Working across text, workshops and performance, Luisa Ungar’s practice investigates how social and cultural norms are constructed and institutionalised. Practicing research as free association, Ungar often seeks to re-connect the archived or the academic material back in to the everyday, popular use. Testing out different ways of reading and performing a given subject, Ungar interchangeably works with and against what is regarded as 'common knowledge'. In her recent projects, Ungar has focused on the animal and the animalistic as a criterion of differentiation and representation in Western cultures and how specific animals are appropriated as cultural, political and national ideals. 

At Gasworks Ungar will look at the import of exotic animals in 19th century London in relation to the politics of International Fairs and wider formation of cultural identity in Europe.

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Luisa Ungar lives and works in Bogotá Colombia and Amsterdam, Netherlands. Recent exhibitions include The compromise at Fundación Cittadelarte, Turín, Italy (2013), Guided zoo tour at Cali Performance Festival, Cali, Colombia (2012), sabot magazine (with Fran Ilich) at Dokumenta 11, Kassel, Germany (2007) and Grito y escuta at 7 Bienal of Mercosur, Porto Alegre, Brasil (2009).

This residency is supported by TrAIN (University of the Arts Research Centre for Transnational Art, Identity and Nation), University of the Arts, London.