Sadia Shirazi is a scholar, writer, curator, and a Canada Research Chair in the History of South Asian Art, Architecture, and Visual Culture. Their multi-disciplinary research focuses on transregional histories of modern and contemporary art and architecture across South Asia, the Indian Ocean, and its diasporas. 

Shirazi was previously Curator, International Art at Tate Modern. She has also held positions as a Visiting Scholar and an American Council of Learned Societies, Postdoctoral Fellow in Transnational Asian Studies at Johns Hopkins University. From 2018 to 2021, they were Instructor of Curatorial Studies at the Whitney Museum of American Art’s Independent Study Program and has taught at Cooper Union, The New School, and National College of the Arts. They have practiced architecture in America, Bahrain, and Egypt. Shirazi received their PhD in Art History and Visual Studies from Cornell University and a MArch from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.   

Shirazi has contributed essays to numerous catalogues, edited volumes, and peer-reviewed journals, including Panorama, The Journal of Curatorial Studies, and Movement Research Performance Journal. Their art criticism has appeared in e-flux, Frieze, Bidoun, C Magazine, Artforum, and The Funambulist. In 2021, Shirazi was a recipient of the Andy Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant. Their current book project is a history of decolonial, feminist art that traces the journey of four artists across the Indian subcontinent, Indian Ocean, Japan, Europe, and the United States during the second half of the twentieth century.    

Shirazi has exhibited work at Arika, the 16th Venice Architecture Biennial and the Devi Art Foundation. They are currently working on an audio documentary and counter-archive of The 02020 Project for Performance Space New York. As an independent curator, she has organized exhibitions and programs at venues including The Kitchen, Queens Museum, EFA Project Space, and Khoj International Artists’ Association. Shirazi has also served on juries and nominating committees, most recently as juror for the 7th edition of the Jameel Prize: Moving Images.

Image credit: Farah Al Qasimi 

Transregional histories of modern and contemporary art and architecture across South Asia, the Indian Ocean, and its diasporas.