HOSSEI
HOSSEI is a multidisciplinary Australian artist of Persian, Turkish, and Russian ancestry, based on Gadigal Land in Sydney.
Working across performance, film, sound, photography, sculpture, costume design and installation, HOSSEI’s work centres on the transformative and healing potential of art. His practice explores softness as a form of strength. Working across performance, installation, and costume, he creates immersive worlds that draw audiences into moments of care, play, and emotional release. His work is deeply collaborative, often developed through long rehearsal processes that prioritise trust, vulnerability, and togetherness, his work often unfolds through voice, movement, and collaboration, bringing together real and imagined figures within emotionally charged, theatrical worlds. His work is shaped by lived experiences, cultural memory, dreams, pop sensibility, and the everyday rituals of family and community, often blurring the line between performance, gathering, and healing, his practice explores how intimacy, fantasy, and ritual can be used to build shared experiences that feel both tender and surreal.
HOSSEI recently presented TOO~B at the Sydney Opera House, a playspace for the Centre for Creativity. His recent major presentations include THUNDERBLOOM:LIVE at Carriageworks as part of Performance Space’s Liveworks Festival (2024), and the video installation and performance project THUNDERBLOOM at West Space, Melbourne (2023). In 2024, he presented ESSSENSSSE at Verge Gallery and U.F.O. (Uncontrollable Feelings Occasionally) at Blacktown Arts Centre. ESSSENSSSE is now touring regionally in association with Museums & Galleries of NSW. His earlier work O, created during the 2022 UTS Artist in Residence program, was publicly presented in 2023 at UTS Gallery & Art Collection through the Faculty of Design, Architecture, and Building.
HOSSEI was selected for Primavera 2014: Young Australian Artists at the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia and has undertaken several residencies including Parramatta Artist Studios (2014–2015), Artspace (2016), PAS Open Digital Residency (2021–2022), and the PAS Rydalmere studio (2023–2025). He holds a Bachelor of Visual Arts (First-Class Honours) from Sydney College of the Arts. HOSSEI is the current resident in the City of Sydney live/work space in Waterloo.
In this interview, HOSSEI reflects on the evolution of his art practice, including the personal and creative impact of stepping away from practice to care for his mother. He speaks about art’s capacity to support healing and connection, particularly for marginalised and underrepresented communities. HOSSEI shares how stepping back from constant production opened up space for intuition to lead, allowing ideas to surface gradually and with greater clarity.
Video production by Atypical 2025.
Image: HOSSEI, photo by Jamie James, James Photographic Services, 2025.
ID: Photo of HOSSEI seated in a colourful studio space, surrounded by soft sculptural artworks, posters, and vibrant textiles.
About NAVA
The National Association for the Visual Arts (NAVA) is a Membership organisation that brings together the many voices of the contemporary arts sector to improve fundamental conditions of work and practice. We do this through advocacy, education and the Code of Practice.
