SAMMY
RAWAL

Indo-African-Canadian Director/Digital Artist SAMMY RAWAL has earned international attention for his original, hyper-stylized approach to image-making featuring bold colour, choreography, and innovation with digital techniques. Sammy is also a DJ and throws Canada’s largest inclusive dancehall / hip hop party that seeks to create spaces for queer people of colour.

Sammy’s work is informed by a mashup of personal and culturally diverse influences, fashion and hip hop. He has brought his signature quick-fire, bold-colour style to 3D inspired video portraits, complex video loops, and digital installations for clients such as Cardi B, Reebok, Equinox, Converse, and Chanel. “I love how a 5-second video loop can effectively tell a story, “ he says.nSammy’s music video work has been nominated at The UK Music Video Awards, The Berlin Music Video Awards, and the Juno Awards. Notable collaborations include projects with Aluna George, Dragonette, Michael Calfan and Hannah Georgas.

Sammy’s passion for LGBTQ rights is seen in work such as his “Body 2 Body“ music video for Dragonette, with its strong pro-trans message. In it, Sammy used the singer Martina Sorbara’s body as a canvas for digital manipulation in a way that skews notions of binary gender. As she rotates like a piece of clay on a pottery wheel, different shapes, sizes and shades of bodies are superimposed to create multifarious selves.

“As a queer P.O.C. visual artist, I want to blur the lines between representations of gender and sexuality.”

SAMMY
RAWAL

LOS ANGELES

NEW YORK

LONDON