Shahzia Sikander Maps Empire and Trade Across the M+ Facade
3 to 12 Nautical Miles brings hand-painted animation and history to Hong Kong’s skyline
This spring, the south face of M+ in West Kowloon comes alive. Shahzia Sikander’s 3 to 12 Nautical Miles (2026) unfolds nightly across the museum’s LED façade, tracing centuries of trade, empire, and maritime power. From Mughal India to Qing China, from the East India Company’s commercial rise to its political reach, Sikander moves through history with the precision of miniature painting and the sweep of cinema.
Co-commissioned by M+ and Art Basel, presented by UBS, the work is built from hundreds of hand-painted images. Each gesture, each symbol, is part of a larger story about how power was won, contested, and maintained. The animation touches on Britain’s opium trade, the First Opium War, and the ways authority—especially at sea—remains fragile and fluid.
It runs nightly from 23 March to 21 June 2026. The scale is spectacular, the detail meticulous. “This commission gave me a chance to explore Hong Kong’s position at the crossroads of empires and markets,” Sikander says. “The sea, the trade, the power struggles—they all converge in this work.”
The programme includes public talks and screenings. On 25 March, Sikander will speak with Doryun Chong, M+’s Artistic Director, as part of Art Basel Hong Kong’s Premiere Artist Talk. The following day she gives a free illustrated lecture at the M+ Cinema. Earlier animations from the past two decades will screen from 24 to 29 March, giving audiences a glimpse into the evolution of her moving-image practice.
Limited-edition T-shirts featuring images from 3 to 12 Nautical Miles will be available at the M+ Shop, online, and via Art Basel.
This work sits at the intersection of research, craft, and public display. History is not static. Authority, trade, empire—they shift and circulate. Sikander’s animation gives those movements form, bringing past and present into dialogue across the Hong Kong skyline.
More details on screenings and talks are at M+
Elena Leo is the Arts & Lifestyle Editor of Ikon London Magazine.
