MeSo Ventures
Osman Yousefzada

Osman Yousefzada

London — Textile & Installation

Osman Yousefzada's practice revolves around modes of storytelling, merging autobiography with fiction and ritual. His work is concerned with the representation and rupture of the migrational experience, making reference to the socio-political issues of today — explored through moving image, installation, text works, sculpture, garment making and performance. His practice is described as auto-ethnographic, where personal stories become political. South Asian influences are what many might first see when they encounter his work, but it reaches far broader — unravelling pressing issues of global histories, colonialities, class and race. Osman Yousefzada consistently refuses easy categorisation: his bodies, objects and textiles are presented as part-things that resist fixed identity, insisting instead on the complexity of lives lived across borders. Central to his methodology is the figure of his mother — a talented seamstress whose domestic making practice Osman Yousefzada has openly acknowledged as a foundational artistic source. His work is both symbolic of the precarious nature of immigrants' lives, and a tender and complex portrait of a loved one and, by extension, himself. This intimacy sits alongside a boldly political register: his installation When Will We Be Good Enough? drew links between colonial sea routes and the underwater cables that carry today's digital information — both, he argues, viaducts of power.

Osman Yousefzada (b. 1977, Birmingham, UK) is a British interdisciplinary artist and writer, born to first-generation migrants from South Asia. Working across installation, sculpture, textile, moving image and performance, his practice is auto-ethnographic in nature. Osman Yousefzada transforms personal memory and migrant experience into urgent, politically charged visual language. His work is held in major international collections and has been exhibited at the V&A, the Venice Biennale, and the Whitechapel Gallery, among others.

Education

  • Royal College of Art — PhD Research, Sculpture via Textiles & Ceramics (ongoing), London, UK
  • Central Saint Martins, London, UK
  • University of East London — Anthropology, London, UK
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Selected Works

Apsara II by Osman Yousefzada

Apsara II

Osman Yousefzada, 2023-2024

Pricing on request

Apsara III by Osman Yousefzada

Apsara III

Osman Yousefzada, 2023-2024

Pricing on request

Exhibition History

Solo Shows

  • 2025Arrivals, Islamic Biennale, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia (25 January – 25 June)
  • 2025When Will We Be Good Enough?, The Box, Plymouth, UK (2 November 2024 – 9 March 2025)
  • 2025Possession I, Cartwright Hall, Lister Park, Bradford, UK
  • 2024Welcome! A Palazzo for Immigrants, Fondazione Berengo, Palazzo Franchetti, Venice, Italy — presented in conjunction with the 60th International Art Exhibition, La Biennale di Venezia, "Stranieri Ovunque – Foreigners Everywhere"
  • 2024Where It Began, Cartwright Hall Art Gallery, Bradford, UK — a prelude to Bradford City of Culture 2025
  • 2024Queer Feet, Charleston, Sussex Modern, UK (23 September 2023 – 14 April 2024) — Queer Feet and Works on Paper
  • 2023Embodiments of Memory, British Ceramics Biennale, The Potteries Museum & Art Gallery, Stoke-on-Trent, UK
  • 2023Rituals and Spells, Cromwell Place, London, UK
  • 2022What Is Seen & What Is Not, Victoria & Albert Museum, London, UK
  • 2018Being Somewhere Else, Ikon Gallery, Birmingham, UK

Group Shows

  • 2025Between Worlds, MeSo Ventures at The HiLight, London, UK
  • 2025I Hear Her Breathing, Cooke Latham Gallery, London, UK
  • 2025A Home That Will Not Behave, Bolalne Contemporary, Frieze No.9 Cork Street, London, UK
  • 2025Ablutions, Tate Tanks, Tate Modern, London, UK
  • 2025Talisman, Cardian Art, London, UK
  • 2023Drawing Biennale, London, UK
  • 2023More Immigrants Please, Billboard series commissioned by Artichoke
  • 2023New Contemporaries, Camden Art Centre, London, UK
  • 2023Sculpture, Vadehra Gallery, New Delhi, India
  • 2023A New Dawn, A New Day, Bomb Factory Art Foundation, Marylebone, London, UK
  • 2023Terra, Couvent des Jacobins, Burgundy, France
  • 2023Like Paradise, Claridge's Art Space, London, UK
  • 2023Life is More Important Than Art, Whitechapel Gallery, London, UK — "An Immigrant's Room of Her Own", new commission & iteration of former installation
  • 2023One That Includes Myth, Goodman Gallery, London, UK
  • 2023Brink, Royal College of Art, London, UK
  • 2023Alea Iacta Est, Vistamare, Milan, Italy — curated by Milovan Farronato, with Anthea Hamilton, Celia Hempton, Goshka Macuga, Eddie Peake, Prem Sahib, Lucy McKenzie, Mariya Loboda, Christodoulos Panayiotou
  • 2022Spaces of Transcendence, Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, Sydney, Australia
  • 2022Glasstress, Berengo Fondazione, Venice, Italy
  • 2021Infinity Pattern 1, Ikon Gallery & Selfridges, Birmingham, UK (public art installation, selected via international competition)
  • 2020Radical Figures: Painting in the New Millennium, Whitechapel Gallery, London, UK — "Her Dreams Are Bigger" & panel discussion
  • 2020Malevich Symposium: The Power of Sound, 180 Strand, London, UK — performative costumes for Haroon Mirza
  • 2020A Rich Tapestry, Lahore Biennale, Lahore, Pakistan — curated by Jonathan Watkins & Ayesha Khalid, new commission for "Huis-Clos (No Exit)"
  • 2020Between the Sun and the Moon, Lahore Biennale, Lahore, Pakistan — collaboration with Haroon Mirza on "A belief is not the truth because the truth is unbelievable"
  • 2019Nightfall, Mendes Wood DM, Brussels, Belgium — curated by Fernanda Brenner, Milovan Farronato, Erika Verzutti
  • 2018Volcano Extravaganza, Fiorucci Art Trust, Stromboli, Italy — performance with Cecilia Bengolea and Haroon Mirza
  • 2018Total Anastrophes, Dhaka Art Summit, Dhaka, Bangladesh — curated by Runa Islam and Milovan Farronato
  • 2018The Fabric of India, Cincinnati Art Museum, Ohio, USA — toured by V&A Museum
  • 2017The Fabric of India, Ringling Museum, Florida, USA
  • 2013The Wedding Dresses 1775–2014, V&A Museum, London, UK
  • 2011–2012Reconstruction, British Council — Lahore Museum (Lahore), Central State Museum (Almaty), Georgian National Museum (Tbilisi), Style.uz (Tashkent), Bangladesh National Museum (Dhaka)
  • 2008Design of the Year Awards, Design Museum, London, UK
  • 2005Jerwood: Fashion, Film and Fiction, The Wapping Project, London, UK

Press & Publications

  • The Go-Between (memoir), Canongate — 2023
  • "It Can’t Be Ignored: Osman Yousefzada on His Gigantic Artwork", The Art Newspaper — 2022
  • "A Migrant’s Tale Laid Bare", Financial Times
  • "Artist Osman Yousefzada’s New Show Is a Personal Reflection on Migration", Vogue UK
  • "On Racism and British Fashion", The New York Times — 2020
  • "Shades of Unity in Hope of a New Brown and Black", The Guardian
  • Feature, i-D Magazine
  • Feature, Dazed
  • Feature, Flash Art
  • Artist profile, Wikipedia