Angelica Mesiti has long been fascinated by performance: as a mode of storytelling and a means of expressing social ideas in physical form.

In recent years she has been making videos that reveal how culture is manifested through non-linguistic forms of communication, and especially through vocabularies of sound and gesture.

Mesiti’s two-screen installation Mother Tongue (2017) explores the way diverse communities in and around Aarhus, Denmark connect to their cultural heritage through music, song, and storytelling. Originally com­missioned by the European Capital of Culture Aarhus in 2017, the work takes the songs in the Højskolesang­bogen (The National Folk High School Songbook in Denmark) as its starting point. In a range of public and private settings, communities perform traditional folk songs, from Somali blues to marching drills and wedding dances.

Recent exhibitions include The Musical Brain, The High Line New York (2021); Angelica Mesiti: Mother Tongue, Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki, New Zea­land (2020); Assembly, Arnolfini, Bristol, UK (2020); Busan Biennale 2020: Words at an Exhibition: An Exhibition in Ten Chapters and Five Poems, Museum of Contemporary Art Busan, South Korea (2020) ; The Future of Silence, Nam June Paik Art Centre, South Korea (2020); Assembly, Australian Pavilion, 58th International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia (2019); When Doing Is Saying, Palais de Tokyo, Paris, France (2019); Relay League, Art Sonje Centre Seoul (2018); Angelica Mesiti, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra (2017); The Colour of Saying, Lilith Perfor­mance Studio, Malmö, Sweden (2015); Mom, am I Bar­barian?, 13th Istanbul Biennial, Istanbul, Turkey (2013) and Sharjah Biennale 11, United Arab Emirates. Curated by Yuko Hasegawa (2013).