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The discussion will also situate Giardina Papa’s newest work in the context of her trilogy of video installations exploring forgotten Mediterranean histories and her ongoing investigation into forms of knowledge and desire that have been lost or neglected. This includes her work U Scantu: A Disorderly Tale (2022), which premiered at the 59th Venice Biennale, The Milk of Dreams and screened at the ICA in 2023. There will be opportunity for questions from the audience.
About the speakers
Elisa Giardina Papa’s research-based art practice seeks forms of knowledge and desire that have been disqualified and rendered nonsensical by hegemonic demands for order and legibility. Through a critical yet poetic approach, she works across large-scale video installation, experimental film, and ceramic and glass sculptures, to draw attention to those aspects of our lives which remain radically unruly, untranslatable, and incomputable.
Her work has been exhibited and screened at the 59th Biennale di Venezia, MoMA, the Whitney Museum of American Art, Gropius Bau, ICA London, Vienna Secession, HKW Berlin, Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt, Seoul Mediacity Biennale, the 6th Buenos Aires Bienal de la Imagen en Movimiento, M+ Hong Kong, among others.
Giardina Papa is also a founding member of the artist collective Radha May. Together with Indian artist Nupur Mathur and Ugandan artist Bathsheba Okwenje, they develop performances and art installations that reveal hidden histories and peripheral sites, exploring their relation to gender, sexuality, and the legacies of colonialism.
Giardina Papa received an MFA from RISD, a PhD in Film, Media, and Gender Studies from the University of California, Berkeley. She lives and works in New York and Sant’Ignazio, Sicily.
Erika Balsom is a reader in Film and Media Studies at King’s College London and the author of five books, including After Uniqueness: A History of Film and Video Art in Circulation (2017) and The Edges of Cinema: Essays on 21st Century Film Culture (2026), a collection of ten years of criticism that will be published later this year by Columbia University Press. Her writing has appeared in publications including Camera Obscura, e-flux, Film Comment, New Left Review. Her curatorial practice extends across the cinema and the gallery and includes the survey exhibition “No Master Territories: Feminist Worldmaking and the Moving Image”, which began at Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin, in 2022 and has since toured internationally.
This event is part of the public programme of Elisa Giardina Papa: She Flickered In and Out of History.
Image: Elisa Giardina Papa, She Flickered In and Out of History, 2026. Video installation, 18 minutes, variable dimensions. Still from the video. Courtesy of the artist. The project is supported by the Italian Council program (2024) promoted by the Directorate-General for Contemporary Creativity of the Italian Ministry of Culture.
Image: Elisa Giardina Papa, She Flickered In and Out of History, 2026. Video installation, 18 minutes, variable dimensions. Still from the video. Courtesy of the artist. The project is supported by the Italian Council program (2024) promoted by the Directorate-General for Contemporary Creativity of the Italian Ministry of Culture.
Book tickets
Sat, 18 Jul 2026
Cinema 1
02:00 pm
Ticket information
- All tickets that do not require ID (full price, disabled, income support) can be printed at home or stored in email
- For aged-based concession tickets (under 25, student) please bring relevant ID to collect at the front desk before the event.
Access information
Cinema 1
- Both our Cinemas have step free access from The Mall and are accessible by ramp
- We have 1 wheelchair allocated space with a seat for a companion
- All seats are hard back, have a crushed velvet feel and they do not recline
- These are our seat size dimensions: W 42 x D 45 x H 52
- Arm rest either side of the seat dimensions: L 27 x W 7 x H 20
for the following requirements:
- We have unassigned seating. If you require a specific seat, please reserve this in advance
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Elisa Giardina Papa. Photo: Riccardo Banfi
Erika Balsom
