Arpita Shah

Commissioned Artist

I am a visual artist and arts community facilitator based in Edinburgh. With a background in photography and film, I predominantly work in these two mediums exploring themes around culture and identity.

As an India-born artist based in Scotland, I spent an earlier part of my life living between India, Ireland and the Middle East before settling in the U.K. This is reflected in my practice, which often deals with the experience of shifting cultural identities. My work tends to draw from Asian and Eastern mythology, using it both visually and conceptually to explore the issues of cultural displacement in the Asian Diaspora.

I recently exhibited my first solo exhibition Nymphaeaceae, which was developed during my artist in residency at Street Level Photoworks. Nymphaeaceae comprised of a collection of portraits that explored the identities, stories and experiences of women from Asian, African and Arab backgrounds living in Scotland.

I recently worked in collaboration with Ankur Productions as part of the Intergenerational Jukebox Project where I worked closely with the South Asian elderly community through a series of storytelling workshops which focused around their childhood memories of music and migration. As part of the project, I produced a short film titled Zindagi Ki Ghazal (The song of life) which was screened at Tron Theatre as part of Mayfesto.