KALISTHENICS RESIDENT ARTISTS 2026 – 2027
Hussina Raja
Hussina Raja is a British-Kashmiri multidisciplinary artist, filmmaker and actress. Her practice spans film, photography, installation, archive footage, writing and performance, with work that explores themes of identity, migration, belonging and social justice.
Often drawing on personal experience and the lives of diasporic communities in Britain, Hussina’s research-led and collaborative processes re-examine dominant narratives and investigate how subcultures shape politics and popular culture.
Her films and artworks have been exhibited internationally, including at Whitechapel Gallery’s London Open, Berlinale Talents, Film London’s Selected 13 programme, and the Aesthetica Art Prize. Through engagement with communities and archives, her work questions representation while imagining new possibilities for cultural memory and collective identity.
Project: station
STATION is a new one-woman live performance installation, written and performed by Hussina Raja.
Set within a South Asian living room, the work uses the metaphor of a radio tuning between different "stations in life"—childhood, adolescence, motherhood—to explore bi-cultural identity, heritage and belonging. Through a blend of live soundscore, video projection, text and movement, the performance creates an intimate and immersive experience.
Rooted in community collaboration, the work is being developed through a process of research and dialogue. Hussina is weaving together stories from a diverse group of women she has encountered, threading their voices into the fabric of the final piece.
Following a research and development week at The Albany Theatre, STATION will be presented as part of Kali Theatre’s Kalisthenics programme.
Anna Himali Howard is an award-winning director, theatremaker and dramaturg. Over more than a decade, she has built a body of work that spans new writing, opera and reimagined classic texts.
Her directing credits include The Secret Garden (co-created with Holly Robinson, Regent's Park Open Air Theatre), Graceland by Ava Wong Davies (Royal Court), Orpheus (Opera North), Kabul Goes Pop by Waleed Akhtar (Brixton House) and Curious by Jasmine Lee-Jones (Soho Theatre). Her production of Orpheus for Opera North received the Critics' Circle Award for Outstanding Achievement in Opera, the Asian Media Award for Best Stage Production, and the UK Theatre Award for Achievement in Opera.
Anna trained on the Birmingham REP Foundry, as the Paines Plough Trainee Director, on the NT Studio Directors' Programme and the Royal Opera House Directors' Course. As a dramaturg, she is currently New Work Manager at Birmingham Hippodrome and a visiting tutor on MA Dramaturgy at Birkbeck. She was Senior Reader at the Royal Court and continues to read for theatres and awards including the Bush, Soho Theatre and the Bruntwood Prize.
Her practice is driven by a commitment to staging exciting new plays and uprooting classic texts for new audiences.
Anna Himali Howard
Project: ROOTS
As part of her Kalisthenics residency, Anna will delve into the archive of South Asian women's playwriting in Britain—rediscovering a rich, bold and often-overlooked canon of work.
Through research and public presentation, she will share plays from the archive with new audiences, surfacing voices that deserve to be seen and heard again.
Alia Romagnoli
Alia Romagnoli is a photographer and visual artist. Her work explores joy, colour and tenderness, focusing on portraiture, storytelling and our connection to nature. Based between London, UK and Bangalore, India, her personal practice has explored a variety of subjects ranging from narratives within the LGBTQIA+ community as well as South Asian stories both in and outside of the diaspora.
Her past exhibitions include: Pioneers, Royal National Maritime Museum (2024), Queer Britain - Chosen Family, London (2022 to 2025), PhotoVogue NFT Residency (2023), Colours of Resistance - Margate Black Pride (2023 & 2024), PhotoVogue Festival - Italian Panorama, Milano (2022), Through Queer Eyes, us/they Collective, Milan (2022, Palm* Photo Prize Exhibition, 1014 Gallery, London (2022), Hope for India - Covid Relief, citta.org, (2021), Coming Together, BBH (2020), Queer Frontiers, ARTIQ (2020), Global Womxnhood, Shado Mag, HARTsLane Gallery (2019), Britain We Exist, Queer, British and South Asian, Saatchi Gallery (2019), Chosen Family, Levi's® x Queer Britain (2019)
The showcase will range from older pieces from her archive to newer series that platform South Asian and queer identities as well as her own journey as a cancer survivor and solace found in the natural world.
Instagram
www.aliaromagnoli.com
