16th Gwangju Stateless Mind Pavilion, 2026
Platform for artistic dialogue on identity, migration, and transnational cultural perspectives.
Current Project
Stateless Mind Pavilion
16th Gwangju Biennale 2026
At the invitation of the Gwangju Biennale Foundation, the Stateless Mind Pavilion will participate in the 16th Gwangju Biennale (2026) as an artist-led platform for installation, performance, sound, and multimedia works exploring belonging, displacement, and statelessness.
The Pavilion is developed through collaboration between:
Jambatan (Denmark/Malaysia)
CAD+SR – Center for Arts, Design and Social Research (US/Finland)
Kapallorek Artspace (Malaysia)
The project brings together artists and curators across Europe and Southeast Asia to create a temporary public site of encounter where installation, performance, and participatory practices invite audiences into dialogue around identity and cultural exchange.
Organizing Partners
The Stateless Mind Pavilion is developed through collaboration between three international cultural platforms working across Europe and Southeast Asia.
Jambatan (Denmark–Malaysia)
Artist-led platform supporting cross-cultural artistic exchange and research.
Center for Arts, Design and Social Research – CAD+SR (Finland)
Lead Nordic partner responsible for research, curatorial development, and dissemination.
Kapallorek Artspace (Malaysia)
Independent cultural platform supporting socially engaged artistic practices and international collaboration.
Institutional host:
Gwangju Biennale Foundation (Republic of Korea)
Curatorial Team
The curatorial framework of the Stateless Mind Pavilion is developed through collaborative authorship between the organizing partners and invited curators.
Amir Zainorin
Co-Curator & Co-Project Coordinator
Dalida María Benfield and Christopher Bratton
Lead Project Coordinators & Co-Curators
Fadly Sabran
Co-Curator & Project Coordinator
Anna Cuomo
Associate Curator
Camilla Boemio
Associate Curator
Participating Artists
The list of participating artists for the 16th Gwangju Stateless Mind Pavilion will be announced soon as the curatorial program continues to develop.
About the Stateless Mind Pavilion
The Stateless Mind Pavilion is an artist-led platform for interdisciplinary artistic practices exploring questions of identity, belonging, and cultural displacement in a global context.
Developed through collaboration between artists, curators, and cultural institutions across Europe and Southeast Asia, the Pavilion operates as a curatorial framework for installations, performances, time-based media, and participatory public programs.
Rather than presenting a single narrative, the Pavilion functions as a temporary site of encounter where diverse artistic perspectives engage with lived experiences of migration, memory, and cultural transformation.
Through exhibitions, performances, and collaborative projects, the Stateless Mind Pavilion fosters cross-cultural dialogue and experimental forms of exhibition-making that extend beyond traditional institutional formats.
Locations & Network
The activities of the Stateless Mind Pavilion unfold across multiple international contexts through collaborations with cultural institutions, artist-run spaces, and research platforms.
Key locations include:
Gwangju (Republic of Korea Rome, (Italy)
Copenhagen (Denmark)
Helsinki (Finland)
Seri Iskandar (Malaysia)
Langkawi (Malaysia)
About the Pavilion
The Stateless Mind Pavilion is an artist-led platform for interdisciplinary artistic practices exploring questions of identity, belonging, and cultural displacement in a global context.
Developed through collaboration between artists, curators, and cultural institutions across Europe and Southeast Asia, the Pavilion functions as a curatorial framework for installations, performances, time-based media, and participatory public programs.
Through exhibitions and collaborative projects, the Stateless Mind Pavilion fosters cross-cultural dialogue and experimental forms of exhibition-making that extend beyond traditional institutional formats.
Stateless Mind Pavilion, Museo della Mura, Rome, Italy, 2026
Dario Paini (Italy) — saxophone
Gravity of the Wall
Stateless Mind Pavilion — Museo delle Mura, Rome, Italy, 2026
A quiet activation of the Stateless Mind Pavilion within the historic architecture of Museo delle Mura.
Gravity of the Wall marks the activation of the Stateless Mind Pavilion within Amir Zainorin’s solo exhibition at Museo delle Mura in Rome. Rather than appearing as a clearly defined program or separate section, the Pavilion unfolded as a subtle condition within the exhibition itself.
Musicians, video works, and quiet interventions emerged within the architectural space without formal announcement or signage. Sound, gesture, and image entered the environment gradually, inviting visitors to encounter the works before identifying their authors. In this activation, recognition was intentionally displaced in time: the experience of presence preceded the naming of artists and roles, which later appeared through documentation and archival record.
The title Gravity of the Wall refers both to the physical presence of the ancient walls of Museo delle Mura and to the invisible forces they hold. Walls carry memory, history, and the weight of boundaries, yet they also create spaces of encounter. Within this context, the Pavilion approached the wall not only as architecture but as a condition—one that gathers sound, movement, and attention into a shared space where listening and presence briefly reshape how the exhibition is experienced.
Acknowledgments
With gratitude to the artists whose presence shaped the activation of Gravity of the Wall at Museo delle Mura.
Grace Xu — flute (USA)
Dario Paini — saxophone (Italy / Switzerland)
Fadly Sabran — augmented reality intervention (Malaysia)
Dalida María Benfield & Christopher Bratton — video work (2026)
Across continents and without institutional production support, their generosity, trust, and willingness to gather made this activation of the Stateless Mind Pavilion possible.
Grace Xu-flute
Dalida Maria Benfield and Chris Bratton's Five excerpts. (video), 2026
Fadly Sabran's Echoes of the wall, AR, 2026
Dario Paini and Amir Zainorin
Stateless Mind Pavilion, Langkawi, Malaysia, 2025
Stateless Mind Pavilion — Reflection Mode
Lintas Benua Residency, Langkawi, Malaysia, 2025
Following its inaugural activation, the Stateless Mind Pavilion entered a period of reflection during the Lintas Benua Residency in Langkawi.
Sometimes the most necessary gesture is not to produce, but to pause—not as absence, but as a form of attention.
In Langkawi, the Pavilion slowed down. There was no urgency to define its direction or expand its structure. Instead, it remained open: listening, observing, and allowing the conditions around it to unfold.
Within this state of stillness, the Pavilion did not disappear. It shifted. What had previously emerged through activation and gathering became a quieter mode of awareness.
Reflection Mode marked a moment in which the Pavilion moved from presence toward attentiveness—from structure toward condition. Nothing was fixed, nothing was resolved, yet the process continued, preparing the ground for future activations in new contexts.
Stateless Mind Pavilion — Inaugural Activation
Kapallorek Art Space, Malaysia, 2024
The first activation of the Stateless Mind Pavilion took place during Amir Zainorin’s solo exhibition at Kapallorek Art Space in 2024. Within this context, the Pavilion began to take form as an evolving curatorial framework.
An archive of activities from the Stateless Mind Festival was introduced into the space—not as static documentation, but as a living presence. Fragments of past gatherings re-emerged through installation, conversation, and shared time, allowing earlier encounters to resonate within the exhibition environment.
Rather than functioning as a conventional exhibition structure, the Pavilion appeared as both a lens and a condition within the space: a site for reflection, performance, dialogue, and exchange.
This first activation established the Stateless Mind Pavilion as an open and adaptable platform—one that continues to unfold through future collaborations and new contexts.
Following this initial activation, the Pavilion entered a period of reflection and development through Stateless Mind Pavilion — Reflection Mode, presented during the Lintas Benua Residency, Langkawi, Malaysia (2025).
Subsequent activations expanded the Pavilion’s international context, including Gravity of the Wall, presented at Museo delle Mura, Rome (2026), and the 16th Gwangju Stateless Mind Pavilion at the Gwangju Biennale (2026).
