Shaunak Mahbubani

Shaunak Mahbubani (they/she) is a curator-writer based between Berlin and Mumbai. They explore possibilities of co-visioning futures grounded in the pursuit of non-duality, striving to hold complexity, contradiction, multiplicity, ambiguity, and mutability in investigating the boundary between the self and other. Their work focuses on practices that foreground personal and ancestral lived experiences, towards the resuscitation of wounded archives.

From 2017-23, they curated the multicity project ‘Allies for the Uncertain Futures’ featuring over 100 artistic contributions across 7 international locations. Other notable projects include Wrapped in the Shadow of Freedom (Sekhmet Institute, Prishtina, 2024), Disrupting Protected Ignorance (Curated by Sajan Mani, with Shaunak Mahbubani, HKW Berlin, 2024), Dis-Visible Narratives (SAVVY Contemporary, 2024), The Albanian Conference (initiated by Anna Ehrentein) at the 4th Lagos Biennial (2024), When the Moon was Nine Months Full by Seema Kohli (Tao Mumbai, 2024), Parag Tandel: Archipelagic Archivist (TARQ Mumbai, 2023), Skin to Skin by Bhasha Chakrabarti (Experimenter Kolkata, 2023), AUTOPOIESIS (2022—2023, Berlin, Mexico City, Guatemala City, New Delhi), Party Office at documenta fifteen (co-curated with Vidisha-Fadescha, Kassel 2022), DANCE TRANS* REVOLUTION (Curated by After Party Collective, New York 2021), Entre Sures (Co-curated with Eli Moon, Mexico City, 2021), and Saavdhaan: The Regimes of Truth (New Delhi, 2018). They have been awarded residencies, grants, and engagements from Goethe Institut, ISCP New York, La Napoule Foundation, The Gujral Foundation, Inlaks Foundation, and IFA India. Their art writing has appeared in NO NIIN, Hyperallergic, Artforum, Critical Collective, Mezosfera, ifa Biennale stories, and other platforms.