Shahana Rajani’s Lines that World a River (2026) is currently presented in the group exhibition The sky held it, the…
Shahana Rajani’s Lines that World a River (2026) is currently presented in the group exhibition The sky held it, the earth remembered at Ishara Art Foundation in Dubai.
Rajani, recipient of the inaugural Han Nefkens Foundation – South Asian Video Art Production Grant 2023, presents a three-channel video installation focusing on the Indus River as a site of extraction and contested memory. The work traces displaced delta communities using murals and paintings to reconstruct ancestral villages submerged by hydraulic dams and barrages. Lines that World a River (2026) is an expanded iteration of Four Acts of Recovery (2025).
The exhibition also features works by Rohini Devasher and Sarker Protick, examining how land, water and the cosmos serve as living archives of memory and challenging human-centred views of the Anthropocene.
The sky held it, the earth remembered is on view at Ishara Art Foundation, Dubai, from 11 September to 15 December 2026.
Four Acts of Recovery is the result of Rajani winning the Han Nefkens Foundation – South Asian Video Art Production Grant 2023 in collaboration with @prameyaartfoundation, and in partnership with @isharaartfoundation, @nottm_contemp, @mot_museum_art_tokyo, @mhkamuseum and @parasite.hk.
Installation view of The sky held it, the earth remembered at Ishara Art Foundation, Dubai, 2026. Photo: Ismail Noor / Seeing Things. Courtesy of the artist and Ishara Art Foundation.
