Zombie environmentalism at the Lahore Biennale: Art, crisis and the limits of spectacular engagement

As Lahore choked under record smog levels in October–November 2024, the city's third Biennale showcased environmental art addressing, inter alia , air pollution, water scarcity and river degradation. This ethnographic account examines the gap between the Biennale's interventionist ambitions and its limited political agency. Drawing on participant observation, the author analyzes how Biennale artworks created immersive experiences that aligned with Lahore's acute environmental crises through respiratory, aquatic and fluvial themes. Yet this aesthetic engagement coexisted with ‘zombie environmentalism’ – instances where elite environmentalists and others aestheticized environmental destruction while remaining detached from both the crisis and possibilities for action. The study argues that the Biennale's transformative potential is doubly constrained by art's autonomy as a field and by the classist insularity of its organizers. The study reveals how spectacular environmental art events in the Global South can powerfully engage local crises yet fail to generate deeper political mobilization.