The Jameel Prize is the V&A’s award for contemporary art and design inspired by Islamic art, culture, history, society and ideas. Founded in 2009, the Jameel Prize is open to artists of any background, based anywhere in the world. Over fifteen years, the Prize has celebrated artists who creatively and critically explore the complex heritage of Islam, or engage with issues that affect Muslim communities all over the world today.

This seventh edition is devoted to moving image and digital media – from film, photography and animation to sound, sculpture and virtual reality. The exhibition brings together the work of seven finalists who were selected by a panel of judges from over 300 submissions, following an open call. In a series of intimate, immersive encounters, their diverse practices take us from Palmyra to Karachi, Chibayish to Detroit, Tehran to Kolkata.

Jameel Prize: Moving Images opened at the V&A South Kensington, London, in 2025, and then travelled to Cartwright Hall, Bradford, as part of Bradford’s year as UK City of Culture.

Finalists

Marrim Akashi Sani, Jawa El Khash, Alia Farid, Ramin Haerizadeh, Rokni Haerizadeh and Hesam Rahmanian, Khandakar Ohida (Winner), Sadik Kwaish Alfraji, Zahra Malkani

Curator

Rachel Dedman, Jameel Curator of Contemporary Art from the Middle East, V&A

Rachel Dedman is a curator and writer based in London. As Jameel Curator of Contemporary Art from the Middle East at the V&A, Rachel curates the triennial Jameel Prize, including exhibitions Poetry to Politics, 2021, and Moving Images, 2024. In 2020 she founded the V&A’s Jameel Fellowship programme, a research residency for contemporary artists. In her independent practice, Rachel specialises in fashion and textiles, and in 2024 was co-curator of the State of Fashion Biennial: Ties that Bind in the Netherlands. Between 2013 and 2019, Rachel was an independent curator based in Lebanon, where she curated projects across the Middle East and Europe. Thread Memory grows out of over a decade of work she has done on Palestinian embroidery and dress, which began as curator for the Palestinian Museum. Her exhibitions on tatreez include At the Seams at Dar El-Nimer, Beirut, 2015, Unravelled at Beirut Art Center, 2016, Labour of Love at the Palestinian Museum,  Birzeit, 2018, and Material Power for Kettle’s Yard and the Whitworth, UK, in 2023/24. She is also the author of three books on this subject. Trained in the history of art at St John’s College, Oxford, and Harvard University, Rachel lectures and teaches worldwide.