Lead Artists
Touchlines of Fortitude I (11-21 September 2025)
Agnieszka Lokaj
Agnieszka Lokaj is a contemporary artist and curator whose socially engaged practice is shaped by her lived experience of ADHD. After a career in sport and digital technology, she found her creative voice through visual art. Blending storytelling, participation, and accessibility, Agnieszka’s work bridges art, sport, and resilience.
Her artwork has been exhibited at Guildford House Gallery, Brighton Art Fair, The Beach Gallery and was selected for the Royal Birmingham Society of Artists Friends’ 2025 Exhibition. Agnieszka was longlisted for The Women in Art Emerging Artist Prize 2024 and Visual Art Open 2024 & 2025 Award. In 2024 she has been selected to take part in Re:Create Richmond!, an innovative business support programme designed to boost the creative industries in the London borough of Richmond Upon Thames.
In 2024, Agnieszka was chosen to take part in Re:Create Richmond!, a business support programme designed to boost the creative industries in the borough. She recently curated Spring Tide: A New Wave of Art at MAGAN Gallery in Tooting — a successful open call group exhibition featuring over 60 artists.
She has also been awarded Arts Council funding for Touchlines of Fortitude, an inspiring programme of cultural and creative events celebrating female resilience, set to take place across the Richmond borough in 2025.
website: agalokaj.art
Gina DeCagna
Gina DeCagna is a London-based contemporary artist working across visual media, text and participatory forms. Her practice explores how personal and collective stories are shaped, especially in relation to power and memory.
She earned her MFA at Goldsmiths, University of London, following a BA in English, Creative Writing and Fine Arts from the University of Pennsylvania. Her work has been exhibited and published in London, New York and Philadelphia. She currently serves as artistic director of Palimpsest Projects, a multimedia curatorial platform exploring how stories are told, erased and rewritten, and she also works in cultural learning and public engagement, currently as Creative Learning Manager at the Landmark Arts Centre in Teddington.
A former football player for 20 years, her lived experience of sport informs her understanding of embodied resilience, making Touchlines of Fortitude an exciting project to delve into how communities and identities are formed through the storytelling components of movement, voice and image.
Tahira Mandarino
Through the use of drawing, painting, textile film, photography and site specific, Tahira brings to light aspects that are often hidden or overlooked.
Central to the work is the theme of exposure, capturing moments of vulnerability and emotional unveiling, while also embodying the paradox of being seen but not seen.
Simultaneously Tahira explores the absence of the father, delving into the emotional and quiet void left by his departure.
Through this exploration, the work sparks a conversation about loss, identity, and the complexities of relationships, allowing each viewer to form their own understanding and connection to the themes. Tahira embraces a symbiotic approach, emphasising that nothing exists entirely by itself.