Wood, paper, ink, paint
192 x 384 x 24 in
487.7 x 975.4 x 60.9 cm
2017
Richard Humann • A Tide of Credence at the Karachi Biennale, Karachi, Pakistan, 2017
A Tide of Credence is a large-scale sculptural installation by Richard Humann that recreates the Indus River on a raised platform. The river is filled with thousands of words in Urdu, drawn from letters and stories sent by people in Pakistan, alongside poetry, history, and literature connected to the country. Through this accumulation of language, Humann transforms a geographical feature into a vessel for the memories, beliefs, and aspirations of a people whose relationship with their homeland extends across generations and borders.
The Indus River and its tributaries flow through Pakistan toward the Arabian Sea, connecting regions, communities, and histories along their course. Humann invited people in Pakistan to share their hopes, dreams, and beliefs through letters and personal stories written in their native Urdu. He also gathered historical and contemporary poetry, literature, and writings about Pakistan. The texts were printed, cut into individual words, and placed within the sculptural river, bringing personal testimony into conversation with the country’s broader cultural history.
The words follow the river’s winding course, gathering like fragments of collective memory. Separated from their original sentences and contexts, they become both language and material, preserving the presence of individual voices while contributing to a larger, shared landscape. The river carries these fragments southward toward Karachi and the Arabian Sea, suggesting the movement of ideas, traditions, and aspirations through time.
The work’s title, A Tide of Credence, evokes the currents of belief that connect people to their homeland. The letters and stories offer intimate perspectives on Pakistan, while the literary and historical texts situate those personal accounts within a longer cultural narrative. Together, they reveal a country understood not only through its geography and history, but through the experiences, convictions, and hopes of the people who live there.
By using Urdu as both the language of the contributions and the physical substance of the sculpture, Humann gives cultural expression a tangible form. Individual words become part of a larger current, suggesting that national identity is continually shaped by the stories people tell, the histories they inherit, and the hopes they hold for the future.
Ultimately, A Tide of Credence presents the Indus River as more than a geographical landmark. It becomes a metaphor for the ongoing movement of memory, belief, and cultural identity. The thousands of words flowing through its sculptural form connect personal experience with collective history, creating a portrait of Pakistan through the voices and stories of its people.
Richard Humann • A Tide of Credence installation at the Karachi Biennale, Karachi, Pakistan, 2017
Richard Humann represented the United States of American in the 2017 Karachi Biennale in Karachi, Pakistan, with A Tide of Credence installed in the main exhibition building.
Photo credits: Ali Khurshid / Courtesy of the Karachi Biennale (KB17)