Aya Chriki

Aya Chriki (born in 1995 in Gabès, Tunisia) is a Paris-based visual artist and PhD candidate in Art History and Fine Arts at the University of Rennes 2, France. Her work, situated at the intersection of artistic creation and academic research, explores themes of exile, gender, displacement, and identity. Through photography, video, writing, and their intersections, she develops a deeply engaged artistic approach grounded in both technical experimentation and conceptual reflection.

Her academic background reflects this dual commitment: after earning a degree in Cinema and Audiovisual Studies (ISAMM, Tunisia, 2017), she completed a Master’s in Photography (Sousse, 2018) and a Master’s in Art Sciences (Saint-Étienne, 2022). During her studies, she focused on moving images as a form of resistance among women artists from the SWANA (South West Asia and North Africa) region. Between 2022 and 2024, her participation in the CAPS program (Creative Approaches to Public Space) at Rennes 2 marked a pivotal turning point, deepening her focus on the visual narratives of women in exile. Since 2024, she has been conducting practice-based doctoral research analyzing the trajectories of exiled women artists across France, Egypt, and Lebanon.

Alongside her research, Aya Chriki develops an artistic practice attentive to the materiality of her media. In analog photography, she explores the relationship between time, matter, and chemical processes to create works with a strong sensory dimension. In video, she experiments with temporality, opacity, and transparency to construct narratives that blur the boundaries between reality and imagination. In 2026, she presented her solo exhibition The Right of Images to Self-Determination at the University of Rennes 2.

Her trajectory is also marked by several artistic residencies. In autumn 2025, she took part in the Halaqat program organized by the Goethe-Institut in Egypt, as part of a three-month photography residency (September 15 to December 15, 2025). This project explored how cinematic imagery shapes our perception of cities, and how photography can be used to challenge and liberate that gaze. She specifically investigated the position of a female photographer in public space, questioning the presence of a female body holding a camera in a city like Cairo. In 2026, she participated in a second residency in Tunisia, Tilal Utique Air (February 16 to March 10), organized by the Kamel Lazaar Foundation, where she developed a project on the relationship to the Mediterranean in a context of migration, addressing the disappearance of the sea as a metaphor for home through photographic practice.

Her work has been exhibited in numerous festivals and galleries in Tunisia, France, Lebanon, Egypt, and the United Arab Emirates. She has received several distinctions, including the Photography Prize at the Gabès Cinéma Fen Festival (2022) and a special mention in the ICTJ writing competition (2024). In 2025, she was selected for the Mediterranean project Tae’thir and led the workshop From the Image, We Build Walls, a Roof, and Windows in Cairo, bringing together migrant artists to explore the notion of “home.”

Through her work, she seeks to interrogate contemporary issues of identity and to cross borders – artistic, academic, and geographical – that she continuously strives to transcend through her artistic practice.

The drawing was created by Elline Baglin.
The photo was taken by Nawres Zriei.