Aysha Nagieva

Aysha Nagieva lives and works in London but is originally from Azerbaijan, where she spent her first seven years. A young artist with a Bachelor’s degree in Fine Arts from City & Guilds of London in 2021, she was shortlisted for the ACS Studio Prize in the same year.

Aysha Nagieva paints Nevalyashkas, those traditional roly-poly dolls from former USSR countries, with a weighted base and vibrant colors, using them as a visual diary. Often functioning as self-portraits, she projects her emotions onto these dolls, giving her much more freedom than traditional, realistic self-portraits would allow.

More recently, she has chosen to give her Nevalyashkas animal forms, allowing her to further extend the personal stories she tells in a metaphorical way.