Rabiya Nagi’s painting practice draws on personal and collective memory as she investigates how the past shapes the present and how histories, both personal and collective, echo across time. Often prompted by fleeting observations and fragments of everyday experience, these concerns emerge in paintings where layers of reference and reinterpretation blur the boundaries between memory and imagination.

Working across large-scale paintings and smaller, cropped compositions, Nagi creates images that hover between recognition and uncertainty. Through her practice, she interrogates the act of seeing and challenges perception by constructing disconcerting visual stagings. These compositions, often unsettling and ambiguous, evoke an uncanny sense of dislocation infused with the surreal.

Drawing from the language of film, Nagi develops her own imagery alongside reimagined reference photographs. Her work is further informed by literature and art history, which she recontextualizes through a contemporary lens to reveal new ways of looking and remembering.

Alongside painting, Nagi explores moving image, text, and sculpture, approaching each through a painterly lens.

Education 

·     Central Saint Martins, (2021/23): MA Fine Art
·     Royal College of Art (2020/21): Graduate Diploma
·     Kensington and Chelsea College (2019/20): HNC

Solo Exhibitions

2026 - ‘Corps Exquis’, The Assembly Room, Long Buckby, Northants.

Group Exhibitions

2026 - Open Studios, Common Room, Proposition, London.
2026 - ‘Meanwhile, Here’, BOTH Gallery, London.
2025 - Open studios, Proposition, London.
2025 - An-X, ‘If I Become An Alien?’ group show Finissage, London.
2025 - An-X, ‘If I Become An Alien?’ group show, Pause/Frame at Koppel Project, London.
2025 - ‘Exposed’, The Art Academy Gallery, London.
2024 - ‘OFFPRINT’, Tate Modern, Turbine Hall, London.
2024 - ‘Agents of Deterioration, Sideshow’, Lethaby Gallery, London.
2023 - ‘Mootookakio’ssin: Creating in Spacetime’, University of Lethbridge Art Gallery, Canada.
2023 - ‘Un(done)’, Hypha, London.
2023 - ‘Across and Over’ Royal College of Art, online.
2023 - ‘Ost’, end of ‘Prisoners of Love’, residency show, Kopple City, London.
2023 - An-X, ‘What We Thought We Knew’, Koppel Project Station, London.
2023 - Central Saint Martins graduation show, London.
2023 - ‘Prisoners of Love: Affect, containment, and alternative futures’, Lethaby Gallery, London.
2023 - ‘Transparent Ritual’ Art Publications, Lethaby Gallery, London.
2022 - Annex Open Studios, CSM Archway Campus, London.
2022 - ‘MERCH’ Print Exhibition / Sale, Koppel X Gallery, Piccadilly Circus, London.
2022 – ‘Without Space’ MFA Open Studios, CSM Archway Campus, London.
2022 - Rolls Building, London.
2022 - ‘This is Not a Party’, MA Interim Show, Central St Martins, Trinity Buoy Wharf, London.
2021 - Rolls Building, London.
2021 - Shiftists, ‘Lingua Franker’, Hoxton 253, London.
2019 - Collage Arts Open Studios, Cumberland Road, London.

 Residencies

·     Residency, ‘Prisoners of Love’, OPENing, London EC2, August -September 2023.

Curatorial Projects

2026
Meanwhile, Here –  BOTH Gallery, London
Curator

2025
Exposed – Art Academy Gallery, London
Curator

2023
What We Thought We Knew - Koppel Project Station, London
Co-curator (one of six)

Publications

·    Artist Talk Magazine, 34/2024
·    OFFPRINT, Tate Modern
·    Across & Over, RCA X HSBC
·    Lingua Franker
·     Agents of Deterioration

Selected Awards

·    2026 - Special Commendation.
·   2021 -  Laura Devine Prize, best 3-D work.
·  2025 - VAA100 International

Upcoming Events

·     VAA Open Spaces, November 2026.
·   Fair Play Curates, 15-18 October, 2026, One Marylebone, London NW1.

Professional Activities

·    2026– Guest Judge, Enfield Community Art Exhibition.

·    2023–Present – Member of An-X, an artist-led collective focused on critical dialogue, collaborative exhibition-making and curatorial practice. Contributed to the development, installation and delivery of exhibitions and public programmes.

Studio

Studio 118, Proposition studios, 22 Market Square, Poplar, London E14 6AB.

Social Media

Instagram:       @rabiyanagi
LinkedIn:         in/rabiya-nagi
Website:          www.rabiyanagi.com
Vimeo:             vimeo/user12316230
YouTube:        youtube.com/@RabiyaNagi