Introducing, DEEQA ISMAIL
WoCAA 2026 Finalist
Deeqa Ismail is an artist working across printmaking, sound, video, and installation, often incorporating analogue processes and Somali sonic archives.
Her practice explores hybrid identity and in-between spaces, tracing how colonial histories shape present-day realities. Through film, sculpture, and sound, she creates immersive environments for reflection and imagination.
Recent exhibitions include Castlefield Gallery, Whitechapel Gallery, as part of Numbi arts and Chisenhale Art Place - Salon for speculative futures (SFASF).
Part of the Women of Colour Art Award (WoCAA) 2026 exhibition at 198 Contemporary Arts & Learning.
Chronological Experiments with VHS and Family Archives (2025)
In this snippet from my VHS work, I engage in an experimental dialogue with memory, time, and media. Using VHS footage from family archives, I wanted to craft a series of edits that explore the elasticity of time stored in these devices.
Really thrilled to have my work selected for the upcoming exhibition with @something_useful_project_tw
激活 Activation
藝術微型語言模型 / Micro-Language Models of Art
Responding to “Interweaving and Co-creation: Diverse Pathways of Art Education”, the exhibition extends the conference into a spatial and material context. Where the conference operates through discourse, the exhibition unfolds through practice. Here, ideas are not defined, but experienced.
回應「交織與共構：藝術教育的多元軌跡」主題，本展覽將研討會的討論延伸至空間與物質的實踐場域。當研討會以論述為運作方式，展覽則透過實踐展開。在此，觀念不只是被定義，而是在經驗中被理解。
Exhibition Dates : 9 - 24 May 2026 | Monday closed, 11 am-5 pm
Opening Event : 9 May (Saturday) 14:00
Venue Address (@miartspace2025 ) 1F, No. 31, Ping’an St., Changhua City, Changhua County 500, Taiwan.
For more information: /public-educational/conference-collateral-exhibition
We’re pleased to host Deeqa Ismail (@deeqa_deeqa_deeqa ) for a Kaleidoscope Network talk at Bloc Projects on Thursday, 21 May.
📅 Thursday, 21 May*
🖥 6 - 7:30PM, Online
In Soft Borders, Hard Walls, Deeqa Ismail will explore how her artistic practice connects with family archives, particularly through materiality and sound, to create sonic worlds that extend beyond time and space. She will consider what diversity in spaces looks like for emerging artists beyond the performative and institutional framework, drawing on her experience as a Somali-British artist and curator from London, now living in the North West. She will interrogate the gap between institutional claims of inclusion and the realities faced by emerging artists navigating hybrid cultural identities. Deeqa has taken part in exhibitions and public programmes at Tank Gallery in South London, KALEID Editions in East London and Agora Collective in Berlin, Germany. She is currently doing a practice-based research degree at Manchester School of Art and Design.
*This is a Members-only event and is presented as part of the Kaleidoscope Network programme. To join our community or find out more, see: blocprojects.co.uk/membership
Book your spot through our link in bio or website, blocprojects.co.uk 🎆
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Deeqa Ismail (b. 1988, Hargeisa, Somalia) is a Somali-British artist based in Stockport, Manchester. She works with sculpture, printmaking, sound, video, and installations, often incorporating analogue processes and Somali sonic archives. Her work explores both shared and personal experiences of hybrid identity and the in-between spaces.
Image Credits: Deeqa Ismail
This work in progress takes audio moving through pipes and compresses it into a vertical line, a drawing made from vibration and pressure. Played through the pipes and reconstructed into a sonic visualiser, I love how, instead of expanding outward, the sound folds in on itself.
Closing the chapter on this exhibition today.
After weeks of conversations on reflection, resistance, and change, the space now returns to stillness. For me, deinstalling always feels like watching something slowly exhale after holding so much cosmic energy in.
Grateful for everyone who came through, supported us, questioned, and connected with the works and programme.
Thank you to everybody at Castlefield Gallery ( @castlefieldgall ), and a special thanks to guest curator Cindy Sissokho ( @cindysissokho ) for selecting our proposal. A huge thank you to Alana Lake ( @alanalake.studio ), my co-artist. Thank you to the wonderful artists and practitioners whose work deepened our collective community in these dark times, xhi Ndubisi ( @anotherdiasporan ), Mohammad Ali Sheida ( @shda_ali ), LOkesh Ghai ( @ghailokesh ) and Fayann Smith.
Photos by Castlefield Gallery, Alana Lake and @juleslisterphotography
Gaza Gaza Gaza, 2026
Woodcut print with mixed media on paper
135cm x 100cm
In this print, I wanted to capture a family’s moment of displacement and suspension in the genocide. A father and his children stand in the skeletal remains of their living room, carved using feather patterns. For this, I treated the wood like a sound plate, carving high-frequency scraping sounds into the wood’s natural resonance to amplify a layered sense of destruction and chaos.
Currently on display at Castlefield Gallery ( @castlefieldgall ) until April 19
Photographer @juleslisterphotography
We Are Not Singular (2026)
Woodcut print on paper (100 × 80 cm)
Currently on display at Castlefield Gallery @castlefieldgall (March 15-April 19th 2026)
Work in progress.
Lately I’ve been pushing into larger pieces of wood, rougher cuts, and more space to let the form evolve naturally. Working at this scale is also responding to the material as it shifts in its own direction.
I’ve been experimenting with carving techniques that leave more of the process visible and keeping the wood present.
A bit of jungle music in the studio helps too.
