Born stateless, raised in exile, Linda Abdullah turned inherited trauma into art — finding that for Palestinians, hope isn’t just a feeling, it’s an act of survival.
Linda Abdullah is an interdisciplinary artist and designer who grew up stateless — born to a Palestinian father displaced during the 1948 Nakba, she spent her life navigating a world where she belonged nowhere. In this deeply personal talk, Linda weaves together her family’s story of loss and displacement with her own journey as an artist, immigrant, and mother, exploring how art becomes a tool for processing grief, honoring ancestry, and resisting erasure. From sculpting moving concrete to curating exhibitions for Gaza artists amid active conflict, Linda shows how creativity and community can be a lifeline in the darkest of times — and why, for Palestinians, hope is not optional. It is how they survive.
About the speaker
Linda is an interdisciplinary visual artist, designer, curator and daughter of Historic Palestine. She holds a BSc in Visual Communications from the American University of Sharjah (United Arab Emirates) and an MFA in Interdisciplinary Art Media and Design from OCAD University (Canada).
Linda lived most of her life in the Middle East before moving to North America. This cultural, intellectual and visual shift has engendered a series of experimental projects that allowed her to view her own culture as an outsider for the first time and to look at her being from the perspective of intellectual exile. Her work acts as a commentary on social, cultural and political themes through critical thinking that translates into optic and haptic modes of representation.
Linda exhibited her work in Dubai, Toronto, Rome and Chicago where she currently lives with her family. She is a recipient of the Jackman Goldwasser artist in residence at the Hyde Park Art Centre forthcoming in 2027.
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