With the theme ‘For The Time Being’, this edition of the biennial is curated by Indian artist Nikhil Chopra from the Goa-based multidisciplinary project HH Art Spaces, featuring 66 artists and collectives from over 20 countries, according to the Kochi Biennale Foundation.
“Our invitation to participants was to work with the climate, conditions, and resource reality” of the port city of Kochi, in the state of Kerala, highlighting the necessity for coexistence, states the curatorial team in a release.
Mónica de Miranda, “aligned with the theme of Coexistence in the Biennial,” will present the project ‘Earthworks’, which “revives the practices of connecting with the earth through a unique installation,” the artist details on her website.
“Inspired by Vandana Shiva,” the Indian scholar, feminist, anti-globalization activist, and advocate for the environment and food sovereignty, Mónica de Miranda’s project “explores the soil as a historical agent, emphasizing its decolonizing and regenerative role,” extending her research on “ecologies of belonging and the role of territory as a space of memory and identity.”
‘Earthworks’ is also the name of the installation Mónica de Miranda showcases this month in London, at Somerset House, where the 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair is held from October 16 to 19.
In the British capital, based on the Cameroonian philosopher Achille Mbembe’s concept of “earthly communities,” the artist proposes a reflection on the interdependence between humans and non-humans, shared care, and collective survival.
Designed specifically for Somerset House, ‘Earthworks’ transforms its central courtyard into a “public space as a living, collective, and sensory archive, with an arrangement of scenic sculptures and vertical gardens, hosting performances, dialogues, and community actions.”
Mónica de Miranda’s artistic practice has interrogated colonial and post-colonial memories, attended to marginal places, and constructed narratives of resistance moving between personal and collective.
Born in Porto in 1976, Mónica de Miranda is an artist, curator, and researcher who lives and works between Lisbon and Luanda, exploring urban archaeology, politics, gender identity, memory, and personal geographies.
In 2024, co-curated with Sónia Vaz Borges and Vânia Gala, she represented Portugal at the 60th Venice Art Biennale with the project ‘Greenhouse’, a “Creole garden” installed at Palazzo Franchetti, featuring a sound installation, sculptures, and a program of dance, workshops, readings, and participatory activities.
The artist’s work is featured in public and private collections such as the Museum of Art, Architecture and Technology, the Municipal Archive of Lisbon, the National Museum of Contemporary Art, and the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation. She participated in the Dakar Biennale, Senegal, in 2016, and the Bamako Encounters Photography Biennale, Mali, in 2015.
The Kochi-Muziris Biennale, billed as “the largest contemporary art exhibition in South Asia,” showcases 50 new projects occupying public spaces and historical heritage sites in the port city’s neighborhoods, including the Aspinwall House, the Pepper House, and the Durbar Hall, the former court of the maharaja.
The biennial features numerous artists, including Marina Abramovic, Abul Hisham, Dima Srouji and Piero Tomassoni, Faiza Hasan, Lionel Wendt, and Ratna Gupta.
Nikhil Chopra, curator of this edition, founded HH Art Spaces in 2014 in Goa with artist Romain Loustau.
His artistic practice combines live art, drawing, photography, sculpture, and installation, having participated in international exhibitions such as Documenta in Kassel, Germany, the Sharjah Biennial in the United Arab Emirates, the Havana Biennial, and the Venice Biennale.
