Sid Sanni (b. Brescia, Italy; lives and works in London) is an artist of Nigerian heritage whose multicultural background informs a practice that merges figuration and abstraction. Drawing from the morphology of African masks and the visual language of cartoons, his work explores diasporic identity and the construction of self.
His paintings combine vibrant colour, bold linework, and geometric structure to create a symbolic language where human presence meets the exaggerated traits of animation. Cartoons are used for their ability to personify human characteristics, allowing emotion, instinct, and behaviour to be expressed with immediacy. Figurative fragments and expressive distortion become a means of examining constructed identities and shifting emotional states.
Brutalist memory forms the foundation of this spatial framework, its weight, density, and structural honesty shaping an early psychological landscape. Modernist clarity enters as a later lived experience, introducing openness, light, and proportion. The tension between these two architectural states defines the emotional atmosphere of the work, allowing compositions to move between containment and freedom, mass and lightness.
Texture and movement play a central role, amplifying the energy of each piece while maintaining a careful balance between control and expression. Across the work, the familiar and the surreal coexist, opening a space between the personal and the imagined.
Exhibitions
2022, New Beginnings, open studio exhibition, London
2023, Perfected Imperfections, group show, collaboration with Kaecen, artistic fragrance house, Covent Garden, London
2026, Vortic Art TBC