un Projects is based on the unceded sovereign land and waters of the Wurundjeri and Boon Wurrung people of the Kulin Nation; we pay our respects to their Elders past and present.
un Projects
Sumugan Sivanesan

Sumugan Sivanesan

PROTOTYPING

Sumugan Sivanesan

Flight Simulator (Schematic)

Sumugan Sivanesan is an anti-disciplinary artist and writer. Often working collaboratively, his interests span minority politics, artist infrastructures and more-than human rights. Sumugan organises with Black Earth, a collective who address interacting issues of race, gender, colonialism and climate justice in Berlin.

Sumugan Sivanesan

A problem of the middle class (a belated letter from São Paulo)

Between Schadenfreude and Saudade On 29 September 2000, the late Aníbal López, also known by his Guatemalan ID number A-1 53167, undertook a ‘mugging action’ for which he robbed a person of middle-class appearance at gunpoint. He used the stolen 874.35 quetzales (equivalent at the time to US$115) to fund an exhibition at Contexto, a […]

Sumugan Sivanesan

Marking Histories’ Discontents: Frontier Imaginaries Edition No. 5, Trade Markings

Artists: Richard Bell (with As Long As It Takes), Marcel van den Berg, Blade, Alice Creischer, Bonita Ely, Ho Rui An, Gordon Hookey, Patricia Kaersenhout, Karrabing Film Collective, Tshibumba Kanda Matulu, Tom Nicholson, Wendelien van Oldenborgh, Rachel O’Reilly (with PALACE, Valle Medina & Benjamin Reynolds), Elizabeth A. Povinelli, Ryan Presley, Rammellzee, Farida Sedoc, The Otolith […]

Sumugan Sivanesan

Mass action media: Ende Gelände, Break Free 2016

‘Actions live off the images’ So said one of the plenary speakers at the Lausitz Climate Camp, following the first day of action. On the previous night an action primer video, a short documentary following activists from camp to pit to police van during last year’s Ende Gelände, was screened in the camp’s central circus […]

Sumugan Sivanesan

The Work of Art in the Age of Neoliberal Acculturation: Reflections on a correspondence with Karmelo Bermejo

I came across Karmelo Bermejo’s work through an offhand photograph of a scuffed Nilfisk vacuum cleaner in an otherwise slick art magazine, captioned: Internal Component of the Vacuum Cleaner of an Art Centre Director Replaced by a Solid Gold Replica with the Funds of the Centre He Directs 2010. Intrigued, I sent Karmelo an email […]

Sumugan Sivanesan

Fernando 2.0

Lately I’ve been having these visions. Glimpses. An outline, a figure — an icon. A ‘black’ bearded man brandishing a pistol. No ill premonition, rather the assured revelation of Anthony Martin Fernando. There’s not a lot we know about Fernando. He was a sailor, an engineer … a toymaker? He was Aboriginal, and also a […]