Shatha Altowai is a Yemeni visual artist, creative practitioner, and performer based in Edinburgh. Her artistic journey, spanning painting, digital art, printmaking, and collaborative theatre and music projects, is shaped by her experience of the Yemeni civil war and her commitment to artistic activism. A recipient of the IIE Artist Protection Fund Fellowship, she has been an artist-in-residence at Edinburgh Printmakers and Art27Scotland, and currently serves as a UNESCO RIELA Affiliate Artist in partnership with musician Saber Bamatraf.
Shatha’s work explores themes of displacement, identity, and heritage, and has been showcased in exhibitions and festivals across the UK, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. She is a winner of the Scottish Women’s Award for Arts & Culture (2022) and the John Byrne Award (2021). Through her art, performances, and public speaking — including at the National Museum of Scotland, PeaceRep workshops, and TEDxLIUSanaa — she continues to champion cultural expression, resilience, and inclusion as tools for peacebuilding and social change.
