Warmest congratulations to Trinidadian artist Christopher Cozier, whose work is now on view at the 36th Bienal de São Paulo. Open (with free admission) from September 6, 2025, to January 11, 2026, the Bienal features “125 individual and collective artistic positions, and six chapters that propose critical reflections on humanity.” The organizing theme is “Nem todo viandante anda estradas— Da humanidade como pratica” [Not all travelers walk roads— Of humanity as practice].
Billy Fowo writes, “For the 36th Bienal de São Paulo, the artist presents a newly produced work titled After the Appeal Will Come the Next Delivery (2025). Inspired by childhood memories of listening to cricket commentary, the piece consists of several pennant flags, each carrying a sign or pattern. Recognizable amongst the myriad of drawings is the ‘appeal gesture’ – commonly known as ‘howzat’ – performed by a fielder (or fielders) toward the umpire during a cricket game.”
Description (by Billy Fowo): Christopher Cozier is a Trinidadian artist, writer, and curator whose practice critically examines the lingering effects of colonialism and globalization on the Caribbean region. Working across several artistic mediums, like drawing, installation, video, and performance, Cozier’s oeuvre offers dialogic spaces for nuanced, poetic, and sometimes ironic explorations of the world and everyday life from a Caribbean perspective.
Deeply rooted in drawing, which remains a central element in his practice, his pieces often resemble storyboards or visual essays, which, when looked at closely, display layered compositions that suggest movement through time and space and reference both history and the present. Functioning both as mirror and map – reflecting the complexities of Caribbean existence while charting new pathways for thought and action – Cozier’s works invite viewers to confront uncomfortable histories, question inherited narratives, and imagine alternative futures grounded in self-definition and cultural critique.
For the 36th Bienal de São Paulo, the artist presents a newly produced work titled After the Appeal Will Come the Next Delivery (2025). Inspired by childhood memories of listening to cricket commentary, the piece consists of several pennant flags, each carrying a sign or pattern. Recognizable amongst the myriad of drawings is the “appeal gesture” – commonly known as “howzat” – performed by a fielder (or fielders) toward the umpire during a cricket game.
Referring to a crucial decision-making process, an appeal usually symbolizes the decisive moment before a batsman is given out or not, and the game can be resumed. Particularly engaging, the piece, beyond its aesthetics, serves as a metaphor whereby parallels can be drawn between aspects of the game and the mechanisms that define and regulate societal interactions, such as unfairness, power dynamics, among others. Additionally, symbols such as human figures and text fragments – characteristic of Cozier’s unique artistic and visual language, developed over time – recur, inscribed primarily on red, green, and black pennant flags – colors that recall liberation struggle movements across the African continent and the Middle East.
Christopher Cozier (Port of Spain, 1959. Lives in Trinidad) is an artist and the co-director of Alice Yard, which participated in documenta 15. He was awarded a Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant (2004) and is a Prince Claus Award laureate (2013). Through his notebook drawings and installations derived from recorded staged actions, Cozier investigates how Caribbean historical and current experiences can inform understandings of the wider contemporary world. Exhibitions include the 5th & 7th Havana Biennials, Infinite Island, The Brooklyn Museum (2007), Afro Modern: Journeys through the Black Atlantic, Tate Liverpool (2010), Entanglements, The Broad Museum, Michigan (2015), Relational Undercurrents, MOLAA, L.A. (2017) and The Sea is History, Historiskmuseum, Oslo (2019). Cozier participated in the public program of 10th Berlin Biennial (2018), exhibited in the 14th Sharjah Biennial (2019), the 11th Liverpool Biennial in (2021), Experiences of Oil, the Stavanger Museum, Más Allá, el Mar Canta, The Times Art Centre, Berlin (2021), Fragments of Epic Memory, AGO, Toronto (2021), Forecast Forms at the MCA, Chicago (2022) and Unraveling The ( under- ) Development Complex, Savvy, Berlin (2023). The artist participated in Prospect 6 (2024) and the Project Black Planet: The Art and Culture of Panafrica at the Art Institute of Chicago (2024). His works were recently acquired for the collections of the MCA in Chicago and MoMA, in New York.
For more information, see https://36.bienal.org.br/en/artista/christopher-cozier-en/, https://bienal.org.br/ and https://36.bienal.org.br/en/
[Photo above by Levi Fanan / Fundação Bienal de São Paulo: Installation view of After the Appeal Will Come the Next Delivery, by Christopher Cozier, during the 36th Bienal de São Paulo. Fundação Bienal de São Paulo.]
Warmest congratulations to Trinidadian artist Christopher Cozier, whose work is now on view at the 36th Bienal de São Paulo. Open (with free admission) from September 6, 2025, to January 11, 2026, the Bienal features “125 individual and collective artistic positions, and six chapters that propose critical reflections on humanity.” The organizing theme is “Nem
