17/08/2026
Artist Millie Shafiee is currently completing a residency at Orleans House Gallery .art
Millie says: “I am a UK-based, half-Persian artist. During my residency at The Workshop at Orleans House Gallery, I have developed a new body of work through drawing, painting, moving image and sound. By using recordings of family conversations in Farsi and English, combined with film stills and video games, I intended to generate imagery that reflects an imagined, hopeful, evolving vision of Iran.
I’ve found myself returning to the stories my family tells about Rasht (a city by the Caspian Sea) – the fish markets, the rice paddy fields, the smell of freshly harvested rice, the rustle of fabric as women prepare to wade through the water, the shifting light, and the constant rain. These vivid descriptions, communicated through fragmented Farsi and English, create shifting, fluid, and imagined visions of a real yet fantastical landscape. I am interested in the interplay of these imaginary landscapes rooted in ancestral stories that exist somewhere between family history, longing, and fiction.
I’ve also been experimenting with the material qualities of painting - thinning oil paint until it almost behaves like ink. I explored building deep tinted blacks through layers and using mediums such as Liquin on textured surfaces to create paintings that feel fluid, unstable, and atmospheric. These material experiments have become another way of thinking about memory itself—how it blurs, shifts, and leaves traces.
I’m grateful to everyone at Orleans House Gallery who made this residency possible, and to the artists I shared this experience with. Thank you for the conversations, generosity, and support throughout. I’m looking forward to continuing this work and seeing where these stories lead next.”
Millie’s residency is part of the Artists Make Space programme, which offers free space for artists based in Richmond Borough.
