‘Practice’ is the daily ‘work’ (verb) of art. It represents the sum of all moves—practical, conceptual, affective, cognitive, philosophical, analytical, and aesthetic—that occupy or de-occupy the state of our triangulation at any given moment. Contingent by nature, this practice shifts shape, surprising itself as much as it surprises others. Like a mycelial inhabitation—indeterminate and unbounded—it keeps expanding.

Re Run

n revisiting and re-staging Cartier Bresson’s photograph in Shanghai, Raqs meet the conditions of the self-fulfilling prophecy invoked by the event captured in the original image.

Diver’s at Work

The diver, maybe she is a specter, maybe he is a submarine apparition. Diving, we are  closer to the surface of the earth than an astronaut, but the paradoxical nature of a submarine horizon makes for an experience that envelopes and recedes at the same time. We could recognize this paradox as key to an awareness of our experience of the contemporary. 

The necessity of Infinity

The Necessity of Eternity recounts what must be one of the most exciting yet neglected exchanges (Al-As’Ilah Wa’L-Ajwibah/Questions and Answers) in the intellectual history of the world.

The Blood of Stars

The Blood of Stars invites us to think about the relation between the presence of iron, a fugitive from the stars, sleeping deep inside the earth and the veins of warm-blooded mammals.

The Emperor’s Old Clothes & Hollowgram

The Emperor’s Old Clothes (2017)Shortlisted for The Fourth Plinth on Trafalgar Square 3D printed PLA Plastic and cast polyester resin What, would the departure of power from a Trafalgar Square pedestal look like? The Emperor’s Old Clothes is an answer to this question in sculptural form. What we intend to place on the fourth plinth in Trafalgar Square is […]

The Translator’s Silence

Fragments of texts by three South Asian poets, Faiz Ahmed Faiz, Rabindranath Tagore, and Agha Shahid Ali, are presented in Urdu, Bengali and English, in lenticular 3D prints

Utsushimi

Utsushimi Site-specific installation at Suzu City, Oku-Noto Triennale, Japan (2017 – ongoing)  Materialized Architectural Drawing in Illuminated Wireframe  Utsushimi (Tr:double image/token/emanation) traces the outline of a now-defunct railway station in the Noto Peninsula of central Japan, capturing its essence through a ‘drawing sculpture’ that renders the station’s form as an exoskeleton. This skeletal emanation stands slightly […]

The Return of Tipoo’s Tiger

he Return of Tipoo’s Tiger is a communiqué from the far future channeled by the Raqs Media Collective into the Victoria & Albert Museum for “Collecting Europe” a programme conceived by the Goethe Institute, London and the V&A Museum.