Drawn to the News
 

Rahimat Adetunji, founder of Shop Rhai Rahimat Adetunji: "You have to keep at it for it to make sense.” Rahimat Adetunji is a designer based in Nigeria and the creative director and founder of Shop Rhai, an accessories brand that makes shoes and bags from leather and indigenous fabrics. “When I started Rhai, it was just a shoe brand. I wear size 42 or 43 and I have flat feet, so growing up it was really hard to get nice shoes. I remember in my final years in secondary school

Mariia Opal Mariia Opal: "Have fun and just let yourself be imperfect." Mariia Opal is a Ukrainian artist based in London. “I moved to London when I was only about 17 with big dreams and goals, and currently I'm working on them. The main word I could use to describe my art is statement.” Opal says “there are a lot of things that inspire me, but music is probably one of the biggest ones. Every bag I've made has had its own playlist or mood that kind of helped me shape it. I a

Jemiarth: "That sole act of creating is an act of glorifying God." Jemiarth is an artist based in Hong Kong. The painter’s art explores ethereal themes of healing and faith. “Usually, people call me AJ because it's easier to remember. Jemiarth actually comes from my middle name, which is Jemieah, and I just added an art in between it.” “I've grown up Christian, but I wasn't entirely sure of my faith until I actually discovered Jesus for myself in the last few years of high sc

Seun Oyedele: "Everybody has an unfair advantage. Look for it." Seun Oyedele is a textile designer based in Lagos, Nigeria and owner of fashion and textile brand Seun’dele. “Seun’dele started because I spotted a problem, and that problem was that I didn't see any prints that felt like me. All the prints I saw were either too rigid, too stuck in the same colour conversations, or too traditional. And as someone who is an artist, who's obsessed with colour, with pattern, with ju

Joyce Peters Joyce Peters: "I feel like it's a disservice to myself and the world to have all these ideas and not do anything about it." Joyce Peters is a fine art photographer and artist based in the UK. She has been active in the industry for 11 years and for about a year and a half has been selling art and creating stylised self-portraits. The creative says she first felt inspired to take up the art in 2014 when she was in university. “It was actually my friends who encour

Patendoyart Patendoyart: "I think the fact that even one single person has told me that they're inspired by the work I create is enough to keep me creating." Patendoyart is Nigerian abstract motif artist and designer based in London. The painter's paten motif which she started drawing in 2022 appears across a wide variety of mediums from canvas to clothing. “Paten is one of my nicknames, it's a nice coincidence that paten sound a bit like pattern.” She says though she does

Fade the Healer Fade the Healer : "Know what your sound is and stay true to it, whoever gravitates towards it will" Fade the Healer is a Nigerian singer and song writer based in Lagos, Nigeria. In 2022 following the encouragement of friends and family she made her official debut as an independent afro-pop, afro-soul musician, though she says she "still doesn't know how to describe my genre." “I think music is something I was always going to do. Even as a child I was in cho

Semilore Delano Semilore Delano: “You can't plan for certain things to happen, things just fall into place” Why is art worth creating? Why is it worth copious amounts of sacrifice and self-discovery? Semilore Delano's simple answer is "art means living to me.” Delano is a London-based artist from Lagos, Nigeria who studied architecture at the University of Cambridge. After graduating in 2020, Delano reflects on her struggles balancing a rigorous workload with her creative