New Printed Exhibition in Textual Form: magazine Pina, Issue #2, London

Pina Issue #2

Author: Nina Chkareuli

Pina is a new conceptual magazine providing an experimental exhibition space for contemporary artists and writers. Just as white gallery or museum walls have the potential to become a part of any period show, so the white pages of Pina coming from the print can conjure up palimpsests of meanings and symbols, while focusing on just two artists at a time. Founded by London-based Catalina Imizcoz, a visionary researcher and curator with a post-modernist approach to collaborations and exhibitions, Pina looks at what in-depth dual shows could look like in print. One important difference is that readers can take real time to take it all in; put the well-published pages aside and then go back to it at their own pace. This concept of recreating an exhibition on a page has always intrigued me when creating a checklist or a proposal for a hypothetical show. I always think of the white Word file as white walls, so it was a welcomed surpise to see this idea conceptualized to a heightened degree earlier this year with the first printed issue.

The magazine takes its name from pinax—a flat, painted board or tablet—and from the root of pinacoteca, meaning a place for images. Each commission unfolds across 60 pages, giving artists ample room to build immersive worlds that readers can navigate much like a physical exhibition. Every issue couples these print-based exhibitions with original short stories, inviting two writers to respond to the exhibition designs through fiction. Positioned between literary and contemporary art publishing, Pina creates a close, imagination-led experience of exhibition viewing. The all-female team is made up of researcher Catalina Imizcoz (Founder and Editor), poet and radio host Bitsy Knox (Deputy Editor), and cultural producer Lucila de Arizmendi (Producer).

The first issue focused on two exhibitions by Gala Porras-Kim’s artistic practice was dedicated to examining the relationship between objects and the institutions that contained them. For Pina, Porras-Kim conceived Conditions for recognising a living stone, a legally precise case that defended the rights of a spirit residing within a statue held by the British Museum. Asad Raza’s work involved creating encounters both within and beyond the exhibition space, approaching art as a metabolic and active process. For Pina, Raza conceived Array, which traced the path of radiation from sources across the universe to the trees used to make the magazine’s paper, and from there, reflected into the reader’s eye.

For the second issue, the selection of the exhibitions is very different. Forensic Architecture presents A Counter-Archive of the Ovaherero and Nama Genocide, a rigorous investigation into the genocide carried out by German colonial authorities in the early twentieth century in what is now Namibia. Based on extensive archival research and spatial analysis, the exhibition unfolds in three sections, examining the ideological foundations of racialised imperialism, the architecture of the concentration camp, and the enduring legacy of colonial violence through ongoing environmental damage and the dispossession of Indigenous communities. These themes are taken further in a dialogue featuring Eyal Weizman, Agata Nguyen Chuong, Irmgard Emmelhainz, and Zoé Samudzi. The exhibition is accompanied by a newly commissioned short story, Breaking Even, by Rwandan-born, Namibia-based writer Rémy Ngamije, founder of Doek!, an independent Namibian organisation dedicated to supporting the literary arts. Centered on a quiet, intimate exchange between a father and his son, the story reflects on how a life is shaped not only by history but even more by the uncertainty of what lies ahead. 

Edgar Calel’s Dreams and memories dazzle through the flickering of fireflies explores dreams, memory, and daily life within his multigenerational family home in Comalapa, Guatemala. Each morning, family members share their dreams as both a practical and poetic way of sensing the day’s energy ahead. From these exchanges emerge concrete plans and everyday reminders—what work must be done, which dishes should be prepared—forming a ritual so embedded in family life that, even when separated, they continue to recount their dreams through shared voice messages.

Calel preserves these visions by etching them into the smoke-darkened walls of the home, surfaces marked by years of hearth residue, turning fleeting experiences into a living archive. These drawings are translated onto the pages of Pina, woven together with Kaqchikel poetry, family Polaroids, and handwritten notes that trace the delicate textures shaping both the artist’s dreams and those of his family. As a record of the most fragile images, the exhibition invites viewers to “see” through touch, sensing the transience and force of dreams, poetry, and intimacy. The fragility of being human is at the center of this thoughtful exhibition.

A conversation between curator Lisette Lagnado and Calel deepens understanding of these practices, linking them to moments from the artist’s life and opening a cosmological perspective. The project is accompanied by a newly commissioned short story by Trinidadian writer Portia Subran. Her piece, A Gathering of Seeds, employs xenofiction to move across generations, encouraging reflection on dreams as vessels for the spiritual and physical nourishment essential to survival.

Pina #2 could  be purchased at these locations

  Nina Chkareuli 

Pina, Issue #2, exhibition by Edgar Calel.

Pina, Issue #2, exhibition by Forensic Architecture.