Asim Waqif: ‘touch is really important in experiencing any art work’
‘I’m really keen to try and bring together things that are apparently very disparate or polarised’
The words of artist Asim Waqif as he introduced us to वेणु [Venu], his striking bamboo installation which occupied our Hayward Gallery Terrace in 2023.
वेणु [Venu], the third Bagri Foundation commission to appear at the Southbank Centre, embodies Waqif’s approach, with a swirling, sprawling natural bamboo structure, wrapped around the industrial metal skeleton which holds it against the concrete of our brutalist Hayward Gallery.
Waqif joined us at the Southbank Centre to give this video introduction to his installation, in which he explains his concerns at the creative industry’s hierarchical nature, how his preference for improvisation led him from architecture into the arts, and his lessening fear at being typecast as a bamboo artist.
‘I want to improvise. I am much happier when I am surprised by what turns out at the end’
Asim Waqif
Yin Xiuzhen: Heart to Heart, Portable Cities and ‘second skin’
Go behind the works of Yin Xiuzhen’s Hayward Gallery exhibition in the company of Senior Curator Yung Ma and choreographer Julia Cheng.
How I create... with visual artist Yin Xiuzhen
The artist behind our current Hayward Gallery exhibition on ideas she can’t abandon, and the evolution of her creative process.
Chiharu Shiota: red string, black threads and cultural identity
Take a video tour of the Hayward Gallery exhibition Chiharu Shiota: Threads of Life with Senior Curator Yung Ma and our Associate Artist Julia Cheng.