Appupen (b. 1976, Kerala), is a visual artist, graphic novelist, and musician based in Bangalore. Renowned for his distinctive world-building, Appupen creates richly imagined universes through comics, paintings, and installations, often exploring themes of power, greed, environment, and human folly. His most celebrated creation is the mythical world of Halahala, a shifting, allegorical landscape that appears across his graphic novels, each iteration reflecting different dimensions of contemporary society.

Trained initially as a painter, Mathen turned to comics as a form that allowed him to merge narrative, satire, and visual experimentation. His first book, Moonward (2009), published by Blaft, introduced readers to Halahala and established him as a pioneering voice in Indian graphic storytelling. This was followed by Legends of Halahala (2012), Aspyrus (2014), and The Snake and the Lotus (2018), each work blending fantasy and social critique.

Beyond books, Appupen contributes illustrations, editorial cartoons, and mural projects, using satire to address pressing political and ecological concerns. As a musician and performer, he also explores sound as an extension of his storytelling. Based in Bangalore, he remains a leading figure in Indian comics and independent publishing, continually expanding the visual language of contemporary art and narrative.

Dima Srouji (b. 1990, Nazareth, Palestine) Dima Srouji is a Palestinian architect, artist, and researcher interested in the ground as a living archive. She works with glass, text, archival materials, maps, plaster casts, and film, understanding each as an evocative object and emotional companion. Her works are used as experiments in reframing histories of the land by reshuffling strata and retelling stories from new perspectives previously untold by following lines of thought through particular material cultures such as glass and stone. Srouji’s projects are developed closely with archaeologists, anthropologists, sound designers, glassblowers and stonemasons. 

She was the Jameel Fellow at the Victoria & Albert Museum in 2022-2023 and is currently leading a studio titled Underground Palestine in the MA City Design programme at the Royal College of Art in London. She has previously taught at the American University of Sharjah as Visiting Assistant Professor, at Birzeit University and at the Yale School of Architecture as teaching fellow.

 Her work is part of the permanent collections at the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, Victoria & Albert Museum, Institut du Monde Arabe, Corning Museum of Glass, and Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary. She has exhibited works at the Sharjah Art Biennial 15, Lagos Biennial 2024, Sharjah Architecture Triennial 2019, the first Islamic Art Biennale 2023, the first Doha Design Biennale,  at the Victoria & Albert Museum, Ford Foundation Gallery, Tai Kwun Museum, Institut du Monde Arabe, Alserkal Arts Foundation, Contemporary Arts Center Cincinnati and others.

City As A Spaceship (CAAS) is a visionary collective reimagining how humans inhabit cities as closed-loop, spaceship-like ecosystems. Rooted in the conviction that future urban environments should produce most of their own resources locally while remaining interconnected to larger grids, CAAS seeks to balance self-sufficiency with resilience. Waste is recycled into the system, redundancy is built in, and the metaphor of “Spaceship Earth” becomes a tool for designing habitable, efficient, sustainable cities. Thus, the concept of spaceship ecologies reciprocates with planetary ecologies to deepen CAAS’ exploration of water, society, and technology boundaries.

Founded in 2007, by Susmita Mohanty and Siddharth Das, the idea went public in 2010 via the essay “Mumbai as a Spaceship”. In 2011, Barbara Imhof joined, contributing the “Spaceship City” concept for ESA a year later; Sue Fairburn became a co-pilot bringing environmental-body connections into the collective. CAAS has manifested globally—through lectures, installations, design studios, residencies and workshops in cities like Amsterdam, Mumbai, Paris, Toronto, New Delhi, and more.

Susmita Mohanty, PhD is a spaceship designer and serial space entrepreneur, founder of multiple space ventures across continents.

Barbara Imhof, PhD is a space architect focused on sustainability, transformable spaces, and resource-conserving systems.

Sue Fairburn, MSc MeDes, FRSA brings expertise in environmental physiology, critical design, and materials for extreme environments.

Rohini Devasher is a collaborating artist whose practice explores astronomy, deep time, and speculative futures through drawing, video, and sound.

Together, the CAAS Collective catalyzes new thinking about habitability—bridging Earth and space, design and systems, local and global—to spark urban futures that are resilient, regenerative, and deeply interwoven with the cosmos.

You can find much of the information on our website - http://www.cityasaspaceship.org/

Michelangelo Pistoletto was born in Biella in 1933. He began exhibiting in 1955 and in 1960 held his first solo show at Galatea Gallery in Turin. His initial pictorial production is characterized by research on self-portraiture. Between 1961 and 1962 he began making his Mirror Paintings, with which he quickly achieved international recognition and success. Between 1965 and 1966 he created a group of works entitled Oggetti in meno (Minus Objects), considered basic for the birth of Arte Povera, an artistic movement of which Pistoletto was an animator and protagonist. Starting in 1967, he produced actions outside traditional exhibition spaces that represented the first manifestations of the “creative collaboration” that Pistoletto would develop over the following decades, bringing together artists from different disciplines and increasingly broad sectors of society. In the 1990s he taught at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna and, with Progetto Arte and the creation in Biella of Cittadellarte-Fondazione Pistoletto, he put art in relation to the different spheres of the social fabric in order to inspire and produce a responsible transformation of society. 2003 saw the start of the most recent phase of his work, called Third Paradise, which would become a major collective and participatory work over the following decades. In 2022 his book The Formula of Creation is published, in which he traces the fundamental steps of his entire artistic journey and theoretical reflection. In February 2025 he was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Over the course of his long career, he has received countless international prizes and awards. His works are in the permanent collections of major contemporary art museums.

For a more extensive biography, presentation of his work, complete list of exhibitions, artist's texts and bibliography, please refer to the artist's official website: www.pistoletto.it

Midhun Mohan (c. 1984–1985 – June 4, 2023) was a dynamic and innovative contemporary artist from Kerala who navigated mediums with striking dexterity—from traditional painting to digital media and cinematic expression. A graduate of the University of Calicut, Mohan possessed an exceptional visual imagination that allowed him to traverse varied artistic terrains with ease. His work responded intently to local histories and broader social narratives, embedding layers of cultural memory and speculation within his visual vocabulary.

Mohan’s contributions ranged across exhibitions like Lokame Tharavadu, curated by Bose Krishnamachari in Alappuzha (2021), where his works resonated among more than 250 artists. In a group show titled Sea: A Boiling Vessel at Mattancherry (Dec 2022 – Apr 2023), his Flotsam series stirred reflections on Kerala’s maritime intersections with layered histories, while works like Kappiri – The Eternal Slave evoked the enduring presence of enslaved African spirits in cultural memory.

Mohan’s premature passing on June 4, 2023, in Goa, at the age of 38, was deeply mourned by peers; Bose Krishnamachari called it “a tragedy that a young artist of such immense potential has been taken away from us too soon”. His art, brimming with empathy and insight, continues to echo across Kerala’s contemporary art landscape.

Ratheesh T (b. 1980, Kerala) is a contemporary painter based in Kochi, whose practice is deeply rooted in personal memory, everyday life, and the layered histories of place. Working primarily with large-scale oil paintings, Ratheesh constructs densely detailed narrative worlds that weave together realism, symbolism, and fantasy. His canvases often bring together people, animals, objects, and landscapes from his immediate environment in Kerala, transforming ordinary scenes into complex allegories of memory, conflict, and coexistence.

A graduate of the Government College of Fine Arts, Thrissur (2002) and an MFA in Painting from the Government College of Fine Arts, Kottayam (2008), Ratheesh has emerged as one of the most distinctive voices of his generation in Indian contemporary art. His paintings frequently reflect the socio-political tensions of his milieu, while remaining rooted in the intimacy of familial and community life. Works such as his recurring portraits of his mother or densely populated landscapes demonstrate his commitment to painting as a means of archiving lived experience.

Ratheesh has exhibited widely in India and internationally, including at the Kochi-Muziris Biennale and leading galleries in Mumbai, Delhi, and abroad. Based in Kochi, he continues to create works that explore the intersections of memory, identity, and place.

Rami Farook (b. 1981, Dubai) is a self taught artist & curator. His journey in the arts began in 2007 as a founder & director of cultural space “traffic”, and a patron, before becoming an artist in 2011 - with a purpose to be useful, honorable and compassionate. He's driven by art's possibilities & responsibilities, and dedicated to sociocultural development. His approach is deeply collaborative, foregrounding process and participation over fixed outcomes.. His intermedia practice is deeply rooted in the socio-historical, intending to create change in understanding & behavior. He uses art as a tool to inform, educate and entertain, often blending conceptual with documentary & fiction.Thriving on intervention and experimentation, often executing his projects with emotional intensity & impulsivity, but also planned, and sometimes collaborative & communal. 

Kabir Project consists of many journeys inspired by Bhakti, Sufi, and Baul poetry and songs as they flow in rural folk traditions. Spanning over two decades, our inspiration in the wisdom of these poems has taken the shape of several films, a web archive - Ajab Shahar, books, rural yatras, urban festivals, and much more. Inspired by the call of Kabir, the 15th century north Indian mystic poet, we investigate the socio-political and the spiritual in the same breath in all of our work. The true spirit of our work lies in the taana-baana (warp & weft) of social networks and friendships built over two decades between singers, scholars, activists, artists, students, and the larger public.

Initiated by filmmaker, writer and artist Shabnam Virmani in 2002 at Srishti Institute in Bangalore, the work of Kabir Project is now enabled by the Shabad Dhun Foundation. The Kabir Project team is made up of a diverse group of creative seekers including Smriti Chanchani, Anisha Baid, Shubhangi Bansal, Shreeparna Mitra, Alafiya Hasan and Kartikay Khetarpal. 

Sixtous Shanvin serves as the proprietor of Vinton Engineering, an architectural metalworks firm based in Kochi, Kerala. Founded in 2000 as an extension of Sixto & Co., which had specialized in metal fabrication services for the Cochin Shipyard, the company gradually shifted its focus toward architectural metalwork—designing and fabricating structures and components for buildings and infrastructure across India.

Under Shanvin's leadership, Vinton Engineering has grown into one of Kerala’s premier firms in its field, known for its commitment to quality, precision, and timely project delivery. The firm’s evolution reflects his dedication to craftsmanship and operational excellence. Legally structured as a proprietorship, the business is registered under his name—Arackal Sixtous Shanvin—and has maintained an active GST registration since July 1, 2017, ensuring compliance and transparency in its operations.

Through strategic growth and a focus on architectural innovation, Shanvin continues to guide Vinton Engineering’s mission to deliver robust, bespoke solutions in metal fabrication. His leadership positions the firm as a reliable engineering partner in Kerala’s architectural and construction landscape.

Shilpa Gupta (b. 1976, Mumbai) is a contemporary artist whose interdisciplinary practice spans installation, video, sound, performance, and public interventions. Working at the intersection of art and activism, Gupta explores questions of freedom, borders, censorship, and the politics of nationhood. Her art often addresses how identities are constructed, controlled, and contested, while remaining deeply attentive to the emotional and everyday dimensions of these struggles. A graduate in sculpture from Sir J.J. School of Fine Arts, Mumbai (1997), Gupta's works blur boundaries between the public and the private. She frequently employs interactive technologies, voice, text, and ephemeral materials, creating works that invite participation and reflection. Gupta’s work has been exhibited at leading institutions including Tate Modern, Centre Pompidou, Museum of Modern Art, and biennales in Venice, Berlin, Gwangju, and Kochi. Based in Mumbai, she continues to create works that challenge dominant narratives and foreground silenced voices. 

White Balance presents a multi-stranded programme and installation that turn the city into a porous stage for spirit, language, and resistance. Gopalan Solo moves through the streets of Mattancherry, mapping how violence and war erode the human soul, leaving silence in their wake. Language Spirit, a digital scroll, playfully unsettles the way alphabets are tethered to faith, revealing how meaning drifts beyond inherited boundaries. The spectral presence of Kappiri surfaces as a subterranean guardian of Kochi’s forgotten past—an African spirit both feared and revered, reminding us of histories buried yet alive. Gaza Sings gathers Palestinian and Indian poets to braid tongues into a chorus of freedom and non-violence. Together, these gestures hold a fragile balance between memory, belief, and the possibility of shared futures.

Zahir Mirza is a dynamic and multifaceted creative professional, renowned for his innovative cross-platform storytelling, strategic thinking, and cultural branding expertise. Though he’s hesitant to talk about himself in the third person—finding it “incredulous and counter-intuitive” —his work speaks volumes.

A strong proponent of what he cheekily abbreviates as the M.A.G.A. Movement (Make Advertising Great Again), Mirza infuses projects with fresh energy, pop-cultural flair, and collaborative spirit. His creative vision seamlessly integrates disruptive ideation and business savvy, bridging agency silos and forging meaningful client relationships.

Zahir has crafted compelling campaigns for global brands such as McDonald’s, Audi, Pepsi, Nestlé, Maserati, Whirlpool, Land Rover, Emirates, and Porsche. His work has earned accolades at prestigious international advertising award shows including Cannes, Clios, D&AD, One Show, Effies, and Dubai Lynx. He’s also served as a juror at Cannes, Clios, LIA, and Dubai Lynx, and his creative output has been featured in publications like Fast Company, Adweek, AdAge, The Indian Express, and Communication Arts.

When he’s not shaping narratives, Mirza enjoys 10K runs, curating reading lists, plotting screenplays, and dabbling in abstract art with his daughter Emma.