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Nishat Akhtar

@nishat

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Happy bday Snoopy! I made these paper mache jawns earlier this year for the @the_________show while workin thru a ton of feelings on subjects ranging from burn out (snoopy sleepin on the house) community action (Woodstock peacefully protesting), and fighting the good fight (flying ace). There really is a Snoopy for every occasion. Ty to @sellonb who was so so generous by offering to shoot these lil guys the best studio in PDX @halfcourtstudio and we couldn’t have made it thru wo @itz.cuauhtli 🖤🙏🏽

These pics are just a peek into the strange and silly sculpture archive we captured in a really fun shoot. I’ve been designing a place you can peruse the collection and maybe get a lil something to hold in your hands too….more on that soon.

In the meantime, put on some jazz and do a lil dance for the ultimate good boi Snoopy!!!! 🐶🎂 by @nishat

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12 days ago

Made a lil drawing to commemorate wrapping up nearly nine years at Instrument. 🎉

Feeling incredibly grateful for every friendship, experiment, collaboration, and lesson from that chapter. Thank you to everyone who made those years so meaningful. 🙏🏽

Looking forward to more nature, more making things with friends, and drinking coffee together in our favorite places. See ya somewhere soon ❤️ by @nishat

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2 months ago

The longest days of summer have arrived and it feels like we’re closer to the sun than we’ll be all year. @vivek_thakker and I collabed on a shirt for the @instrument crew heading to Cannes and Config this week. And while I can’t be in multiple places at once, I will be in SF first for Config and then France + UK after. Let’s find each other somewhere.🫣✏️⚽️ by @nishat

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4 months ago

Some feelings arrive in a warm cup. Some leave like a storm cloud

I made this diptych, Exhale Inhale, to join alongside a bunch of other lovely artist’s work at The Smoke Show. Come see it all tomorrow, Saturday June 13th 7-10p at Plink at 19th and Belmont. It’s one night only, so carpe diem! @the________show 🖤☕️💨 by @nishat

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4 months ago

Spent a perfect Sunday drawing w some old friends and some new ones in prep for a one day art show fundraising for @pirc_oregon. Artwork will be sold for a steal at $55 a pop with 100% of proceeds being donated to the Portland Immigrant Rights Coalition.

It was such a special day meeting folks, sharing materials, nerding and drawing for hours. A lot of great work was made for a good purpose. So save the date and hope see you there!!!!!!!

May 30th 3601 Division st, 4-8pm. @asometimesgallery
@mariah_bn Tysm for organizing!

Ps If you can’t make it to the show, it’s still worth supporting PIRC efforts directly!!!! They are a great org doing meaningful direct action work on the ground for families affected by ICE. Injustice is still happening every day, support how you can. 🖤✏️☮️🙏🏽 by @nishat

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5 months ago

Drawings of some things that actually happened and some other things that haven’t quite yet. But I’ll be smellin flowers and buyin fruit at a market in France this summer, I know it. 🥖🇫🇷 by @nishat

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5 months ago

Last week in NY I committed to not scrolling while on the train or waiting in line and instead drew the people and places in my surroundings. You really do notice a lot if you just make the effort and time to look around…. by @nishat

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5 months ago

These photos were taken one week ago and 17 years ago. Friendship is forever…and apparently so is how we dress. 😆❤️ @braulioamado
📸 @m_h_raines by @nishat

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7 months ago

More drawings from the Exhaust show! Each one is a part of an unfinished narrative that I’ll maybe reveal (or finish) someday. In the meantime enjoy em as is.

Up now at @fiskgallery
224 NW 13th in PDX
Plz reach out to fisk for gallery times and other inquiries including if you want to take a piece of mine or Bráulio’s home! 🩶 by @nishat

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7 months ago

If you were at the opening for EXHAUST, @braulioamado and my new show, I probably shared w you the inspiration for my car pile up drawings came from the 80s film The Blues Brothers. There’s a legendary stretch where cop cars just keep crashing into each other…pileups on pileups, driven by the sheer buffoonery of the pursuit.

We started planning for the show late January when things felt especially grave in the states and particularly Minneapolis. A slapstick comedy is obviously far from that reality, but those chaotic images stuck in my mind and had to come out somehow. The pileups and the paper-mâché car fit so naturally with the show theme. All that w a series of drawings of a character making her way through daily frustrations…in particular the drawing w a figure standing above another car pile up is a reminder to not let the struggle bring us down! It’s brought to life even more by a very sick mural behind it by Bráulio. Our work sits next to each other throughout the gallery, and w multiple murals filling the space.

The show is up thru 5/2, plz go check it out, it was a labor of love and of friendship, for which I am so so grateful. Bijan was an unbelievable force in making this idea a reality, and doing this all side by side w Bráulio was an absolute joy. ❤️

Inquiries to @fiskgallery
Photos by @m_h_raines
Film still from Blues Brothers! by @nishat

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7 months ago

Announcing our first program of the year, EXHAUST, a two-person exhibit featuring new drawings by Nishat Akhtar (Portland) and paintings by Bráulio Amado (NYC) opens March 5, 5-8pm 💨

FISK at W+K Portland
224 NW 13th Ave,
Portland, OR 97209

The show examines the aesthetics of breakdown, both in a mechanical and emotional sense, through two bodies of work that are in dialogue with each other. Amado’s paintings capture the grit and exhaustion of everyday life through shapes and forms that contain play and optimism. In turn, Akhtar’s drawings stage vignettes of uneasy collision and slapstick defeat. Working in a related spirit but different expressions, we see abstract and figurative explorations on instability, release and reclamation from the two artists who are straddling notions of breakdown and becoming. Together, the exhibit reflects on how energy dissipates, how systems fray, and how exhaustion itself can become its own visual and emotional force for connection.

Nishat Akhtar is a Portland-based designer, illustrator and visual artist working across drawing, publishing, and visual storytelling. Her work blends thoughtful composition with a spirit of play, curiosity, and human-centered inquiry, often distilling complex ideas and emotions into precise, expressive line drawings.

Bráulio Amado is a Portuguese-born, New York–based graphic designer, illustrator, and visual artist working across posters, record covers, editorial illustration, prints, publications, and immersive installations. Known for a playful, improvisational visual language, his work blurs the boundaries between commercial design and fine art through bold color, warped typography, and energetic, rule-breaking compositions. taken in Wieden + Kennedy by @nishat

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8 months ago

Daily dissonance and doom scrolling is not what the doctor ordered. I’ve managed to unstick myself from hard things, but doomscrolling at night has to be one of the hardest habits I’ve managed to get away from…and the other side is pretty nice. There’s a whole brain of thoughts and world of other stuff to do. by @nishat

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8 months ago