is a photographer, writer, curator, and activist. He founded the Drik Picture Library, Pathshala South Asian Media Institute, and Chobi Mela photo festival in Dhaka as well as the Majority World photo agency in London. His work has been shown in The Rubin Museum of Art, Museum of Modern Art, New York; Centre Pompidou, Paris; Royal Albert Hall, Tate Modern, London; and Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art. A guest curator of Whitechapel Gallery, London; Fotomuseum Winterthur, Switzerland; National Art Gallery, Kuala Lumpur; Musée du Quai Branly, Paris; Brussels Biennial and the Auckland Festival of Photography, Alam has received numerous awards, including the Shilpakala Padak, the highest state honour given to Bangladeshi artists; the 2018 Lucie Foundation Humanitarian Award; and the 2019 ICP Special Presentation Award. He was nominated one of Time Magazine’s Persons of the Year in 2018.

is a politically radical theater company founded in 1963 by Peter Schumann on New York City’s Lower East Side, currently based in Glover, Vermont. Besides rod-puppet and hand puppet shows for children, the concerns of the first productions were rents, rats, police, and other neighborhood problems, also participating in protests and demonstrations against the Vietnam War with giant puppets. More complex theater pieces followed, in which sculpture, music, dance and language were equal partners. The puppets grew bigger and bigger, and in 1974 Bread and Puppet moved to a farm in Glover. The 140-year old hay barn was transformed into a museum for veteran puppets. Today, Bread and Puppet continues to be one of the oldest, nonprofit, self-supporting theatrical companies in the country.

is an independent curatorial platform exploring the social role and political agency of art practice, initiated by Sanne Oorthuizen and Alec Steadman. Current projects include Struggles for Sovereignty: Land, Water, Farming, Food, a one-year program on social and ecological justice, co-curated with Bakudapan Food Study Group; A Pond is the Reverse of an Island, a project acting together and thinking together with refugee communities and informal kampungs in Jakarta; and Publishing Solidarity, a children’s colouring book, developed with Anang Saptoto and Mumtaz Khan Chopan to share the story of refugees in Kalideres and raise funds to support them during COVID-19. Previously, Sanne and Alec were Co-Chief Curator’s at Cemeti – Institute for Art and Society.

is an artist whose painting and photography practice is strongly informed by his personal experiences. In 2013, Mumtaz was forced to flee his home country of Afghanistan due to war and discrimination. He has been living in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, ever since. He co-initiated the Publishing Solidarity platform (together with Anang Saptoto, Alec Steadman, and Sanne Oorthuizen), developing a children’s colouring book to share the situation of refugees in Indonesia and to raise funds to support one particular refugee community in Jakarta during the Covid-19 pandemic. In collaboration with Bodies of Power / Power for Bodies, Mumtaz is currently developing a podcast series about refugees in Indonesia, including personal stories and research into the legal and structural frameworks that dictate their lives.

is an assault team that establishes moral beauty, political poetry and human greatness while aiming to preserve humanitarianism. The group’s basic understanding is that the legacy of the Holocaust is rendered void by political apathy, the rejection of refugees, and cowardice. The Center for Political Beauty engages in the most innovative forms of political performance art- an expanded approach to theatre: art must hurt provoke and rise in revolt. In one basic alliance of terms: aggressive humanism. The Center’s exhibitions and plays were shown at Gorki Theatre, the 7th Berlin Biennale, ZKM Karlsruhe, Steirischer Herbst, NGBK, and HMKV, amongst others.

Originally trained in film, artist Kin Chui inflects collaborative projects and performative interventions in his ill-disciplinary artistic practice, with a sustained interest in emancipatory struggles and notions of spirit. He is currently on a voyage researching on piracy, both digital and seafaring, drifting within the histories and contemporaneities of Southeast Asia as a framework for decolonial praxis. He is an artist-in-residence at NTU Centre for Contemporary Art Singapore, and recently finished a fellowship under Eyebeam’s Rapid Response for a Better Digital Future (New York) with soft/WALL/studs. Kin has participated in group exhibitions at Cemeti Institute for Art and Society (Indonesia) and the National Gallery Singapore, alongside solo exhibitions at Grey Projects and The Substation (both Singapore). 

is a journalist and activist whose work often revolves around the themes of social justice, human rights, politics and democracy. She curates We, The Citizens, a newsletter covering Singaporean politics, civil society, and social justice, and was formerly Editor-in-Chief of New Naratif. As an activist, Kirsten has advocated for an end to the death penalty in Singapore, and is a founding member of abolitionist group We Believe in Second Chances.

is a PhD student in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania. She has been working with Rohingya refugees in Malaysia for a few years now where her research revolves around the notions of legibility, political subjectivity, migration, and borders. She was formerly the Research Coordinator of Advocates for Refugees–Singapore where she coordinated research efforts to advocate for the softening of Singapore’s stance toward refugees and asylum-seekers. Wani also volunteers her time with Geutanyoe-Foundation to support educational, research and livelihood programmes for refugees in Malaysia. Currently, she’s working on a project in collaboration with a Rohingya youth in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, together with Geutanyoe Foundation to center the voices of Rohingya refugees in their narratives.

is a filmmaker and visual artist with a background in graphic design. In July 2017 he received a Master Degree in Visual Culture & Identity from The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts School of Design. In his work he investigates the relationship between humankind and their images. His first film, The Migrating Image, has been presented at major film events in Europe and won The Audience Award at 25FPS in Zagreb and an Edward Snowden award at Signed Du Nuit.

is an activist, humanitarian, women’s rights advocate and a young mother. In 2016, she founded the Reyna Movement, an organisation that aims to empower women through up-skilling programs and community engagement. The Reyna Movement also seeks to raise awareness on issues and struggles faced by women, and get the public involved in helping them cope with their struggles. In 2020, Raeesah was elected as a Member of Parliament for Sengkang Group Representation Constituency

is an artist whose creative practice traverses educational, social, and political realms. She is interested in how the arts can bridge between experiences, disciplines, and across social structures. In 2014, she created the Naked Wagon, a mobile platform that creates context for art and exchange on the streets, whose journey contributed to symposia, lectures, and collaborations with artists and organisations in Lebanon, London, and Scotland. Dima began working with Catalytic Action shortly after, as the art and education programmes director, developing methods in group participation that explore relationships between art and built environments. Today, she is working at a forest school in Lebanon and actively exploring collective art making, theatre, and street performances. She holds a BA in Fine Arts from Central Saint Martins, London, and an MA in Arts in Education from Harvard Graduate School of Education.

is a filmmaker based in Beirut, where he studied film and theater at the Lebanese University. Since 2007, he has worked as a director, film editor, and director of photography in several feature films, short films, documentaries, and experimental films. Combining his experience in filmmaking with his interest in electronic and experimental music, his work often draws from archival images, found images, glitch art, generative art, audio-reactivity, and abstraction, between the analogue and the digital. Fundamental to his practice is the belief in art as a means of political intervention and social change. His experimental documentary Now: End of Season premiered in 2016 at the Berlin Film Festival forum expanded and was awarded the Think Film Award.

is an artist based in Diyarbakır. He graduated from the Painting Department at Çukurova University in 2000. Erkan works on video-based installations that deal with the complex questions of war, trauma, migration, and human rights. He was awarded the “Polarized! Vision is War/Peace” (2016) prize for his film Wonderland. In 2018 he had a solo exhibition at the Fundació Antoni Tàpies, Barcelona. Since then, his work has been presented in several museums, art institutions, and biennales world wide, such as Tate Modern, London; Louisiana Museum of Modern Art; Pinakothek der Moderne Munich; Seoul Museum of Art; Cleveland Triennial for Contemporary Art; Manifesta Palermo; among others. Erkan also works as an activist and supports various ecological initiatives. He is one of the founders of Loading Independent Art Space established in Diyarbakır in 2017. He was a member of the advisory board for the Istanbul Biennial Production and Research Programme 2018-19.

is a writer, poet, and the Resident Playwright of theatre company W!LD RICE. His published works include three collections of poetry, One Fierce Hour, A History of Amnesia and The Invisible Manuscript; a collection of short stories, Corridor; a collection of flash fiction, Malay Sketches; three collections of plays and the published play Cooling-Off Day.

is a visual artist whose work deals with the relation between art, propaganda, and democracy. He is the founder of the artistic and political organization New World Summit (2012–ongoing) and the campaign New Unions (2016–ongoing). With BAK, basis voor actuele kunst, Utrecht, he co-founded the New World Academy (2013–16), with Florian Malzacher he is directing the utopian camp Training for the Future (2018–ongoing) and with Laure Prouvost he is co-administrator of the Obscure Union (2017–ongoing). Exhibition-projects include Museum as Parliament (with the Democratic Federation of North Syria, Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven, 2018–ongoing), The Scottish-European Parliament (CCA, Glasgow, 2018), and After Europe (State of Concept, Athens, 2016). Staal completed his PhD on propaganda art at Leiden University, the Netherlands. His most recent book is Propaganda Art in the 21st Century (The MIT Press, 2019).