Belinda Kazeem-Kamiński: Respire (Liverpool)
A collaboration with the 12th Liverpool Biennial, UK
Phileas, Opernring 17, Vienna
31 January – 20 April 2024
Belinda Kazeem-Kamiński, installation view of Respire (Liverpool) at Phileas, 2024. Photo: kunstdokumentation.com/ Manuel Carreon Lopez
Belinda Kazeem-Kamiński, installation view of Respire (Liverpool) at the 12th Liverpool Biennial, 2023. Photo: Mark McNulty
Our first exhibition in 2024 presented a new video and sound installation by Belinda Kazeem-Kamiński titled Respire (Liverpool), commissioned by the 12th Liverpool Biennial in 2023 and co-produced by Phileas and the Austrian Federal Ministry of Arts, Culture, the Civil Service and Sport.
During a research trip to Vienna in May 2022 at the invitation of Phileas, curator Khanyisile Mbongwa met Kazeem-Kamiński and invited her to participate in the Biennial. Over the course of the next year, the artist produced Respire (Liverpool), which refers to the precariousness of Black breath as an act not just of existence and escape, but also of liberation and community building. For the video, the artist filmed residents of Liverpool of different ages and genders breathing into a red balloon. The sound moves in waves from the individual to the collective and back again, creating a meditative space in which to process the legacy of traumatic pasts.
The work was accompanied by the sound installation Keep On Keepin’ On (for Nile), developed in collaboration with artist Bassano Bonelli Bassano, and a second video work titled Openings (Red, Black and Green) whose colours commemorate liberation struggles on the African continent and in the African diaspora in general.
For her exhibition at Phileas, Kazeem-Kamiński also produced a new neon sculpture titled a breathing. The work was conceived and developed specially for the exhibition and is based on a quote by Christina Sharpe from her book ‘Ordinary Notes,’ which was a great influence in the conception of Respire (Liverpool).
Opening hours at Opernring 17, Vienna
Tuesday - Friday 11:00am - 5:00pm
Saturday 11 - 15
& by appointment
