Osman Yousefzada is a British artist and writer, born in Birmingham UK, whose work engages with the representation, rupture, and reimagining of the immigrant experience. His work incorporates textiles, printmaking, installations, sculpture and performance.

Yousefzada has shown at international institutions including: Tate Modern, London; Whitechapel Gallery, London; Ikon Gallery, Birmingham; Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney; Cincinnati Art Museum, Ohio; Ringling Museum, Florida; Lahore Museum, Pakistan; and Design Museum, London. Lahore Biennale, Pakistan and Dhaka Art Summit, Bangladesh.

Yousefzada’s practice has been described as “defiant”, where the participating bodies throughout his work are presented as part objects that refuse to identify or conform.

Most recently, his series of solo interventions titled ‘What Is Seen & What Is Not ‘ was shown at the Victoria and Albert Museum in South Kensington, London. Across three site-specific works, this commission responded to the 75th anniversary of Pakistan independence and its partition, exploring themes of displacement, movement, class, migration, and climate change.

In collaboration with Artichoke, he launched 5000 large-scale billboards in 2024 across four nations, boldly stating “More Immigrants Please” to challenge the dominant narrative and negative depiction of immigrants and small boat crossings.

In April 2025 Yousefzada’s exhibited ‘Welcome! A Palazzo for Immigrants’ at the Palazzo Franchetti, presented by the Fondazione Berengo & V&A in conjunction with the 60Th Venice Biennale.

In May 2024, Yousefzada was invited to prelude Bradford City of Culture 2025 with ‘Where it Began at Cartwright Hall’. His recent large scale solo finishing in April 2025 at The Box in Plymouth (European Museum of the Year), titled ‘When Will We Be Good Enough?’ was reviewed by Ekow Eshun stating that ‘Yousefzada opens new territory in the discourse of colonialism and its afterlife”.

He is a visiting Professor of Interdisciplinary Practice at the Birmingham School of Art, BCU, a visiting Fellow at the Jesus College, Cambridge University and a Research Practitioner at the Royal College of Art. Yousefzada is also the author of ‘The Go-Between’ Memoir of Growing Up Between Different Worlds (2022), a coming-of-age story described by Stephen Fry as ‘one of the greatest childhood memoirs of our time’. Memoir of Growing Up Between Different Worlds (2022), a coming-of-age story described by Stephen Fry as ‘one of the greatest childhood memoirs of our time’.

He/They

@osmanstudio

Photo Courtesy the Artist