Niya B

Contact

Email: niya.b@kingston.ac.uk
Location: Kingston School of Art, Knights Park
Faculty: Kingston School of Art
School: School of Arts
Department: Department of Performing Arts
Personal website

Research project: Towards A Transecological Live Art Practice

Abstract

My practice-as-research project will investigate the capacity of live art practices to contribute to the nascent field of trans ecology, which explores the alliances, influences and intersections of ecology and trans-gendered embodiments across human and non-human subjectivities and sites.

The project will draw its knowledge through an emplaced auto-ethnographic methodology that transgender studies scholars have used in order to connect embodied subjectivities and material environments (Stryker 2008) and produce "situated knowledges" (Haraway 1988). My methodology will follow a series of "emplacements": performative actions with and within a number of diverse ‘places' where the performing body is a component of an evolving ecology of interconnected entities (Pink 2011).

I will explore each one of these emplacements across their specific ecosystems and investigate their capacity in generating and supporting a transecological praxis.

Research degree: Practice-based PhD
Title of project: Towards A Transecological Live Art Practice
Research supervisor: Professor Maria Chatzichristodoulou
Other research supervisor: Dr Caoimhe Mader McGuinness

Biography

I am a multi-disciplinary artist, working at the intersections of visual art and performance on ecology, (trans)gender embodiments, class, mythology and the knowledge held in the land and the performing body.

I have exhibited and performed, among others, at Tate Britain (London), CCA (Glasgow), Site Gallery (Sheffield), BOM (Birmingham), International Print Biennale (Newcastle), Visioni Del Sud (Salento, Italy), 5th and 8th Thessaloniki Biennale (Greece), 2023 European Capital of Culture (Greece), 5th Moscow Biennale (Russia), Goldsmiths University of London, University of Leeds. I have been supported by Arts Council England, the British Council, Jerwood Arts and the Cultural Institute Leeds among others. In 2023, I became an artist-in-residence at BOM Immersive Lab.

I hold an MA in Landscape Architecture (University of Sheffield) and I am currently a candidate for a practice-as-research PhD at Kingston University, School of Art, where I am investigating the intersections of ecology and gendered embodiments.

Areas of research interest

Trans Ecology
Transgender Studies
Queer Ecology
Transfeminism
Ecofeminism
Live Art

Qualifications

MA in Landscape Architecture, University of Sheffield

Funding or awards received

2020: a-n Bursary, Audiovisual production for immersive performances.
2020: Jerwood Bursary, Innovative ways of recording and performing live art.
2021: 'Intimate Threads', Gender plurality in the UK and the Philippines, British Council SE Asia.
2021: 'Ekdysis', moving image project, Arts Council England Project Grant.
2022: '912', Virtual Reality video project, Arts Council England Project Grant.
2022: Full-time MPhil/PhD studentship in the Kingston School of Art, Kingston University.
2023: Hackney Pride365

Publications

selected exhibitions/performances/screenings

-2023-

8th Thessaloniki Biennale, Greece

ΕΛΕVΣΙΣ, European Capital of CultureGreece

BUZZCUT, Glasgow

-2022-

912 VR (solo), BOM, ONCA, Site Gallery

Frame-Frequency, Rockville, USA

-2021-

Visioni del Sud, Salento, Italy

Camden Together, London

Ekdysis (solo), Ugly Duck, PerformanceSpace & Fringe! Film Fest

Unfix Festival

Intimate Threads, Fringe Manila-Fringe! Film Fest

Iklectic, London

-2020-

Tate Britain, London

Queer Art(ists) Now, London

Ekdysis (solo), Enclave Gallery, London

Trans Pregnancy conference, Leeds

-2019-

Re@ct: Social Change Art-Technology Symposium, Dundee

Translucent, VO Curations, London

Ecofutures Festival, London

Unfix Festival, CCA Glasgow

-2018-

Translucent, Leyden Gallery, London

Emergency, Manchester

-2017-

Twist, Queer Film Festival, Seattle, USA

SPE-Media Festival, Orlando, USA

Queer Art(ists) Now, Archive Gallery, London

Slippages, Goldsmiths University

-2016-

Fringe!Queer Film Festival, London

Trans:plant (solo), Archive Gallery, London

-2015-

5th Thessaloniki Biennale, Greece

artvideoKOELN, Cologne, Germany

-2013-

5th Moscow Biennale, Moscow, Russia

-2011-

International Print Biennale, Newcastle