Origins
The Pavilion began long before it had a name.
In 2008, with Pia Poulsen, I co-founded Jambatan: a bridge for migrant and diaspora artists in Copenhagen. A fragile crossing, made of conversations and necessity.
From 2018 to 2023, it took the form of festivals. Gatherings became shelters: performances, screenings, voices stitched across Copenhagen and Venice. During these years, I also began a research into Southeast Asian diaspora artists living in the Nordic countries—mapping lives and practices scattered between climates and languages. The Pavilion was already growing, even if it didn’t yet know its own name.
Venice gave the Pavilion its name by refusing it. Only nations, we were told, could claim a “pavilion.” So Stateless Mind claimed it anyway—for those who carry more than one place, or none at all. What was exclusion became declaration.
In 2024, at Kapallorek Artspace in Malaysia, the Pavilion was formally activated. No longer just festival or protest, it became an open-ended structure—sometimes installation, sometimes performance, sometimes just a table where strangers drink coffee while waiting for something to collapse.
It continues as a living platform: unfinished, porous, adaptable. A site for works, conversations, and interruptions that keep moving between borders.
Timeline (fragments)
· 2008 — Jambatan collective founded in Copenhagen.
· 2018–2023 — Stateless Mind Festivals in Copenhagen and Venice: performances, screenings, dialogues. Research into Southeast Asian diaspora artists in the Nordic countries.
· 2023 — Venice restriction → Stateless Pavilion declaration.
· 2024 — Activation at Kapallorek Artspace, Malaysia.
· 2025 — Planned activation: Emergency Room, National Art Gallery Malaysia.
· 2026 — Planned activation: Museo delle Mura, Rome.
· 2027+ — Pavilion continues as a living, unfinished platform.