16th Gwangju Biennale: Stateless Mind Pavilion
Stateless Mind Pavilion: Neither Here nor There, but Everywhere
5 September – 30 September 2026
Venue: Gallery SEEUM
26-12, Seoseopyeong-gil, Nam-gu
Gwangju, Republic of Korea
The Stateless Mind Pavilion brings together artists from Asia, Africa, Europe and South and North America, whose practices engage questions of movement, memory, identity, sound, ecology, technology, and collective knowledge. Rather than representing a nation, the Pavilion proposes another way of imagining international exchange - one grounded in relationships rather than borders.
Instead of functioning as a fixed exhibition, the Pavilion unfolds as a constellation of temporary relay points connecting artists, communities, and places. Each relay becomes both a local gathering and part of a wider translocal conversation, where encounters, hospitality, collaboration, and shared experiences take precedence over national representation.
Through installations, moving image, sound, performance, workshops, artist talks, neighbourhood walks, shared meals, radio broadcasts, and informal gatherings, the Pavilion explores how artistic practice can create spaces for dialogue across different histories, cultures, and geographies. Sound functions as one of the connecting threads - not as a prescribed medium, but as an invitation to listen to places, to one another, and to the conditions from which each encounter emerges.
Inspired by Bertolt Brecht's vision of radio as a reciprocal medium rather than a one-way channel of communication, the Pavilion embraces exchange over transmission. In an age of digital connectivity that often produces isolation, the project asks how communication might once again become participatory, collaborative, and locally grounded. Building on this, the Pavilion will host an international research program, Poetic Economies of the Non-State, convened by the Center for Arts, Design, and Social Research, which will continue through early 2027.
Resonating with the 16th Gwangju Biennale's theme, You Must Change Your Life, the Stateless Mind Pavilion remains unfinished, adaptive, and shaped by those who participate in it. Rather than presenting a single narrative, it offers an evolving ecology of encounters in which each local gesture contributes to a larger conversation while retaining its own specificity.
Participating Artists
Tamara Al-Mashouk
Susana Pilar Delahante Matienzo
Sibonelo Gumede & Nombuso Mathibela
Sheung Yiu
Saiful Razman & Yahya Torek
Ronnie Bahari
mónica teresa ortiz
Miguel Keerveld
Lilibeth Cuenca Rasmussen
Grace Xu
Fadly Sabran & Tumbuktikus Collective
Dalida Maria Benfield
Chris Bratton
Ariel William Orah
Amir Zainorin
Curatorial Team
Amir Zainorin (Jambatan)
Dalida María Benfield and Chris Bratton (CADSR)
Fadly Sabran (Kapallorek)
Associate Curators
Anna Cuomo
Camilla Boemio (IKT Member)