BIO
Bradford, UK, 1994.
Lives and works in London.
Lilian Nejatpour is a British-Iranian artist who shifts between making sculptural forms and sound structures. She often investigates displacement and duality through her unique settings and experiences. With influences taken from Southern Iran, to her northern background in bassline music from Bradford, much of her work is a dialogue between performance, sound, and theory. She questions how these very distinct modes operate alongside one another and what problems arise when captured and re-situated in discourse.
Nejatpour gained a First Class BA Honours Degree in Fine Art and History of Art from Goldsmiths, University of London (2013-2016). After completing her studies in 2016, Lilian went on to represent Iran as an artist in residence for the cultural exchange between NODE Forum for the Digital Arts (Frankfurt) and TADAEX (Tehran’s Annual Digital Arts Festival). The residency was kindly supported by the Goethe-Institut, TADAEX (Iran), VVVV (Frankfurt) and Ars Electronica (Austria).
From 2017-2019, Nejatpour was a studio resident at Somerset House Studios in London under the mentorship of Imran Perretta, before receiving a full Oxford Graduate Humanities Studentship to pursue her Master’s degree in Fine Art at The Ruskin School of Art at The University of Oxford (2019-2020), which was completed with Distinction in 2020.
Recent Publications include When You Blossom I Bloom: Baesianz, The Royal College of Art (2021); Return: Paadmaan Projects, Tehran (2021); Displacement and Duality: Oxford Student Publications Ltd (2019); GORRSED: Art Licks Issue 22 at Tender Books, London (2018) and Absinthe §2: Elam x Kronos Publishing (2019). Selected Exhibitions include Hoist at Bold Tendencies, Peckham (2020); Lilian’s Vow at Photoworks, London (2019) and 4:3 Boiler Room (2019); Choreophobia at Somerset House, London, Edinburgh Fringe Festival (2018) and Chisenhale Studios, London (2018); Choreophobia II at Turner Contemporary, Margate (2018) and Saint (The Empty Pose) at The Photographer’s Gallery, London (2017). International Exhibitions and Residencies include The Venice Biennale Fellowship in partnership with the British Council (2021); Hope Machine at Cairotronica (Cairo Electronic and New Media Arts Festival), Cairo Palace of Arts (2018); A Social Script for Prompt Relief at Cyan Gallery, Oslo (2018); Hope Machine in collaboration Simon Weckert for Node Forum for the Digital Arts and the Goethe-Institut at Naxoshalle, Frankfurt (2017) and Dumbphne at TADAEX (Tehran Annual Digital Art Festival), Mohsen Gallery, Tehran (2016).
She is a currently a member of EAST (Eating At the Same Table Collective), WANAWAL (The West African and North African Women's Archive), and Collective Ending.