
COLOMBOSCOPE / EDITION NINE
RHYTHM
ALLIANCES
21 - 31 JANUARY 2026
OVER 50 SRI LANKAN AND INTERNATIONAL ARTISTS
conversations • echoes and reverbs • excursions • performances
workshops • concerts • cinema • listening experiences
Curated by Hajra Haider Karrar.
With artistic director Natasha Ginwala.
INTRODUCTION
Rhythm Alliances is an exercise of attunement to the varied dispositions of rhythm—energizing, contrasting, haunting, recurring, turbulent, and imagined. Far more than a static exhibition, it is a celebration of energies and experimental forms. Since experiencing rhythm-making is also an invitation for time-travel, the acts in this edition assemble a communal score of creation, resistance, and alliance-building. Involving over 50 artists and collectives, musicians, choreographers, filmmakers and cultural organizers, the festival programme will continue its pluriversal journey across freely accessible venues in Colombo.
The ninth edition of Colomboscope draws on a range of vocabularies embodying rhythms of remembrance, dissent, and renewal. From the noise of a global order where hyperconsumption and war are rife, how may sonic counter-currents transmit the ingredients of struggles today, make paradoxical realities audible, echo in the lifeways of migrant belonging, and resonate shared dreaming? Across live experiences and exhibited works we will also explore the role of listening in producing relationships of reciprocity and engage with the ways in which acoustic leakages and vocal atmospheres compose new public territories that refute borderlines, data harvesting, and oppressive systems.

ARTISTS
Aboothahir Al Wajahath / Atiyyah Khan / Ayumi Paul
Basir Mahmood / Basma al Sharif / Chamindika Abeysinghe / Charwei Tsai Dinar Sultana / Dinoj Mahendranathan / Gayan Hemarathne
Haseeb Ahmed / Imaad Majeed / Jegatheeswaran Keshavan
Josefa Ntjam / Jovita Alvares / Kaimurai / Kavan Balasuriya / KMRU Mahesha Kariyapperuma / Mekh Limbu / Moe Satt
Mohammad Ali Talpur / Naiza Khan / Nina Mangalanayagam with Marie Louise Dilmaya Bergqvist and the Transnational Adoptee Choir: The Whale Pinaree Sanpitak / Raven Chacon / Saadia Mirza / Sabeen Omar
Sarah Kazmi / Seher Shah / Stephen Champion / Tashyana Handy and Sakina Aliakbar Tharmapalan Tilaxan / Tissa de Alwis
Vivian Caccuri / Yara Asmar / Zarina Muhammad

COLLABORATORS
Arka Kinari / Bread Modular / CoCA Art / Dizzi Geetha / Kahli / Mawongany P. Ahilan / the Repropriation Riddims project (Asvajit Boyle, Divanke Sewmin, Mike de Silva, Nigel Perera,
Sebastiampillai Vasanberk, Uvindu Perera and many more)
Sumudi Suraweera and Susantha Rupathilaka with band*, Sunara / Thomas Burkhalter and Daniel Jakob with Melodies in My Head / TBA21 Academy Convening with Brook Andrew (BLAK C.O.R.E), Neelima Jaychandan, Daniel Fernando (Blue Resources Trust), Anna Arabindan Kesson, Eduardo Castillo-Vinuesa, KMRU, Laleh Khalili, Naiza Khan, Hajra Haider Karrar, Setareh Noorani, Charwei Tsai, Markus Reymann, and Small Cat Advocacy and Research (SCAR) NooN and band / Weather Reports* (Imaad Majeed, Mayun Kaluthantri, Tashyana Handy, Dinoj M, SajaS, Toulip Wonder, Suren Seneviratne, Kavitha Balasingham, Ushara, and Seth De Silva)

VENUES
Colomboscope venues for exhibitions and events are free and open to the public. All events are limited capacity.















