Afghanistan’s First Female Street Artist Has First Solo Exhibition in UK

In Tehran, where Shamsia Hassani was born to Afghan refugees in 1988, restrictive policies denied her access to a formal arts education due to her immigrant status. It wasn’t until Hassani and her family returned to their native Afghanistan in 2005 that she could fully pursue that passion, earning degrees in the visual arts from Kabul University. Now, two decades later, Hassani, who is known as “Afghanistan’s first female graffiti and street artist,” is staging her first solo exhibition in the United Kingdom.

Currently on view at Dorothy Circus Gallery in London, The Dreamer catalogs the impact and significance of Hassani’s street art, which considers themes like feminism, displacement, gendered oppression, resilience, and hope. Much of Hassani’s work incorporates singular, highly illustrative figures, often enveloped in stylized burqas and depicted with their eyes firmly shut. Hassani strikes a delicate balance throughout these compositions, evoking the simultaneous determination and historical suppression of Afghan women by repurposing cultural symbols.

“I prefer that the signs of my roots be present in each of my works in some way, whether in the content or in the margins and details,” Hassani tells My Modern Met. “My character’s clothes, for example, are a combination of traditional Afghan clothes and my own creations.”

Kites also figure strongly within Hassani’s work, as seen in the artist’s 2023 acrylic painting Freedom. The piece showcases a woman set against a gray background, her hands outstretched and cradling a small pot. The pot isn’t home to a plant or flower, as would be expected, but instead a white kite. As if urging the woman to follow it, the kite shoots out from the pot, soaring away from the gray canvas and into its own smaller canvas doused in a sky blue. The contrast is both deceptively simple yet provocative, joining together disjointed realities—or canvases, in this case—into one cohesive image.

“The kites in my paintings are a reminder of the beautiful and free days of Afghanistan, a reminder of the flow of life,” Hassani explains. “Many other characteristics that are remembered in me from being Afghan can be discovered in every corner of my works.”

It’s true that Hassani’s work benefits from an attentive eye, but she knows that this isn’t always a given. In fact, this conundrum is what originally drew her to graffiti and street art.

“Sometimes, a work of art needs to be seen many times to be remembered,” she says. “Street art gives people the opportunity to see more, learn more, and become curious.”

Given their sheer scale, murals demand not only attention, but space. Sprawling across city walls, Hassani’s graffiti effectively becomes “part of people’s daily lives,” nearly impossible to avoid or forget, whether it be during a regular commute home or a quick visit. Their immediacy, combined with their “layered content” and “symbolic style,” make for compositions that encourage optimism as well as reflection about how, exactly, the current realities faced by Afghan women can be reimagined.

As for The Dreamer, Hassani is most excited about gallery visitors and, in particular, British audiences being able to encounter her work in-person.

“The fact that people see my works up close and see my work in detail is a great achievement for me,” she adds. “I can look at my paintings through the eyes and mind of another person and get acquainted with new dimensions of my paintings.”

Shamsia Hassani: The Dreamer is currently showing at Dorothy Circus Gallery in London through May 31, 2025.

The Dreamer, Shamsia Hassani’s first solo exhibition in the UK, unveils the Afghan street artist’s singular, highly illustrative style.

For years, Hassani has created graffiti and street art that considers themes like feminism, displacement, gendered oppression, resilience, and hope.

Shamsia Hassani: The Dreamer is on view at Dorothy Circus Gallery in London through May 31, 2025.

Exhibition Information
Shamsia Hassani
The Dreamer
May 1–May 31, 2025
Dorothy Circus Gallery
35 Connaught Street, London W2 2AZ

Shamsia Hassani: Website | Instagram
Dorothy Circus Gallery: Website | Instagram

My Modern Met granted permission to feature photos by Dorothy Circus Gallery.

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