![Left to right: Belinda Kazeem-Kamiński, Strike a Pose, 2017, 2021, 2026. Presentation at the 25th Biennale of Sydney was made possible with generous support from Phileas - The Austrian Office for Contemporary Art, and Federal Ministry Housing, Arts, Culture, Media, and Sport Republic of Austria. Courtesy of the artist. Schebestas Schatten [Schebesta’s Shadow], 2017/2021. Presentation at the 25th Biennale of Sydney was made possible with generous support from Phileas - The Austrian Office for Contemporary Art, and Federal Ministry Housing, Arts, Culture, Media, and Sport Republic of Austria. Courtesy of the artist. Unearthing. In Conversation, 2013. Courtesy of the artist © Belinda Kazeem-Kamiński . Installation view, 25th Biennale of Sydney, Rememory, 2026, Chau Chak Wing Museum. Photograph: David James.](https://www.biennaleofsydney.art/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/CCWM_Biennale-25-Install_-David-James-35-900x600.jpg)
Belinda Kazeem-Kamiński
Born & Lives in:
Austria
Location
- Chau Chak Wing Museum at the University of Sydney
Belinda Kazeem-Kamiński is a writer, artist, and scholar. Rooted in Black feminist theory, she has developed a research-based and process-oriented investigative practice that often deals with archives, specifically with the voids in public archives and collections. Interlacing the documentary with the fictional, her works manifest themselves through a variety of media and dissect the present of an everlasting colonial past: a past without closure.
Belinda Kazeem-Kamiński, Strike a Pose, 2017, 2021, 2026. Presentation at the 25th Biennale of Sydney was made possible with generous support from Phileas – The Austrian Office for Contemporary Art, and Federal Ministry Housing, Arts, Culture, Media, and Sport Republic of Austria. Courtesy of the artist © Belinda Kazeem-Kamiński. Installation view, 25th Biennale of Sydney, Rememory, 2026, Chau Chak Wing Museum. Photograph: David James.
Belinda Kazeem-Kamiński, Strike a Pose, 2017, 2021, 2026. Presentation at the 25th Biennale of Sydney was made possible with generous support from Phileas – The Austrian Office for Contemporary Art, and Federal Ministry Housing, Arts, Culture, Media, and Sport Republic of Austria. Courtesy of the artist © Belinda Kazeem-Kamiński. Installation view, 25th Biennale of Sydney, Rememory, 2026, Chau Chak Wing Museum. Photograph: David James.
Belinda Kazeem-Kamiński
Born 1980, Austria
Lives and works in Vienna, Austria
Unearthing. In Conversation 2017
single channel video, colour and sound, 16:9 aspect ratio, looped 13 mins
Courtesy of the artist
Schebestas Schatten
[Schebesta’s Shadow] 2017 / 2021
digital C-prints on paper Courtesy of the artist
Strike a Pose 2017 – 2021
digital C-prints on paper
Presentation at the 25th Biennale of Sydney was made possible with generous support from Phileas – The Austrian Office for Contemporary Art, and the Federal Ministry of Housing, Arts, Culture, Media, and Sport, Republic of Austria
Courtesy of the artist
The artist Belinda Kazeem-Kamiński stands on stage before an empty theatre unpacking boxes of photos taken by Austrian-Czech missionary and ethnographer Paul Schebesta (1887-1967) in what is now the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Addressing an unknowable ‘you’, Kazeem-Kamiński strategises ways to protect the photos’ subjects from a literal and metaphoric colonial gaze. Unable to cover the subjects without contributing to their continued erasure, Unearthing.
In Conversation confronts the difficulties of negotiating the colonial violence implicit in archival material.
In Unearthing. In Conversation, Belinda Kazeem-Kamiński’s research-based practice is turned into a provocation as she looks the viewer in the eye and asks, “How does one oppose by looking?” Complicating the very nature of artistic research, the work’s self-reflexivity positions self-empowerment not as the opportunity to shield, but to gaze back.