Naeem Mohaiemen

Naeem Mohaiemen is a visual artist, filmmaker, academic, and writer who researches postcolonial markers in South Asia. His work utilizes film, photography, installation, and essays to examine historical events such as the 1971 Bangladesh Liberation War and the Indo-Pakistani War of 1947–1948. He currently serves as an Associate Professor of Visual Arts at Columbia University.

Early life and education

Mohaiemen attended New Tripoli School in Libya during his youth. He later studied at St. Joseph Higher Secondary School, which is a Jesuit institution located in Dhaka. After completing his secondary education, he moved to the United States to attend Oberlin College where he earned a BA. He eventually returned to advanced studies to obtain a PhD in anthropology from Columbia University in 2019.

Career

Mohaiemen creates films that investigate the histories of the revolutionary left. His film United Red Army, released in 2011, focuses on the 1977 hijacking of Japan Airlines Flight 472. This project premiered at the Sharjah Biennial and has since been shown at The New Museum. He also directed Last Man in Dhaka Central in 2015, which premiered at the 56th Venice Biennale under the curation of Okwui Enwezor.

His cinematic work includes the duo Tripoli Cancelled and Two Meetings and a Funeral. Both films were released in 2017 and received nominations for the Turner Prize. These works premiered at Documenta 14 in Athens and Kassel, while Tripoli Cancelled had its American premiere at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Two Meetings and a Funeral saw its British premiere at Tate Britain as part of the 2018 Turner Prize cycle.

As an artist, he has exhibited numerous solo projects across international galleries. His project "The Young Man Was" explores the 1970s revolutionary left and has appeared at the British Museum and the New Museum. Other individual works include "My Mobile Weighs A Ton," which examined military coups at Dhaka Gallery Chitrak, and "Kazi in Nomansland," which addressed Indian partition at Dubai Third Line. He also co-founded Visible Collective, a group of artists and lawyers that investigated security panic following the events of 9/11.

Mohaiemen is an active writer and critic within academic and cultural circles. He authored the book Prisoners of Shothik Itihash and edited anthologies such as Collectives in atomised time. He engaged in a public scholarly debate regarding Sarmila Bose's book, Dead Reckoning, which resulted in his response being cited by the BBC. His essays cover diverse topics ranging from the Islamic roots of hip-hop to the history of the 1971 genocide.

Awards and recognition

The artist received a Guggenheim Fellowship from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation in 2014. He was also nominated for the Turner Prize in 2018. His academic and theoretical contributions earned him shortlistings for the Villem Flusser Award in 2009 and the Herb Alpert Award in 2019.

His films are held in several prestigious permanent collections. These include the Tate Modern, the Museum of Modern Art, and the Sharjah Art Foundation. The Kiran Nadar Museum also maintains his work within its holdings.