Raisa Kabir is an interdisciplinary artist and weaver based in London.
2023 Biennial Year Find out more
Kabir utilises woven text/textiles, sound, video, and performance to materialise concepts concerning the cultural politics of cloth, gendered archives, and colonial geographies. Kabir’s (un)weaving performances and tapestries comment on histories of trans-national power, global production, and matrixes of labour. Her textile works uses a queer theory of entanglement to weave discourse around disability, resisting function and the queer racialised body as a living archive of collective trauma.
She has participated in residencies and exhibited work internationally at, among others: The Whitworth, The Tetley, Glasgow International, Craft Council London, Ford Foundation gallery NYC; and has lectured on her research at Tate Modern, Institute of Contemporary Art London, The Courtauld, and the V&A.
Liverpool Biennial 2023
‘Utterances: Our vessels for the stories unspoken. Subaqueous violence. Sea. Ocean...’ (2016-present)
This survey of Raisa Kabir’s works comprises a range of key pieces created since 2016, including weaving, performance, film and ephemera. The works explore the material histories of cotton, silk, indigo, cochineal, jute and flax. In particular, Kabir investigates the associated labour and networks of extraction linked with the production and global trade of these materials, referencing the maritime boats, ships and sails that arrived cargo-laden to Liverpool’s docks.
Activated by a new performance taking place over the Liverpool Biennial 2023 launch weekend at Stanley Dock, this exhibition is inspired by Kabir’s research into the interwoven networks between Bengal, Liverpool, the Caribbean, the Americas, Africa, Asia and Europe. She has researched the journey made by Bengal Lascars – little-known Indian sailors
This survey of Raisa Kabir’s works comprises a range of key pieces created since 2016, including weaving, performance, film and ephemera. The works explore the material histories of cotton, silk, indigo, cochineal, jute and flax. In particular, Kabir investigates the associated labour and networks of extraction linked with the production and global trade of these materials, referencing the maritime boats, ships and sails that arrived cargo-laden to Liverpool’s docks. Activated by a new performance taking place over the Liverpool Biennial 2023 launch weekend at Stanley Dock, this exhibition is inspired by Kabir’s research into the interwoven networks between Bengal, Liverpool, the Caribbean, the Americas, Africa, Asia and Europe. She has researched the journey made by Bengal Lascars – little-known Indian sailors who were employed and exploited by the British East India shipping company – many of whom docked and made their home in Liverpool. In doing so, she draws a connection between histories of labour, industrialisation and extraction with increasing climate disasters in these places. She remarks on the impact of a ‘fossil-fuel based global economy’, rooted in colonial expansion and imperialism, which continues to destroy indigenous eco-systems, people’s homes and land.
‘Utterances: Our vessels for the stories unspoken. Subaqueous violence. Sea. Ocean...’ (2016-present)
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Raisa Kabir, 'Our vessels for the stories, unspoken. Subaqueous violence. Sea. Ocean…'. Liverpool Biennial 2023 at Stanley Dock. Photography by Mark McNulty
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Raisa Kabir. Liverpool Biennial 2023 at Bluecoat. Photography by Stuart Whipps
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Raisa Kabir. Liverpool Biennial 2023 at Bluecoat. Photography by Stuart Whipps
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Raisa Kabir. Liverpool Biennial 2023 at Bluecoat. Photography by Stuart Whipps
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Raisa Kabir. Liverpool Biennial 2023 at Bluecoat. Photography by Stuart Whipps
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Raisa Kabir. Liverpool Biennial 2023 at Bluecoat. Photography by Stuart Whipps
