Visit Dhaka Samdani Art Foundation Level 5, Suites 501 & 502 Shanta Western Tower, 186 Gulshan- Tejgaon Link Road Tejgaon I/A, Dhaka- 1208 Visit Samdani Art Foundation Applying for a VISA The Bangladeshi Government provides a visa-on-arrival (VOA) service for citizens of the following countries: United States of America, Canada, New Zealand, Russian Federation, China (excluding Hong Kong passports), Japan, Singapore, South Korea, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia (KSA), Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain, Malaysia, and all European countries If applying for a VOA, you will need to provide a photocopy of your passport, two passport-size photographs, a printed copy of your hotel reservation (including a full address and contact number), a copy of your return flight ticket, and a completed arrival card and visa application: copies can be obtained on arrival at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport. The VOA fee is approximately $52 USD (other currencies are accepted) and must be paid in cash (debit and credit cards are NOT accepted). If you need to apply for a visa before you fly, please contact the nearest Bangladesh High Commission/Embassy. For more info, visit the Bangladesh Ministry of Foreign Affairs . Our VIP team is there to assist you with visa letters or any queries. Please contact our VIP team here: vip@dhakaartsummit.org The Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport is served by numerous international and domestic airlines. Flight options from most international destinations are easily searchable through popular travel sites and travel search engines. Getting to Dhaka 01 Samdani Art Foundation is based in the Gulshan-Tejgaon link road, closer to the industrial and commercial are of Dhaka. Dhaka Art Summit, produced by the Samdani Art Foundation take place at the Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy, in Segun Bagicha, Dhaka. Suitable hotels can be found through popular travel sites and hotel search engines. Due to the heavy traffic situation in Dhaka, we recommend international visitors to stay closer to the venue during the Dhaka Art Summit. For hotel options, download the recommended list Accommodation 02 The best way to move around on the streets of Dhaka is in a car. The best way to arrange a rental car is through your hotel concierge. In case, you decide to go and book a rental car by yourself here is what we recommend the followings: App-based ride share: Uber Pathao For pre-booking visit: RentalCarBD Sheba.xyz Bdcabs.com Getting around in Dhaka 03 The official currency in Bangladesh is the Taka: known as Bangladeshi Taka or BDT. The Taka is a restricted currency and you will only be able to obtain cash currency on your arrival in Bangladesh. Taking money out at an ATM is the quickest and easiest means of currency exchange, but don’t forget to tell your bank that you are travelling before you leave. There are also several money exchange available at the airport If you require further assistance, please email info@dhakaartsummit.org For press enquiries, please email press@dhakaartsummit.org or visit our press page Currency Exchange 04

The Dhaka Art Summit (DAS) is an international, non-commercial research and exhibition platform for art and architecture related to South Asia. With a core focus on Bangladesh, DAS re-examines how we think about these forms of art in both a regional and an international context. Nadia Samdani CO-FOUNDER AND PRESIDENT Nadia Samdani MBE is the Co-Founder and President of the Samdani Art Foundation and Director of Dhaka Art Summit (DAS). In 2011, with husband Rajeeb Samdani, she established the Samdani Art Foundation to support the work of Bangladesh and South Asia’s contemporary artists and architects and increase their exposure. As part of this initiative, she founded DAS, which has since completed five successful editions under her leadership. She is a member of Tate’s South Asia Acquisitions Committee, Tate’s International Council and Alserkal Avenue’s Programming Committee, one of the founding members of The Harvard University Lakshmi Mittal South Asia Institute’s Arts Advisory Council and member of Asia Society’s Advisory Committee. In 2017, with her husband Rajeeb, she was the first South Asian arts patron to receive the prestigious Montblanc de la Culture Arts Patronage Award. She was appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the 2022 Birthday Honours for services to global art philanthropy and supporting the arts in South Asia and the United Kingdom. She has also received the Knight of the Order of the Arts and Letters by the Cultural Ministry of France.A second-generation collector, she began her own collection at the age of 22. She collects both Bangladeshi and international art, reflecting her experience as both a proud Bangladeshi and a global citizen. She has written about collecting for Art Asia Pacific and Live Mint and has been a guest speaker at art fairs and institutions including the Royal Ontario Museum, Art Basel, Frieze and Harvard University among other institutions. Works from the Samdanis’ collection have been lent to institutions and festivals including: Kiran Nadar Musem of Art, New Delhi (2023); Hayward Gallery, London (2022); Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (2019); Para Site, Hong Kong (2018); Museum of Modern Art, Warsaw (2018); documenta 14, Kassel and Athens, (2017); Shanghai Biennale (2017); Office for Contemporary Art Norway, Olso (2016); Centre Pompidou, Paris (2015); Kunstsammlung Nordrhein, Düsseldorf (2015); Gwangju Biennale (2014); and Kochi-Muziris Biennale (2014). Rajeeb Samdani CO-FOUNDER AND TRUSTEE Rajeeb Samdani is a Co-Founder and Trustee of the Samdani Art Foundation, and Managing Director of Golden Harvest Group - one of the leading diversified conglomerates in Bangladesh. Together with his wife Nadia Samdani MBE, he established the biannual Dhaka Art Summit, and Srihatta- Samdani Art Centre and Sculpture Park. Rajeeb is also known for his modern and contemporary art collection. He is a founding member and Co-Chair of Tate’s South Asian Acquisitions Committee, a member of Tate’s International Council and Tate Advisory Board and Alserkal Avenue’s Programming Committee, a founding member of The Harvard University Lakshmi Mittal South Asia Institute’s Arts Advisory Council, Delfina Foundation’s Global Council member, a member of Art SG and a member of Art Basel Global Patrons Council. In 2017, with his wife Nadia, he was the first South Asian arts patron to receive the prestigious Montblanc de la Culture Arts Patronage Award. He has been a guest speaker at art fairs and institutions including the Royal Ontario Museum of Art, UC Berkeley, Harvard University and the Private Museums Summit. Diana Campbell ARTISTIC DIRECTOR Diana Campbell is a Princeton educated American curator and writer working in South and Southeast Asia since 2010, primarily in India, Bangladesh, and the Philippines. She is committed to fostering a transnational art world, and her plural and long-range vision addresses the concerns of underrepresented regions and artists alongside the more established in manifold forums. Since 2013, she has served as the Founding Artistic Director of Dhaka-based Samdani Art Foundation, Bangladesh and Chief Curator of the Dhaka Art Summit, leading the last five editions of the platform with a global team of collaborators. Campbell has developed the Dhaka Art Summit into a leading research and exhibitions platform for art from South Asia, bringing together artists, architects, curators, and writers through a largely commission based model where new work and exhibitions are born in Bangladesh, adding a scholarly element to the platform through collaborations with the Getty Foundation, Asia Art Archive, Cornell University, Harvard University, RAW Material Company, Gudskul, and many other formal and grassroots educational initiatives around the world. Pacific Islands and Bangladesh are at the forefront of climate change; Campbell’s maternal family is indigenous CHamoru from the island of Guam, and her heritage inspires her curatorial practice and the development of DAS as a platform to amplify indigenous practices both in South Asia and internationally. In addition to her exhibition making and writing practice, Campbell is responsible for developing the Samdani Art Foundation collection and drives its international collaborations ahead of opening the foundation’s permanent home and community-based residency program at Srihatta, the Samdani Art Centre and Sculpture Park in Sylhet. Campbell’s practice specializes in building networks. She is part of the facilitation group of AFIELD, a global network of socially engaged initiatives, and leading the international development of EDI Global Forum, a global network of art education departments as an initiative of the Campania Region of Italy developed by the Fondazione Morra Greco in Naples that is convening over 150 global institutions to address needed change in art education. She is currently curating the 2023 edition of DesertX in the Coachella Valley opening in March 2023, linking the climatic challenges of droughts and floods across California and Bangladesh. Mohammad Sazzad Hossain HEAD OF ADMINISTRATION Mohammad Sazzad Hossain is the Head of Administration of the Samdani Art Foundation. Sazzad has worked for the Samdani Art Foundation since 2012 and has been a key member of the management team from the first edition of the Dhaka Art Summit, now moving into its 7th edition. He is responsible for the artistic production of DAS, along with the management of all the teams on site, as well as the production for Srihatta and its artistic program. From the outset, Sazzad has managed the production of major international artist’s projects, such as Rana Begum, Afrah Shafiq, Antony Gormley, Shilpa Gupta, Ramesh Mario Nithiyendran, Nilima Sheikh, Damian Ortega and Antonio Dias to name a few. He was one of the key members of the Srijan Abartan, a cross-disciplinary sustainable exhibition design research programme introduced in 2020. Sazzad Hossain completed his M.A. and B.A. from Stamford University Bangladesh majoring in English Literature. Emily Dolan Director of Operations and External Affairs Emily Dolan is the Director of Operations and External Affairs. She originally trained as a visual artist and since 2002 has worked in art institutions, including five years at The Fine Art Society, her primary focus being contemporary art. Since 2012 she has taken on production orientated roles in non-profit organisations and has coordinated exhibitions at the Hayward Gallery in London, The 55th Venice Biennale, Garage Centre of Contemporary Art and Culture, Moscow, and the Chalet Society, Paris. Eve Lemesle PRODUCER Eve Lemesle is an arts producer based between Europe and South-Asia. She started the arts management agency called ‘What About Art’ in Mumbai in 2010. She has produced many exhibitions and consulted internationally for the Venice Biennale, Qatar Museums, Shanghai Biennale, Dhaka Art Summit, Kochi Biennale, the Asia Now art fair at La Monnaie de Paris, Soho House collection amongst others. She is currently a consultant with Reliance for the upcoming JIO World Centre in Mumbai. She is also a researcher at the Institute of Public Art at the University of Shanghai. Eve has been installing some of the most prestigious private and corporate art collections in South-Asia. Tasmia Nehreen Ahmed Manager of Communications Shabnam Lilani Curatorial Assistant and Assistant to Artistic Director Nivriti Roddam Curatorial Assistant and Institutional Relations Liaison Rezaul Kabir Kochi Architect and Project Manager for Architecture in Bangladesh Safiqul Islam Assistant Project Manager for Architecture in Bangladesh Asifur Rahman Assistant Project Manager for Architecture in Bangladesh DAS 2016 Team Amara Antilla Daniel Baumann Katya Garcia Antón Guest Curators Others CHAIRMAN Farooq Sobhan GOETHE INSTITUT BANGLADESH Judith Mirschberger ALLIANCE FRANCAISE DE DHAKA, BANGLADESH Bruno Plasse BRITISH COUNCIL- BANGLADESH Eeshita Azad BANGLADESH SHILPAKALA ACADEMY Liaquat Ali Lucky Rashed Maqsood BARRISTER Anita Gazi DHAKA ART SUMMIT, BANGLADESH Nadia Samdani MBE SAMDANI ART FOUNDATION, BANGLADESH Rajeeb Samdani Organising Comittee Members

ALL PROJECTS Rehearsing The Witness: The Bhawal Court Case, A Talk By Zuleikha Chaudhari Pathshala South Asian Media Institute, Dhaka, 21 April 2017 The Bhawal court case was an extended pre-independence Indian court case that revolved around the identity of a sanyasi (or Hindu religious ascetic), claiming to be the second Kumar of Bhawal (the heir of one of the last large zamindari estates in Dhaka), who was presumed dead a decade earlier. The claim was contested by the British Court of Wards and by the widow of Ramendra Narayan Roy (the second Kumar of Bhawal) Bibhabati Devi. The case was in trial from 1930 – 1946. Over the course of sixteen years, the physical attributes, birthmarks, portraits and testimony were collated as forensic evidence to establish the claimant/sanyasi’s identity as being the Kumar. Hundreds of witnesses, including doctors, photographers, artists, prostitutes, peasants, revenue collectors, tenants, holy men, magistrates, handwriting experts, relatives and passers-‐by were deposed. The case went from the District Court in Dhaka to the High Court of Calcutta to the Privy Council in London, finally ending in 1946 with a victory for the plaintiff, who died a few days after the verdict. Rehearsing the Witness: The Bhawal Court Case uses this trial about a possible impostor to re-examine the enormous archive that the case produced, through performance as a means of problematising the notions of evidence, archive and identity. Both the domains of the law and theatre/acting frame larger questions that pertain to the production of truth and reality, assumptions of stable, consistent and believable identities and the construction of a credible narrative. The project explores the questions of law as performance, the role of performance in law and the performativity of legal truth-production. The talk at the Pathshala South Asian Media Institute described the three-day performance at the Dhaka Art Summit 2018 which drew a relationship between re-enactment, (crime-scene) reconstruction and retrial; the complex tension between forensic evidence, the act of speculation/imagination and truth-finding and truth-making. . Zuleikha Chaudhari is a theatre director and lighting designer. Her current research uses archival documents (texts and photographs) to develop theatrical performances as a way of thinking about the relationship between production of memory and the role of the archive and how this pertains to the retrieval and reliving of an event. The constructed narratives within the works looked at the relationship between personal lived experience and memories and larger historical events and narratives. These works use a combination of reportage, portraiture, documentary and fiction - the editing, re-interpretation and re-positioning of speculative ideas, opinions, beliefs and anecdotes towards the production of new narratives is central to these investigations about the relationship between history and theatre. Her ongoing research considers the structures and codes of performance as well the function and processes of the actor as reality and truth production. It investigates the tension between looking or watching and doing or acting. Her current projects include three court trials – The Bhawal Court Case (1930-46), The Trial of Bahadurshah Zafar (1858) and the India National Army Trials (1945-46) within the framework of law as performance; the role of performance in law and the performativity of legal truth-production. Her works have been shown at performance festivals, galleries and exhibitions in United States, Germany, France, Belgium, Vienna, South Africa, South Korea, China, Japan, The Netherlands, Pakistan and India.

ALL PROJECTS Today Will End 21 May – 12 Sept 2021, M HKA Antwerp Shilpa Gupta work on the Chitmahals of Bangladesh-India border, previously shown at DAS 2014 was part of her solo exhibition Today Will End at MHKA.

ALL PROJECTS Expression of Time Curated by Md. Muniruzzaman Expression of Time , curated by Mohammad Muniruzzaman, Director of the Department of Fine Arts, Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy, presents an intergenerational exhibition to show a cross-section of the dynamism of young Bangladesh. To connect the idea of giving space to a younger generation of artists, the exhibition will present early works of now prominent artists who have played important roles in building the infrastructure for contemporary art in Bangladesh through their careers alongside works of a younger generation of artists, whose practices will undoubtedly steer the future of the country’s art history. The exhibition will also explore Bangladeshi visual culture in parallel the diverse practice of urban and folk art of Bangladesh from cinema banner painting to the centuries old tradition of kantha embroider. ARTISTS Abdur Rob Khan Abdus Shakoor Shah Abul Barq Alvi Ahmed Nazir Ahmed Samsuddoha Anisuzzaman Anisuzzaman Sohel A. R. Rumy Azadi Parvin Tuesly Bipasha Hayat Bishwajit Goswami Dhali Al Mamun Dr. Mohammad Iqbal Golam Faruque Bebul Haroon Ar Rashid Tutul Jamal Ahmed Jayanta Sarker John Kalidas Karmakar Maqsudul Iqbal Nipa Md. Tokon Mohammad Eunus Monirul Islam Monsur Ul Karim Mostafizul Haque Naima Haque Nasim Ahmed Nadvi Nasirul Hamid Nikhil Das Nisar Hossain Priti Ali Proddyut Kumar Das Rajiuddin Choudhury Ranjit Das Rashid Amin Rashida Begum Rashedul Huda Rezaun Nabi Rokeya Sultana Ruhul Amin Tareque Sahid Kabir Samarjit Roy Chowdhury Shambhu Acharya Shayamal Sarker Sheikh Afzal Siddharta Talukdar Shishir Bhattacharjee Tarshito Tasaddak Hossain Dulu Tejosh Halder Josh Wakilur Rahman

ALL PROJECTS Bearing Point 2 - Dozakh-I-Puri N'imat (An Inferno Bearing Gifts) Curated by Diana Campbell Bearing Point 2 - Dozakh-I-Puri N'imat (An Inferno Bearing Gifts) The 14th century Moroccan scholar Ibn Batuta’s description of Bengal reads as Dozakh-i-puri n'imat – an inferno bearing gifts. This Bearing Point descended into this inferno, considering the interwoven histories of Bengal to face the coming storms of ecological catastrophe and rising ethno-nationalism. Muzharul Islam once said that “independence brings in the greatest opportunity for a nation to express its thoughts, talent, and energy.” Islam designed the campus of Chittagong University, which was the birthplace of the 13-panel mural, Abahoman Bangla Bangali (The Flows of Bengal and the Bengali), painted in 1972 by members of Chittagong-based collective Oti Shamprotik Amra. These panels narrated a history of Bengal up until the birth of Bangladesh in 1971, and were part of the Bangladesh India Friendship Fest, the first exhibition of Bangladeshi art abroad in 1972 in Calcutta, which included artists, musicians and performers. The first panel is titled Ruposhi Bangla (Beautiful Bengal) after the seminal collection of poems by Jibanananda Das (1899-1954), which served as a major point of inspiration for the nationalists of the Language Movement from 1952. Music and oral performance were key in the Bangladeshi Liberation War when radio stations deemed illegal by the Pakistani government disseminated nationalist Bengali songs and troupes of performers travelled to far ends of the country to produce citizenship through music. The Bengali musicians’ collective Mohiner Ghoraguli also draws its name from a Das’s poem. Zihan Karim takes one of their songs as a point of departure to reimagine the metaphor of the body as the architecture for the soul. His 3D video installation examines what is lost when people try to erase difficult pasts, using a lens of social critique offered by the song to engage with centuries of history. Music also played a significant role in the emergence of Bangladesh into international consciousness through the 1971 Concert for Bangladesh organised by Ravi Shankar and George Harrison. The early leaders of Bangladesh were cognizant of the impoverished image of their country in the world’s eyes. Muzharul Islam once remarked: “In the 2,000 years of our history, we have been poor for only 250 years and that too, because of colonisation. If we do suffer from poverty, we suffer only from one kind of poverty– economic.” Student movements have paved the way for revolutions across history, including in Bangladesh, speaking to the role of education as a form of de-colonial practice and a vehicle for changing the course of history. One of the most radical institutions for education was Rabindranath Tagore’s Shantiniketan, where the poet and his contemporaries created an institution that focused on community-based aesthetically-oriented learning. The Otolith Group revisits Tagore’s pedagogical and aesthetic philosophy in their lecture performance which opens DAS’s talks and education programmes. Speaking to the centrality of the spoken word in the production of the law, Zuleikha Chaudhuri’s Rehearsing the Witness revisited a legal case where the identity of the presumed dead Kumar of Bhawal was disputed for over 16 years in the courts of Dhaka, Calcutta, and London. These works activated archives and oral histories, to create contexts that investigate the production of identity as a performed practice. Artists Oti Samprotik Amra (1968-mid 1970s) Sabih-ul-Alam, Tajul Islam, Syed Enayet Hossain, Safiqul Islam, Abul Monsur, Chandra Shekhar Dey, Mohammad Shawkat Haider Eternal Bangla Bangali, 1972 Locally produced paint on board Titles: 1. Beautiful Bengal 2. Strayed worshipper 3. Wisdom’s flare in hand 4. Dark Skies 5. Home searching traveler 6. Sovereign power, sovereign wrath 7. Death’s index 8. Ravenous Strike 9. Voice of resistance 10. Spectrum of life 11. Horrors of 71 12. Victory all courtesy of the Chittagong University Museum Collection Oti Samprotik Amra (We, the Contemporary) was a progressive cultural group founded by the students of the Chittagong University in 1968. Their activity included organizing theatrical shows and various cultural programmes within the university. They were responsible for the first international exhibition of Bangladeshi art (after the liberation war in 1971), held in Kolkata in 1972, which celebrated the triumph of Bengali culture. The group invited seven artists, mostly students of Chittagongian origin (Sabih-ul-Alam, Tajul Islam, Syed Enayet Hossain, Safiqul Islam, Abul Monsur, Chandra Shekhar Dey and Mohammad Shawkat Haider) to create a mural 104 ft long for the Bangladesh-India Friendship Fair which was held in Gorer Math (now known as Maidan or Brigade Parade Ground) in March 1972. This recently re-discovered 13-panel mural (of which we are only able to display 12, due to deteriorated condition of the final work) that chronicles different chapters of the country’s history was collected by the Chittagong University Museum in 1976 when the group slowly ceased to exist. These panels were reunited and reexhibited at Chittagong University Museum in 2017 as part of Dhaka Art Summit’s research initiatives, and we are honoured to exhibit this important historical marker of Bangladeshi independence and artist-led initiatives at DAS 2018. Zihan Karim (b. 1984 in Chittagong, lives and works in Chittagong Various Ways of Departure, 2017-2018 4 channel video with sound courtesy of the artist Music and oral performance were key in the Bangladeshi Liberation War when radio stations deemed illegal by the Pakistani government disseminated nationalist Bengali songs and troupes of performers traveled to far ends of the country to produce citizenship through music. Soon after Bangladeshi independence the Bengali musicians’ collective, which some call India’s rock music collective, Mohiner Ghoraguli (founded in 1975), continued in this tradition and created music deeply connected to the student movements of the 1970s-80s. Inspired by the Mohiner Ghoraguli song Saattala Bari (Seven Storied House), Chittagong based artist Zihan Karim reimagines the metaphor of the body as the architecture for the soul – an idea present across Bengali, Baul, and Sufi traditions. Karim’s resulting video installation Various Ways of Departure (2017-2018) uses this spiritual framework, viewed through lens of social critique offered by the song, to survey two historically significant seven-storied buildings in Chittagong – the Adalat Bhaban (the Courthouse) and the P.K Sen Bhaban– both of which were under threat of demolition. Karim engages with centuries of history through a poetic lens, examining what is lost when people try to erase difficult pasts, using techniques of 3D imaging to show the many layers that build up the composite image we see now. Zuliekha Chaudhuri (b. 1973 in Mumbai, lives and works in New Delhi) with Anita Rahaman Ghazi, Jyotirmoy Barua, Aneek R. Haque, Shahidul Alam, Dr Nandini Chatterjee, Rahaab Allana, Ahona Palchoudhuri, Samina Luthfa, Oroon Das and Arup Rahee Rehearsing the Witness: The Bhawal Court Case (2016-2018) Live performance, archival photographs Commissioned and produced by the Samdani Art Foundation Additional support from the Alkzazi Foundation of Photography and Brown University Courtesy of the artist and the Alkazi Foundation of Photography, New Delhi Photographs courtesy : The Alkazi Collection of Photography, New Delhi Both theatre and citizenship are performed practices; one’s performance as a citizen is either applauded or fails to live up-to expectations. To live with these conditions is to always be on trial and to know that in the eyes of the examining authority one is always an imposter unless proved otherwise. Zuleikha Chaudhuri’s Rehearsing the Witness: The Bhawal Court Case, revisits the historical court case around the Bhawal zamindari estate in Dhaka which ran between 1930-1946. She has staged previous iterations of the work at the Mumbai Art Room, as a “‘rehearsal as exhibition' ', and at the Kochi-Muziris Biennale, focusing on the production of a portrait by an actor. The performance at DAS at 10am on February 3rd in the auditorium takes the form of a trial using some of the original evidence from the case. This project pulls together strands of thought from the previous iterations when moving to the “scene of the crime” in Dhaka, drawing a relationship between re-enactment and retrial; the complex tension between forensic evidence, the act of speculation/imagination and truth finding and truth making. The Bhawal Court Case takes as its point of departure a trial which revolved around the identity of a sanyasi (or Hindu religious ascetic) claiming to be the second Kumar of Bhawal (the heir of one of the last large zamindari estates in Dhaka), who was presumed dead a decade earlier. The claim was contested by the British Court of Wards and by the widow of Ramendra Narayan Roy (the second Kumar of Bhawal) Bibhabati Devi. Over the course of sixteen years, the physical attributes, birthmarks, portraits and testimony were collated as forensic evidence to establish the claimant/sanyasi’s identity as being the Kumar. Hundreds of witnesses, including doctors, photographers, artists, prostitutes, peasants, revenue collectors, tenants, holy men, magistrates, handwriting experts, relatives and passers-‐by were deposed. The case went from the District Court in Dhaka to the High Court of Calcutta to the Privy Council in London, finally ending in 1946 with a victory for the plaintiff, who died a few days after the verdict. Rehearsing the Witness: The Bhawal Court Case uses this trial about a possible impostor to re-examine the enormous archive that the case produced, through performance as a means to reconsider notions of evidence, the archive and identity. Both the domains of the law and theatre/acting frame larger questions that pertain to the production of truth and reality, assumptions of stable, consistent and believable identities and the construction of a credible narrative. It examines how identity is written into history and emerges in the domain of the law, often in opposition to the actual complexity of lived-experiences and relationships. The manner in which the State, here the British Court of Wards, one of the parties in the Bhawal case, considers identity is a central question, explored through the testimony of expert witnesses on the body as evidence (and as the site where identity is played out), in comparison to where the individual locates it. Cast Judge: Anita Rahaman Ghazi Lawyer: Jyotirmoy Barua Lawyer: Aneek R. Haque Expert Witness 1: Shahidul Alam (Artist and Writer) as J. L. Winterton (Artist and Photographer. Plaintiff's Witness No.778) Expert Witness 2: Dr Nandini Chatterjee, (Senior Lecturer in history, University of Exeter, UK.) as J.H. Lindsay (Retired ICS, Secretary of the School of Oriental Studies in London, and former Collector of Dacca. Defendant’s witness, taken on commission) Expert Witness 3: Rahaab Allana (Curator, Alkazi Foundation for the Arts, New Delhi) as Percy Brown (Artist, Secretary and Curator of the Victoria Memorial Hall, Calcutta. Defendant’s witness No.8) Expert Witness 4: Ahona Palchoudhuri (Department of Anthropology, Brown University) as Bawa Dharam Das (Defendant’s witness No 327). Expert Witness 5: Samina Luthfa (Sociologist and actor) as Bibhabati Debi (Defendant No. 1. Widow of the second Kumar of Bhawal) Expert Witness 6: Oroon Das (Actor) and Arup Rahee (Performer, activist, and writer with The Centre for Bangladesh Studies) as Kumar Ramendra Narayan Roy (Plaintiff) the second of the three Kumars, married to Bibhabati Debi.

ALL PROJECTS Fabric(ated) Fractures Concrete, Alserkal Avenue, Dubai Alserkal Avenue collaborated with the Samdani Art Foundation on Fabric(ated) Fractures, an exhibition at Concrete, Dubai in March 2019. Fabric(ated) Fractures provided a platform to amplify the voices of artists from Bangladesh and South and Southeast Asia, and built on the exhibition There Once was a Village Here held at Dhaka Art Summit 2018. Curated by Samdani Art Foundation Artistic Director Diana Campbell Betancourt, this exhibition also introduced new works from artists with a connection to Bangladesh. Fabric(ated) Fractures considers contexts that anthropologist Jason Cons describes as ‘sensitive spaces’–spaces that challenge ideas of nation, state, and territory where cultures exist that do not fit the image that the state has for itself. Sensitive spaces are often razed, with their people forced to succumb to the state and submit to the domination of majority forces. However, the social fabric of these spaces often remains intact, a testament to human fortitude, even if its people are dislocated and their dwellings levelled. Regional lenses, including overarching headers such as ‘South Asia’ or ‘MENASA’ tend to filter out the many traces of difference found on a local level, and this exhibition aims to weave a more complex picture of the vibrant and diverse threads that comprise a yet-to-be crystalised identity in the wounded border areas related to Bangladesh; areas that cannot be defined with a single overarching regional framing device. Selected artists are: Ashfika Rahman Ayesha Jatoi Debasish Shom Gauri Gill and Rajesh Vangad Hitman Gurung Jakkai Siributr Joydeb Roaja Kamruzzaman Shadhin Kanak Chanpa Chakma Munem Wasif Pablo Bartholomew Rashid Choudhury Reetu Sattar Shilpa Gupta To know more about the exhibition, please download the catalogue from here .

ALL PROJECTS Novera Ahmed's Work from the Samdani Art Foundation Collection Exhibited at The Hepworth Wakefield The Samdani Art Foundation is delighted to support Mrinalini Mukherjee: Unbound Forms – Women Sculptors of India and Bangladesh at The Hepworth Wakefield, an exhibition that brings together key women sculptors whose practices shaped the history of modern sculpture in South Asia. Among the artists featured is pioneering Bangladeshi sculptor Novera Ahmed, whose work continues to be reassessed for its foundational contribution to the region's artistic history. Widely regarded as the pioneer of modern sculpture in Bangladesh, Novera Ahmed helped define a new sculptural language in South Asia. Yet despite her foundational contribution to the country's artistic development, her work remained underappreciated for decades, making the continued reassessment of her legacy especially significant. The Samdani Art Foundation has lent Standing Figure from its collection to the exhibition. Created during Novera's time in Lahore in the early 1960s, the work belongs to a rare body of sculptures produced during a pivotal chapter of her practice outside Bangladesh. Unlike many of the works for which she is best known, Standing Figure emerged from a distinct period of experimentation and artistic exchange across what was then East and West Pakistan. Co-curated by Tarini Malik in partnership with the Royal Academy of Arts, Mrinalini Mukherjee: Unbound Forms – Women Sculptors of India and Bangladesh opened on 3 May 2026 and remains on view at The Hepworth Wakefield until 1 November 2026. The Samdani Art Foundation is a major supporter of the exhibition, along with other institutions.

ALL PROJECTS Where Do The Ants Go? at the Horst Arts and Music Festival Brussels Afrah Shafiq collaborated with BC Materials to develop a new outdoor version of her existing work, using earth blocks as the main building material for the Horst Arts and Music Festival in Brussels. The project "Where Do The Ants Go?" is evolving across various geographies and social contexts, involving new participants and bringing fresh cultural perspectives and curatorial insights as it travels from its debut at the 2023 Dhaka Art Summit with curatorial support from Diana Campbell, Fernanda Brenner, Chus Martinez, Daniel Baumann, and Iaroslav Volovod, through the end of 2024 via the To-Gather platform facilitated by the Swiss Arts Council, Pro Helvetia. The anthill changes its form in each iteration, adapting to the unique environment and context of each location. The partnership with Horst was curated by our Artistic Director, Diana Campbell, and is part of the ongoing development of this work. This process began with the original iteration for the Dhaka Art Summit 2023 and continues towards the creation of a permanent outdoor version of the work in Sylhet, our permanent home at Srihatta - the Samdani Art Centre and Sculpture Park in Bangladesh. This pavilion project is co-financed by the VLAIO Living Lab Earth Blocks. Jeremy Waterfield, Bregt Hoppenbrouwers ( @bcmaterials_org ) and Theresa Zschäbitz (BC architects/ Junior Professorship act of building) worked together to translate Shafiq's vision into a structure of compressed earth blocks, reused wood and prefabricated thatch elements in close collaboration with HORST Ateliers, @ vlaio.be and @democogroup . Forty-five students from BC's Junior Professorship act of building have been working on the construction plan since March and built the pavilion together.

ALL PROJECTS 9TH ASIA PACIFIC TRIENNIAL 24 NOVEMBER 2018 - 28 APRIL 2019, QUEENSLAND ART GALLERY, BRISBANE, AUSTRALIA The Samdani Art Foundation and Dhaka Art Summit 2018 are delighted with their partnership with the 9th Asia Pacific Triennial organized by the Queensland Art Gallery & Gallery of Modern Art in Brisbane, Australia, which facilitated the participation of Bangladeshi visual artists in this important regional and International platform for the first time. Tarun Nagesh, Associate Curator, Asian Art, QAGOMA, served as a DAS 2018 fellow and Diana Campbell Betancourt, Artistic Director, Samdani Art Foundation served as a curatorial interlocutor for APT 9, and Bangladeshi artists Ayesha Sultana (who won the 2014 Samdani Art Award) and Munem Wasif were commissioned to make new work for the exhibition. SAF also wishes to thank Artspace Sydney, the Australia Council for the Arts, and Australian Embassy High Commissioner Julia Niblett in Dhaka for being an integral part of this continuing journey of increasing artistic exchange between Bangladesh and Australia. Find out more about the exhibition, the artists, and their works here: www.qagoma.qld.gov.au The 9th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art (APT9) The hugely ambitious APT series brings significant art from across the Asia Pacific to Brisbane. Overflowing with colour and life, this free contemporary art

ALL PROJECTS Risquons-Tout Wiels, 19 Sept 2020 – 1 Jan 2021 Shezad Dawood's research about Bangladeshi modern architecture through the archives and history of Muzharul Islam took a new form at Wiels, expanding upon his Samdani Art Foundation supported co-commissions with the Bagri Foundation and Jhaveri Contemporary at Frieze LIVE London 2019 (with Timothy Taylor Gallery) and Dhaka Art Summit 2020.

ALL PROJECTS World Weather Network Climate can be seen as a collage of world weathers, and we are a proud member of this global coalition of 28 arts agencies around the world formed in response to the climate crisis and biodiversity loss. Learn more about the World Weather Network. Please watch our recent contributions to the network which include Echoes , a new video contribution by Gidreebawlee Foundation for the Arts, and the Dhaka Art Summit panel discussion on Artistic Process and Climate Change . Echoes is an inter-regional performance project that engaged young people aged 13–18 years from Thakurgaon and Khulna and created a collaborative art performance by exploring their collective voices with their respective experiences of climate change.