The Kochi Biennale Foundation is pleased to announce the 5th edition of the Kochi-Muziris Biennale scheduled to open on December 12, 2022 until April 10, 2023. Curated by Singaporean artist Shubigi Rao and titled In Our Veins Flow Ink and Fire, the exhibition will bring together 80 artists and collectives with over 45 new commissions. Originally scheduled for December 2020 and postponed due to the pandemic, the event will be held across multiple venues in Fort Kochi and Ernakulam, in Kerala, India.
In her curatorial framework, Rao notes, “A biennale can be so much more than a mere accumulation of coincidental collisions. As a bulwark against despair, the biennale as commons may seem an impossible idea. But we remember the ability of our species, our communities, to flourish artistically even in fraught and dire situations, with a refusal in the face of disillusionment to disavow our poetry, our languages, our art and music, our optimism and humour. To envision this biennale as a persistent yet unpredictable murmuration in the face of capriciousness and volatility comes from my unshakeable conviction in the power of storytelling as strategy, of the transgressive potency of ink, and transformative fire of satire and humour”.