Institute of International Visual Arts
About iniva
The Institute of International Visual Arts (iniva) is a charity based in Pimlico, London. Founded to challenge inequalities in the visual arts, since1994 we have created spaces for Black and Global Majority artists and communities, nurturing creative practices and expanding the ways we understand art, culture and society. Through commissions, residencies, workshops, exhibitions, and publishing, iniva supports artistic practices that critically engage with lived experiences of racism, anticolonial struggles, identity politics, and social change.
At the heart of iniva is the Stuart Hall Library (SHL), named after the influential cultural theorist, our founding Chair. The SHL houses a world-class collection of over 10,000 volumes, artist books, catalogues, journals, zines, and mixed-media archival materials from over three decades of iniva’s history. Providing a unique research centre dedicated to sharing knowledge, addressing inequality of representation and ensuring the visibility and legacy of diverse artistic practices, the library is a vital gathering space for artist audiences, researchers and communities.
iniva’s core programmes engage artists locally and internationally through our Research Network, Library Residency, Digital Pavilion, CoLab school programme, Exhibitions Programme and public events at the Library and partner venues.
Each year, our work reaches over 70,000 people digitally and 6,000 in person, including 1,900 visits to the Stuart Hall Library. Global Majority audiences represent 63% of our engagement, with young people aged 20–25 making up 20%. iniva continues to create equitable, anti-racist spaces where artists and audiences can explore global and diasporic perspectives together.
Our Vision
Make art from a global perspective accessible to everyone.
Our Mission
We nurture, develop and support anti-racist and equitable spaces that centre Black and Global Majority artists and their communities for creativity, wellbeing, and joy.
Our Values
Care, Community, Collaboration, Access, Education, Justice and Joy.
Our History
The Institute of International Visual Arts has progressed through three main iterations – initially established in East London as an arts agency, then into a gallery-based model at Rivington Place, and under the directorship of Melanie Keen iniva focused on the Stuart Hall Library as the heart of programming. iniva has undergone a scaled transformation fit for purpose as a research-led institution, moving its base to Pimlico in 2018. iniva is nestled within an arts ecology between the University of the Arts – Chelsea and the Tate Britain. iniva is also home to the unique world-renowned collection of the Stuart Hall Library, which contains over 10,000 books from exhibition catalogues, theory texts, periodicals zines and artist monographs. The library is public facing, on the street-level and freely accessible to all who are looking for a space to widen their knowledge and understanding of art history from a globalised perspective.
In 2020, the new Artistic Director, Sepake Angiama, was appointed to take the organisation forward into a new dynamic era. As Director she has continued to strengthen the work of iniva as a small-scale but robust research organisation experimenting with new social forms of artistic research and institutional practice. The new direction of the institution expands upon the relevance and significance of the Stuart Hall Library fostering, nurturing and supporting dialogic and collective exchange, to grow social and research practices and engage with creative communities, locally, nationally and internationally.
In 2024, she was joined by Finance & Operations Director Susannah Gorgeous, and the executive responsibility is now shared between both co-directors.