Helga Arnalds is an Icelandic visual and performance artist whose practice moves between clay, painting, drawing and performance.

She holds a BA in Fine Art from the Iceland University of the Arts and an MA in Performing Arts from the same institution. She has also studied ceramics, experimental drawing and painting, and printmaking at Aarhus Kunstakademi.

Her visual art practice is rooted in material, touch and bodily perception. She is interested in how forms emerge through an exchange between hand, body and material – a way of working she sometimes describes as “listening to material.”

Alongside her visual art practice, Arnalds has developed an extensive international career in visual theatre and performance. Material has remained central throughout this work, including paper, sand, earth, water and clay. In recent years these strands have increasingly converged in her work with clay, painting and performance.