Contributor

Raqs Media Collective was formed in 1992 in Delhi, India. The word “raqs” in several languages denotes an intensification of awareness and presence attained by whirling, turning, and being in a state of revolution. Raqs Media Collective take this sense to mean “kinetic contemplation” and a restless entanglement with the world, and with time. Raqs enlists objects such as an early-modern tiger-automata from Southern India, or a biscuit from the Paris Commune, or a cup salvaged from an ancient Mediterranean shipwreck, to turn them into devices to sniff and taste time. Devices and modalities are also played with to undertake historical subterfuge and philosophical query. Raqs practices across several media; making installation, sculpture, video, performance, text, lexica, and curation.

The members of Raqs Media Collective live and work in Delhi, India. In 2001, they co-founded the Sarai program at CSDS New Delhi and ran it for a decade, where they also edited the Sarai Reader series. Raqs’ work has been shown in museums and exhibitions across the world, including Documenta 11; the Venice, Istanbul, Sydney, Shanghai and Sao Paulo Biennales; and solo exhibitions and projects at the National Gallery of Modern Art (Delhi), Tate Modern (London), UNAM (Mexico City), Fundacion Proa (Buenos Aires), Whitworth Gallery (Manchester), K-21 (Dusseldorf), and Mathaf (Doha), amongst others.

Curated exhibitions by Raqs include The Rest of Now (Manifesta 8, 2011), Sarai Reader 09 (Devi Art Foundation, Gurugram, 2012), Insert2014 (IGNCA, Delhi, 2014), Why Not Ask Again (Shanghai Biennale, 2016), In the Open or in Stealth (MACBA, Barcelona, 2018), Five Million Incidents (Goethe Institut, Delhi & Kolkata, 2019-2020) and Afterglow (Yokohama Triennale, 2020).