Liverpool Biennial 2023 explores the legacy of slavery
The Liverpool Biennial 2023, ‘uMoya: The Sacred Return of Lost Things’, seeks a sense of healing as it explores the legacy of slavery in the city

Receive our daily digest of inspiration, escapism and design stories from around the world direct to your inbox
Thank you for signing up to Wallpaper. You will receive a verification email shortly.
There was a problem. Please refresh the page and try again.
The Liverpool Biennial 2023 turns its lens on the legacy of slavery in the city, and asked South African curator Khanyisile Mbongwa to take on this challenge.
The city of Liverpool, famous for its history of music and football, was at the epicentre of the transatlantic slave trade for over one hundred years and much of the city was built through wealth generated by the trade of goods and people. The United Kingdom and the world are finally addressing the reality of the slave trade and the art world has played a part in this, mainly through artists tackling this gargantuan subject and its continuing ripple effect on our society.
Liverpool Biennial 2023: ‘uMoya: The Sacred Return of Lost Things’
Eleng Luluan, Ngialibalibade to the Lost Myth, 2023. Installation view at Princes Dock, Liverpool Biennial 2023
After walking the city, Mbongwa decided on the biennal’s theme of ‘uMoya: The Sacred Return of Lost Things’, looking at care, breath and return in the city. The word ‘uMoya’ means air, wind breath, spirit and soul in Xhosa and relates to a sense of healing, of care, of passage, the sea and of return.
‘I have invited artists whose works really sit in what I call emancipation practices and these practices… really holding the space between woundedness and how we imagine ourselves through this woundedness for a possible healing to happen,’ Mbongwa said in her opening remarks.
Raisa Kabir, Build me a loom off of your back and your stomach..., 2018
Torkwase Dyson, installation view of ‘Torkwase Dyson/ Liquid a Place’, Pace Gallery, 2021
The venues include spaces around the city relating to the slave trade – the cotton exchange, a tobacco warehouse – and a selection of Liverpool’s great art venues such as The Bluecoat, FACT and Tate Liverpool. Each venue has a grounding artist, explained Mbongwa, their work supporting the other works in the space. At The Bluecoat, it’s artist Raisa Kabir, who has a small retrospective; and at Tate, it’s Torkwase Dyson with the work Liquid A Place, 2021.
Isa do Rosário. Liverpool Biennial 2023 at Tate Liverpool
Nolan Oswald Dennis, No conciliation is possible, 2018 – ongoing
The works at Tate Liverpool include Nolan Oswald Dennis’ ongoing No conciliation is possible (working diagram), 2018-present, which is a ‘diagram tracing recursive structures of power through space and time’. It facilitates deep thought, and its lines, spirals, triangles and free-flowing circles join events, ideas, feelings, states of being and more in a work that spans the entirety of two gallery walls.
‘I thought it was interesting that Khanyisile was interested in this work in this broader context of healing and return, which are often words that are thrown around easily and provide this sense that things are OK, without necessarily attending to the parts that are not OK,’ Dennis explained. ‘I think that work is really about trying to take healing and wounding seriously.’
Charmaine Watkiss, Witness, 2023. Liverpool Biennial 2023 at Victoria Gallery & Museum
All work in the biennial has a connection to the triangle of Africa-The Americas-Europe, and the 35 participating artists include Edgar Calel from Guatemala; Australian Brook Andrew, whose film SMASH IT, 2018, looking at Aboriginal identity is a standout of the biennial; and British Jamaican artist Charmaine Watkiss, who looks at slavery through the lens of her Ghanaian heritage.
Not all works relate to slavery. The stunning feature-length film Stephen by Melanie Manchot looks at mental health and addiction in the city, while Benoit Piéron’s immersive work on his long-term sickness as a child speaks to hidden illness and care.
Sandra Suubi, Samba Gown, 2021. Liverpool Biennial 2023 at Open Eye Gallery
Ibokwe, Black Circus, 2022
While the individual works in the programme are great, it is the performances that really spoke to the heart of the biennial and a sense of healing. Sandra Suubi’s photography of a performance work looks at pollution in waste in Uganda, and is set around the centrepiece Samba Gown, 2021. Meanwhile, the incomparable Albert Ibokwe Khoza’s Black Circus, 2022, encouraged audience members to take part in his flipping of an all-Black human circus.
The task the Liverpool Biennial 2023 has set itself is one it could never fully achieve, in that the scars of slavery on our society will always be there, but the excavating of these long-ignored histories in relation to our lives today felt like a good start.
Liverpool Biennial 2023, 10 June – 17 September, biennial.com
Wallpaper* Newsletter
Receive our daily digest of inspiration, escapism and design stories from around the world direct to your inbox
-
New London restaurant Pollini opens at Ladbroke Hall with interiors by Vincenzo De Cotiis
Architect Vincenzo De Cotiis and chef Emanuele Pollini create Pollini, Ladbroke Hall's new restaurant
By Malaika Byng Published
-
Terra Carta Design Lab announces second edition
For the Terra Carta Design Lab’s second edition, students and recent alumni are invited to design high-impact, low-cost solutions to address the climate crisis
By Rosa Bertoli Published
-
How to conquer the Atomic City: the story behind U2 at the new Las Vegas Sphere
U2:UV Achtung Baby Live At Sphere redefines the 21st-century rock concert. We spoke to the band and its team about the genesis of this expansive art and music experience that marks the opening of the high-tech venue
By Jonathan Bell Published
-
Madelon Vriesendorp’s ‘sculptural interventions and playful ideas’ at The Cosmic House
A Madelon Vriesendorp exhibition opens at The Cosmic House in London, surprising and delighting visitors with its ‘sculptural interventions and playful ideas‘
By Will Jennings Published
-
The best London art exhibitions to see now
Your guide to the best London art exhibitions, as chosen by the Wallpaper* arts desk
By Hannah Silver Published
-
‘A temple of love’: Joana Vasconcelos unveils colossal wedding cake sculpture
At Waddesdon Manor, UK, Joana Vasconcelos unveils her ‘impossible project’ Wedding Cake – part sculpture, part architectural garden folly, part pâtisserie
By Daniel Scheffler Published
-
The art fair personality test: what type of Frieze New York visitor are you?
Are you a selfie seeker or a champagne visualist? Take our art fair personality test to identify yourself at Frieze New York 2023 (17-21 May)
By Harriet Lloyd-Smith Published
-
Home, the London art initiative championing BIPOC artists, launches appeal to save the space
Home, one of the few art spaces in London supporting Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic artists, has launched an urgent appeal to stay alive
By Harriet Lloyd-Smith Published
-
The World Reimagined revisits the history of the transatlantic slave trade through art
Ahead of a Bonhams auction on 21 November, The World Reimagined will conclude with an epic finale in Trafalgar Square this weekend (19 and 20 November). The initiative uses art to illuminate the history of the transatlantic slave trade, inviting us ‘to face our shared history with honesty, empathy and grace’.
By Amah-Rose Mcknight Abrams Published
-
London photography exhibitions: the must sees for Autumn 2022
We zoom in on the most exciting photography exhibitions in London and around the UK
By Sophie Gladstone Published
-
Amy Sherald’s vivid, triumphant portraits reframe Black personhood in Western art
In ‘The World We Make’ at Hauser & Wirth London (until 23 December), American painter Amy Sherald raises critical questions about the position of Black bodies in Western art
By Elisha Tawe Last updated