Geography of the Mind
Geography of the Mind
Saad Qureshi, 2026, mixed media
Banner image ©Fisher Studios
Artwork on display in the Ground Floor of the Pitt Rivers Museum as part of the Oxford-wide trail for the On Paradise exhibition in the White Box at the Schwarzman Centre.
Geography of the Mind brings together architectural and landscape forms inspired by the Pitt Rivers Museum's ethnographic collections. Familiar yet strange, they form an imagined place that exists somewhere and nowhere, exploring how fragments of different histories and cultures are reshaped through memory and imagination.
The work, on the Ground Floor of the Pitt Rivers Museum, is one of five sculptural interventions by Oxford-based artist Saad Qureshi installed across the University's museums. Together, these works extend On Paradise, an exhibition featuring Qureshi's works at the Schwarzman Centre for the Humanities, into the University's collections.
View a short introductory film with Paul Basu, Pitt Rivers Museum Curator and Professor of Anthropology:
https://www.youtube.com/embed/JyZFWeWWHFw?si=YMma_IjIn_Cjgm1R
Find out more
On Paradise: Between Hope and Memory is a major exhibition at the Schwarzman Centre for the Humanities featuring the work of artist Saad Qureshi. It explores humanity's enduring fascination with paradise - lost, longed for, or yet to come, inviting audiences to reflect on the personal, cultural, and collective visions that sustain hope and inspire action. Large-scale sculptural works, intricate paper tapestries, and moving image, alongside a newly commissioned sonic environment.
The On Paradise exhibition and trail invites audiences to reflect on how visions of paradise - whether religious, cultural, or personal - shape our understanding of hope, memory, and the future.
Don't miss the installations at the other University Museums: Museum of Natural History, History of Science Musuem and in two galleries at the Ashmolean Museum.
Listen to Professor of Anthropology and Curator at the Pitt Rivers Museum, Paul Basu, explore a range of perspectives On Paradise by University researchers in a series of six podcast episodes.
