Oxford’s Ashmolean and the Samdani Foundation launch a program for Bangladeshi artists

The Ashmolean Museum in Oxford and the Samdani Art Foundation have announced a new partnership to support contemporary artists from Bangladesh, as the British art magazine FAD Magazine reports.

The partnership combines an annual visiting artist program with the development of a dedicated collection of Bangladeshi contemporary art at the museum. The program, called “Ashmolean Samdani Visiting Artist”, will invite one artist from Bangladesh to Oxford each year for a two-week residency, offering access to the museum’s collections, archives and curatorial expertise.

The first invited artist is Munem Wasif, an artist, curator and educator based in Dhaka, whose practice moves between photography, the moving image, archival material and collected objects. His work often explores questions of transience, precarity and the colonial history of Bengal. During his stay in Oxford, he will work with the Ashmolean’s collections and archives, building links with the wider cultural community around the University of Oxford.

“For years, my practice has returned to the colonial history of Bengal, often through the fragments that remain. The Ashmolean Samdani Visiting Artist gives me the opportunity to see this history more closely, through the museum’s collections and archives,” Wasif says.

Alongside the residency program, the Ashmolean and the Samdani Art Foundation will build a dedicated collection of contemporary art from Bangladesh, with new works entering the museum’s collection every year. The museum has already acquired works by Ashfika Rahman with the Foundation’s support, and further acquisitions are planned as part of a broader effort to strengthen its holdings of South Asian contemporary art.

The partnership marks 15 years of the Samdani Art Foundation’s work supporting Bangladeshi artists through exhibitions, prizes, residencies and international collaborations. “For 15 years, the Samdani Art Foundation has been committed to creating opportunities for Bangladeshi artists to develop their practices and reach new audiences; this new partnership with the Ashmolean is a natural extension of that vision: to create lasting cultural bridges between Bangladesh and the world,” says Nadia Samdani MBE, president and co-founder of the Foundation.

The head of the Ashmolean’s Department of Eastern Art, Professor Mallica Kumbera Landrus, says the program will create new ways of interpreting the museum’s collection through the perspectives of contemporary artists. The Ashmolean’s Department of Eastern Art already holds an important South Asian collection, and the new initiative aims to connect those historic holdings with contemporary artistic practice.

The partnership follows the Foundation’s other recent projects in the United Kingdom and Europe. Earlier this year, the Foundation supported a solo exhibition by Soma Surovi Jannat at the Ashmolean, described as the first solo exhibition by an artist from Bangladesh at a British museum. The Foundation has also announced a partnership with Kunsthalle Basel to host the Samdani Art Award in November 2026.