As part of the opening week of The Phantom Combatants and the Metabolism of Disobedient Organs, we invite audiences deeper into Natasha Tontey’s imaginative and research-driven practice.
Join the artist for a conversation with curators Itha O’Neill and Carly Whitefield. Together, they will explore the ideas shaping Tontey’s work, from her distinctive DIY aesthetic to world-building to the diverse forms of knowledge that inform her process. Her commission, The Phantom Combatants, explores resistance and the body as a site of transformation. Drawing on her interest in oral histories and speculative fiction, the project reflects on collective struggle, as well as questions of autonomy and self-determination.
Natasha Tontey is a Minahasan artist and researcher based in Jakarta and Yogyakarta, Indonesia. Her practice encompasses film and video, performances and installations and often explores alternative futures from the perspectives of marginalised entities. Tontey has exhibited her work at venues internationally, including solo shows at Museum of Contemporary Art, Taipei (2026); Museum MACAN, Jakarta (2024–25); and Auto Italia, London (2022). She has also shown her work in group exhibitions at venues including the MUNCH Triennale, Oslo (2025–26); 18th İstanbul Biennial (2025); 14th Mercosul Biennial, Porto Alegre (2025); Leeum Museum of Art, Seoul (2022); Singapore Biennale 2022; Ghost 2565, Bangkok (2022); and Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin (2021). Her films have screened at the BFI London Film Festival (2025), FIDMarseille (2025) and the Singapore International Film Festival (2021, 2023, 2025). She is the recipient of the Han Nefkens Foundation — Loop Barcelona Video Art Production Grant 2024, and the HASH Award from ZKM | Karlsruhe and Akademie Schloss-Solitude, Stuttgart in 2020. From 2021 to 2023, Tontey was a fellow of the Human Machine programme at the Akademie der Künste, Berlin. Tontey has been selected for participation in the 59th Carnegie International, Pittsburgh and Biennale de l'Image en Mouvement, Tunis (both 2026).