Born in Pakistan, brought up in Lancashire and now living in Shropshire, Halima Cassell’s broad, multi-cultural background is tangibly present in her work.
Her natural creativity presented itself at an early age and was nurtured to fruition as Cassell carved her way through an art-based education: an undergraduate degree in 1997 and an MA in 2002.
The culmination of this process is Cassell’s precociously mature work. In a perfect marriage of her Asian roots to her fascination for African pattern work and her deep passion for architectural geometry, Cassell’s work is intense yet playful, structured yet creative; substantial and dynamic and invariably compelling in its originality.
Combining strong geometric elements with recurrent patterns and architectural principles, Cassell’s work utilises definite lines and dramatic angles in an attempt to manifest the universal language of numbers and create an unsettling sense of movement.
To achieve these effects she uses relatively dense surfaces and solid forms to carve to her chosen depth. Cassell concentrates on simple forms as the basis of her work in order to maximise the impact of the complex surface patterns in combination with heavily contrasting contours.
In 2021 Cassell was appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the Queen’s 2021 New Year Honours list, for her services to art.
Her work is held in various national and international collections, including the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Hepworth Wakefield and Birmingham Art Gallery.