The Otolith Group

Who are in The Otolith Group?

The Otolith Group was established by filmmakers and theorists Kodwo Eshun and Anjalika Sagar in 2002. Based in London, The Otolith Group creates films, installations, performances and exhibitions whose content is informed by extensive research, decolonial thinking and transcultural friendship.

The group's name derives from a minute calcareous body present in the ears of vertebrate animals, which allows them to orient themselves in space, gauge acceleration and position, and maintain balance. Their choice of name allegorically alludes to their intent of operating in multiple areas simultaneously.

What characterizes The Otolith Group?

Ever since its founding, The Otolith Group has been engaged in the methodical research of events, archives, movements, vocalities and space-time as they are engraved in sound recordings and in the media of moving and static images. The group's interest in the history of science fiction and the legacies of Asia, Africa and South America finds its outlet in the curation and repurposing of archival images and footage, sound recordings, documentary accounts and fictionalized narratives.

For The Otolith Group, creativity is contained within a framework of collective productivity signalled by a crisis of authorship centered around a single artist. The group's devotion to an aesthetics of discrepant abstraction when considering past, present and future cultural phenomena stands in stark contrast to the protocolary approach espoused by cultural and educational institutions that seek to quantify and categorize them. In an age of expanding cultural cold wars, the group's artistic practice suspends these norms in its drive to distil and disseminate its often ambiguous message.

Where has The Otolith Group shown their work?

Throughout their long and storied career, The Otolith Group has been involved with a variety of galleries, exhibition spaces, museums and cultural manifestations. Their moving image works, performances, video installations and documentary research have been exhibited and presented at Museu d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA); Argos Centre for Art and Media, Brussels; Metropolitan Museum, New York; Showroom and Gasworks, London; MAXXI, Rome; Project 88, Mumbai; Neubauer Collegium for Culture and Society, Chicago; The Art Institute of Chicago. They have also participated in group exhibitions such as New British Art, Tate Triennial; Ecotopia, ICP Triennial; Translocalmotion, Shanghai Biennial; Manifesta 8, Murcia, Spain.

What recognitions have The Otolith Group received?

In 2010, The Otolith Group was shortlisted for the Turner Prize, a monetary prize awarded to British visual artists by Tate since 1984.

What projects and activities are The Otolith Group involved in?

Kodwo Eshun teaches in the MA program in Contemporary Art Theory at the Department of Visual Cultures at Goldsmiths College, University of London. He also holds a teaching position in the CCC Research Master Program in the Visual Arts Department at Geneva University of Art and Design.

Anjalika Sagar is a board member at a-n, an artist advocacy group based in London. She also works as a curator, essayist, moderator, film director and photographer.

Where can I find more information about The Otolith Group?

Visit their site for more information about their work and to view some of their films. They are also active on IG.