Naeem Mohaiemen


Naeem Mohaiemen uses film, photography, installation, and essays to research South Asia's postcolonial markers. His projects on the 1970s revolutionary left explored the role of misrecognition within global solidarity.

Education

Mohaiemen attended New Tripoli School in Libya and the Jesuit school St. Joseph in Dhaka. He received a BA from Oberlin College and received a PhD in anthropology in 2019 from Columbia University and is an Associate Professor of Visual Arts there.

Films

Mohaiemen's films include the Turner Prize nominated duo of films Tripoli Cancelled and Two Meetings and a Funeral, both of which premiered at Documenta 14 in Athens and Kassel. Tripoli Cancelled had an American premiere at Museum of Modern Art, New York., and Two Meetings and a Funeral had a British premiere at Tate Britain as part of the 2018 Turner Prize. American premiere at Art Institute of Chicago.
His films explore histories of the revolutionary left as "accidental trojan horse", including Last Man in Dhaka Central which premiered at the 56th Venice Biennale as part of "All The World's Futures" curated by Okwui Enwezor., Afsan's Long Day which premiered at the Museum of Modern Art in New York as part of "Doc Fortnight". and had a festival premiere at Oberhausen and a British premiere at the British Film Institute London Film Festival., The first film in this series is United Red Army about the Japan Airlines Flight 472 (1977) Hijacking in which premiered at Sharjah Biennial, Hot Docs, and International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam, has shown at The New Museum.
His films are in the permanent collection of the Tate Modern., the Museum of Modern Art, Sharjah Art Foundation, and Kiran Nadar Museum.

Exhibitions

Chapters from Mohaiemen's project on the 1970s revolutionary left have exhibited at the Mahmoud Darwish Museum,, Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy, Bengal Foundation Shilpalay, Chobi Mela, Documenta 14, Kiran Nadar Museum, Museum of Modern Art New York, British Museum, Tate Britain, New Museum, Frieze Art Fair, MUAC Mexico City, the 56th Venice Biennial, and the Lahore, Sharjah, Marrakech, and Eva Biennials.
Mohaiemen co-founded Visible Collective, a collective of New York-based artists and lawyers investigating post-9/11 security panic. Visible's work exhibited internationally, including the 2006 Whitney Biennial of American Art and L'institut des cultures d'Islam in Paris.
His solo projects have looked at military coups, surveillance, Indian partition, architectural nationalism, and dueling leftist and Islamist politics.

Writing

Mohaiemen is author of Prisoners of Shothik Itihash. He edited the anthologies Between Ashes and Hope: Chittagong Hill Tracts in the blind spot of Bangladesh nationalism, Collectives in atomised time,
He was the primary critic of Dead Reckoning, a book by Sarmila Bose on the 1971 war of Bangladesh. His response was cited by the BBC and published in Economic & Political Weekly. Bose responded to his remarks in the same periodical, followed by a rebuttal from Mohaiemen.
Essays on Bangladesh history include"Muktijuddho: Polyphony of the Ocean", "Accelerated Media and the 1971 Genocide", "Musee Guimet as Proxy Fight", "Mujtaba Ali: Amphibian Man", "Mujib Coat", and "Everybody wants to be Singapore". He wrote the chapter on religious and ethnic minorities in the Ain o Salish Kendro Annual Report for Bangladesh.
Essays on diaspora include "Known unknowns of the class war","The skin I'm in: Afro-Bengali solidarity and possible futures", "Beirut, Silver Porsche Illusion", "Why Mahmud Can’t Be a Pilot", and "No Exit".
Essays on culture include "Islamic Roots of HipHop", "Adman blues become artist liberation" and "At the coed dance ".

Awards