Medya Stemerding Shikhagaie is a Kurdish-Swedish contemporary photographer and immunologist who is based in Haarlem.
Born in Iran, she grew up under a regime that suppressed the Kurdish language and culture. Her early life was shaped by her family’s experience of political persecution and exile. After fleeing to Sweden at the age of nine, the search for belonging has remained a central theme in her work. Through her photographs, she r explore themes of displacement, memory, cultural erasure and identity.
© Frank Degen