Diana Campbell Betancourt.
Talks Programme
Further details of the 2016 Dhaka Art Summit programme will be announced in late 2015
including a central talks programme comprised of spokespeople from across South Asia and
the world. Some topics include the challenges and responsibilities of developing artists’
estates, the responsibilities of curating regional shows for the “distant observer”, building
collections of South Asian Art in a non-Western context, and the history of Bangladeshi artists
in Pakistan pre-and-post independence in 1971.
FIELD MEETING, an initiative of Asia Contemporary Art Week (ACAW) will also have a
presence at the Dhaka Art Summit with lecture performances and open studio visits with a
large representation of artists from Afghanistan and the South Asia diaspora.
Dhaka Art Summit takes place at the Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy in partnership with the
country’s national academy of fine and performing arts and led through the expertise of
Liaquat Ali Lucky. Through its various initiatives, including the Samdani Seminars that take
place at the Shilpakala Academy and the Faculty of Fine Arts, Dhaka, the Samdani Art
Foundation aids to improve existing public art infrastructure and institutions parallel to building
its own art space in Sylhet, Bangladesh.
Praise from curators and artists for Dhaka Art Summit 2014
Beatrix Ruf, Director, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam said: ‘What a memorable experience the
Dhaka Art Summit and the Samdani Foundation organized. An amazing attendance of artists,
curators, art professionals and collectors and the challenging and thought provoking panel
discussions enabled meetings of people, intensive exchange and an insight not only into how
art is integrating in Dhaka and Bangladesh but all of South Asia.’
Adam Szymczyk, Artistic Director, Documenta 14 commented: ‘The Summit was a
surprisingly personal, low key and highly focused gathering of many amazing individuals from
several countries in South Asia. A variety of experiences brought under one roof was what I
really appreciated as it exceeded the usual monoforms of a "biennial", "art fair", "conference"
etc., offering instead a holistic experience of being with the artists, seeing their work and
discussing it on the spot. Unpretentious and intelligently designed in skillful hands of the
Artistic Director Diana Campbell Betancourt, the Summit felt like it was a labour of love and not
a dull cultural marketing exercise.’
Jessica Morgan, Director, Dia Art Foundation, New York commented : ‘I heard over and over
that Dhaka Art Summit had managed the complicated and sometimes impossible by bringing
together artists, thinkers and curators from South Asia, providing a meeting place and a
discursive space which is really to be applauded. The entire event was outstandingly well
organised and installed.
Internationally renowned artist and curator of Kochi-Muziris Biennale 2014, Jitish
Kallat, spoke of ‘the wonderful art I saw in a three-day pop-up museum’ and continued: ‘I
leave Dhaka, carrying with me a whole lot of generative ideas, great thoughts and memories. I
feel what I witnessed is truly historic and will be discussed as a key transformative catalyst for
the entire region in the many years to come. Congratulations to Rajeeb and Nadia Samdani
and Diana Campbell Betancourt on this whole-hearted visionary effort.’
The Samdani Art Foundation is a private foundation based in Dhaka that aims to increase
artistic engagement between Bangladesh and the rest of the world. Founded in 2011 by
collector couple Nadia and Rajeeb Samdani (Co-Chair of Tate South Asia Acquisitions
Committee, New Museum International Leadership Council Members), the foundation has
enabled Bangladeshi artists to expand their creative horizons through production grants,
residencies, education programs, and exhibitions. The Foundation produces the bi-annual
Dhaka Art Summit, which is the world’s largest non-commercial platform for South Asian Art.
Samdani Art Foundation is also a donor for the 56th International Biennale di Venezia,
supporting the projects of Naeem Mohaiemen and Raqs Media Collective who both featured in
Dhaka Art Summit 2014.
The Foundation collects art from all over the world, and the collection is available for
Bangladeshi audiences to view (by appointment). Works from Documenta, the Venice
Biennale, and Liverpool Biennale have a permanent home in Bangladesh, and the foundation
also lends its collection of South Asian art to global exhibitions. The Foundation will expand to
include an international art center it is developing in Sylhet, Bangladesh. The Foundation is led
by Diana Campbell Betancourt supported by an advisory team comprised of Massimiliano
Gioni, Monica Narula, Beatrix Ruf, and Shahzia Sikander. More information can be found at
www.dhakaartsummit.org and www.samdani.com.bd.
Samdani Seminars are the Foundation’s ongoing public programs that happen parallel to the
Dhaka Art Summit in collaboration with the Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy and the Faculty
for Fine Arts, Dhaka University. The first 11 visiting artists and curators are: Pawel Althamer,
Tarek Atoui, Grégory Castéra, Nikhil Chopra, Madhavi Gore, Gianni Jetzer, Myriam Lefkowitz,
Sandeep Mukherjee, Jana Prepeluh, Sandra Terdjman, and Tori Wrånes.
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