( Artist Profile )

Chidirim
Nwaubani

Homecoming

12–25 October 2026
art'otel London Hoxton | Frieze & 1-54 Week
Solo Presentation

In the press

With a calm yet trailblazing energy, Nwaubani invokes the vision of with the Pan-Africanism of .

Read the article

B. 1988, Lagos / London

// Artist Bio

Chidirim Nwaubani (b. Leeds, United Kingdom · h. Umuahia, Nigeria) is a creative technologist and artist working between Dubai and London. His practice sits at the intersection of technology and culture, building digital experiences that blur the line between art and product.

In 2020 he founded LOOTY, a digital platform repatriating stolen African artefacts into the metaverse. Armed with LiDAR scanners, LOOTY staged a digital heist on the British Museum — capturing high-fidelity 3D scans of looted artefacts and reconstructing them as freely accessible digital objects, with blockchain provenance recorded on-chain.

His work has shown at the Venice Biennale Architettura (2023) and the London Design Biennale (2025), where Ogene MIDI — the Igbo Ogene reimagined as a playable, participatory instrument — received an Honorary Mention. Features include The Guardian and the BBC World Service.

Previous name has expired // changes established
Same same but different

Preparing my solo presentation at art'otel London Hoxton for Frieze & 1-54 Week (12–25 Oct 2026). Alongside it I'm continuing working with Cambridge MAA on reimagining their current archives for this project.

Ogene MIDI — Ritual as Algorithm

London Design Biennale

London, United Kingdom
12 Sep – 14 Sep 2026
Honorary Mention

Special Projects — Architettura

Venice Biennale

Venice, Italy
30 May – 7 Jun 2026
Panel: Decolonising the Museum

LOOTY × Art Dubai — Live Reconstruction

Art Dubai

Dubai, United Arab Emirates
7 Feb – 9 Feb 2025
Fair Floor Commission

The Reclamation

Gallery-Scale Staging

2023
Group Show

Press / 22 Mar 2025Featured in The Guardian: Rewriting Ownership — "a heist in reverse"Read →
Press / 20 Nov 2024BBC World Service: on heritage, technology, and the digital twinListen →
Releases / 18 Apr 2025LOOTY NFT — Season Two mint is open, provenance on-chainMint →
News / 30 Jan 2025Fourteen new LiDAR scans join the Open ArchiveArchive →