Gouled Ahmed

Gouled Abdishakour Ahmed (b. 1992) is an Addis Ababa-based, Somali visual artist, costume designer, and filmmaker. Their work explores the themes of memory and belonging through the lens of self-portrait photography, film, costume design, and textile art.

Gouled is a recipient of the African Cultural Fund’s inaugural grant (2019), the Prince Claus Fund’s inaugural Seed Award (2021), the Sharjah Art Foundation’s Production Programme Grant (2022), the Graham Foundation’s Research Grant (2023), and the 421 Artistic Research Grant (2025).

Their self-portrait photography work is included in a six-year touring exhibition entitled “Africa Fashion,” commissioned by the V&A Museum in London (2022); it has subsequently been shown at the Brooklyn Museum (2023), the Portland Museum of Art (2023/2024), the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia (2024), and the Field Museum (2025).

Gouled participated in the 15th Dak’Art Biennale in Senegal as part of the Black Rock Senegal group exhibition “Encounters” (2024), the Lahti Biennial, Finland (2023), and was recently selected as a participant in the 18th International Triennial of Textile in Łódź, Poland (2025–2026)

Gouled’s collaborative film with Bristol-based Somali poet and filmmaker Asmaa Jama, “The Season of Burning Things” (2021), has been screened at the 17th Venice Architecture Biennale in collaboration with the Goethe Institut and Theater Neumarkt’s “100 Ways to Say We” program. It has subsequently been screened at Oscar-qualifying BlackStar Film Festival (2022), the BAFTA-qualifying Aesthetica Short Film Festival (2022), the Arab film festival at the Barbican Centre in London (2022), and at Art Basel Hong Kong (2023). Their latest collaborative film, “Except This Time Nothing Returns from the Ashes” (2022), has had solo presentations at Spike Island Gallery Bristol, in 2023, and at The Africa Center in Harlem, New York, in 2024. It was most recently screened at the ICA, London, in 2025, through the Bloomberg New Contemporaries program.

Gouled has received fellowships and residencies from Black Rock Senegal (2022), ARCAthens (2025), and the Fine Arts Work Center (2025–2026).

Gouled Ahmed is a participant of the Onassis AiR Extended Research Residencies program for 2025/26.