Info:
Immaculata Abba is an artist, researcher, and cultural producer.
Her research spans history, cultural theory, and economic life in West Africa with projects on topics such as market women’s thought, colonial masculinity, and the legacies of the transatlantic slave trade in Nigeria’s colonial period. She holds degrees from Queen Mary University of London and the University of Oxford.
From 2020-2025, under the name Studio Styles, she produced projects on cultural advocacy (#CulturePays), social healing (Sweet Medicine), and relational reflection (Restful, the anthology), supported by volunteer contributions, the Open Society Foundations, and the Goethe-Institut Nigeria, respectively.
As an artist working in film, writing, and photography, her acclaimed short film You Matter to Me (2022) debuted at Film Africa/the BFI London and has been screened internationally. She is currently developing a second film, a product of the Goethe-Institut Nigeria’s post-Memory, post-Archive (2024) workshop. Her essays and features have explored Africapitalism, spirituality, ecology, art, and everyday survival in Nigeria. She is the 2023 winner of the Abebi Award for Afro-nonfiction for her essay The Fire in My Memory.
Immaculata was a 2022 West African Writer-in-Residence at LOATAD in Accra, Ghana and a participant in the 2023 New York Portfolio Review. She lives in Enugu, Nigeria.
Informally:
I like peace and quiet. I love exploring food; I love enjoying food.
My favourite place in the world is any bedroom I can call mine. My favourite moment is every time before I fall asleep. Until I find a partner, my favourite thing to do is work. Music. I am happy to be alive in this world, and I am really grateful for that and many more things. I value integrity and revel in details. And in colours. I look forward to making music and playing with wood and fabric more seriously.
Also, I like making meaning and sense of things, Nigerian life especially. Beyond Nigerian life in particular, I just really like finding out how things are made, where things are, and how things work—and being as precise as I can be at it because journeying is fun.
I love working on things I’m passionate about. Not being precise and not doing the things I love used to feel like I was failing God, but we’re cool now. There’s no failing. I’m part of something vast, and my job is just to stay present and available to it. I enjoy feeling feelings, defining the world for myself, and participating in this very wonderful gift of life.
My favourite place in the world is any bedroom I can call mine. My favourite moment is every time before I fall asleep. Until I find a partner, my favourite thing to do is work. Music. I am happy to be alive in this world, and I am really grateful for that and many more things. I value integrity and revel in details. And in colours. I look forward to making music and playing with wood and fabric more seriously.
Also, I like making meaning and sense of things, Nigerian life especially. Beyond Nigerian life in particular, I just really like finding out how things are made, where things are, and how things work—and being as precise as I can be at it because journeying is fun.
I love working on things I’m passionate about. Not being precise and not doing the things I love used to feel like I was failing God, but we’re cool now. There’s no failing. I’m part of something vast, and my job is just to stay present and available to it. I enjoy feeling feelings, defining the world for myself, and participating in this very wonderful gift of life.
Unless otherwise stated, all images and writing on this website were made by Immaculata Abba.
Copyright: Immaculata Abba (2017 - 2025)