The 11th Shanghai Biennale: City Projects

Infra-Curatorial Platform

The ‘Infra-Curatorial’ constellation represents arguments inside the overall arc of the argument of our curatorial work. They are moments of ventilation, pause, expansion and relay. They represent conversations that spill out from within Raqs to others who are thinking and imagining the world along resonant or even dissonant lines.

Theory Opera

When theory gets to work, it sings. This edition of Shanghai Biennale takes questions as an attitude, a form of life. The ‘Theory Opera’ is a kind of discursive form that one could see as an orchestration of major and minor modes in thought and speculation, voiced in ways that marry the heft of philosophy to the cadence of opera. Raqs Media Collective will invite the previous PSA emerging curator’s program prize winner, art workers Yao Meng Xi and Liu Tian, here to Shanghai to develop an exciting programme.

4 Terminals: Points of Connection and Amplification

The terminal is a key feature of the Biennale. It is also Raqs’ way of recognizing the ability that artists in the contemporary world have to act as shapers of discourse, and as engines and 11th Shanghai Biennale 11th Shanghai Biennale 49 pilots of the imagination.

The first round of Terminals are:
• Ivana Franke (Germany)
• Regina José Galindo (Guatemala)
• Marjolijn Dijkman (Netherlands)
• MouSen + MSG (China)

Swatch and Power Station of Art present: Grain God Narrative
Artists: Roman Stolyar, Cédric Van Parys, Jean-Charles Kien
Date Oct 22, 2016 – Feb 14, 2017
Venue Swatch Art Peace Hotel
Address 23 East Nanjing Road.

51 Personae

The Call for 51 Personae went out on May 1 in the Labour Daily Newspaper, and on the web page of the Shanghai Biennale, and is circulating in a major way in Chinese Social Media. People with amazing and unique stories, special interests and experiences – all citizens of Shanghai – will enter the space  of attention that the Biennale provides to give it depth and energy.