Kidus Hailesilassie

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Kidus Hailesilassie is an architect and speculative world builder whose practice intersects architecture and contemporary visual art. He focuses on hybrid forms of transcontinental expressions that reimagine and shape counter-narratives of Black consciousness.

Kidus Hailesilassie is the creator of the Culture Archive, a multidimensional platform for research, think tanks, and dialogues that recenter the writing tapestry from African and diasporic writing systems. His recent project, the Uncharted Installation, an extension of the Culture Archive, won 2023 PitchBLACK by Black Public Media. Uncharted challenges the current limitations of the concept and form of an archive by weaving together language and performance, incorporating transcontinental unions of Black movement and improvisation.

Through his creative process, which encompasses physical installation design, production design, video installation, interactive environments, and still imagery, Kidus's focal point is the concept of embodied architectural narratives. This approach underscores the ability of architecture to tell stories and convey meanings through its form, materials and spatial arrangements.

Since 2013, Kidus has collaborated with international artists and institutions such as Studio Other Spaces, Studio Olafur Eliasson, Forum des Images, Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen (IFA), and Contemporary And (C&). He is a former M.A. EDGE fellow at the Southern California Institute of Architecture, SCI-Arc.




2023 | 2024 IDA Pare Lorentz Prize 

2023 | Biennale Architettura 2023 | Guests from the future | The 18th International Architecture Exhibition | Installation designer and fabircator - Ferenj 

2023 | Pitch Black Grant Winner for Uncharted Installation, currently in post-production

2023 | Guest Speaker at Cornell, Real-Time Symposium

2022 | MIT and Black Public Media Artist in Residence

2022 | Pavilion Designer, Mozz/Fest

2021 | Guest Presenter at MIT, DocLab, Co-creation Lab

2021 | Culture Archive, New Images Forum

2021 | Culture Archive, Geneva Film Festival Forum

2021 | New Images Festival, "Kandaka and the Black Pharaoh" Short Film

2021 | Designer | Pavilion proposal, Ethiopian Cultural Garden in OH

2021 | Concert film world builder, Contemporary And

2021 | Culture Archive, IDFA Forum

2021 | SCI-Arch Research Fellow

2021 | MFA, SCI-Arc | Southern California Institute of Architecture, Edge Program

2013-2018 | Designer, Memorial Park in Addis, Studio Olafur Eliasson, Studio Other Spaces