Sirena Varma

is a multidisciplinary designer and artist who works across the visual arts, graphic design and exhibition design from Beirut, based in Magan-djin (Brisbane). Through processes grounded in collaboration and co-creation, Sirena brings forth evocative engagements on cultural care, collective memory and visual story-telling. Sirena’s design work has been featured in Beirut Design Week, Dutch Design Week, Frame Magazine and the Institute of Modern Art. 

Formerly an architect and now a graphic designer, Sirena is the co-founder and creative director of Twig Collaborative, where she has spent over a decade refining her creative and collaborative processes. Through Twig Collaborative, Sirena has worked with clients from major global brands and academic institutions such as Uber, Beirut Art Center, Parsons The New School, and University of Chicago. Bringing her array of skills to data visualisation as the lead designer for the United Nations Development Program project on the 2020 Beirut port explosion, this work has since become one of UNDP Lebanon’s most-shared links. Guided by her commitment to cultural care and resistance through art, Sirena co-founded Magan-djin Creatives for Palestine with artist and print-maker, Prita Tina Yeganeh, designing branding and scenography for Magan-djin for Palestine exhibitions and activations. 

Sirena’s interdisciplinary praxis is shaped by creative processes that embrace engaging with a range of mediums and collaborators, alongside inspiration drawn from her Lebanese, Palestinian, German and Indian heritage and personal experience with migration. Sirena’s most recent exhibition, Blatt & Matonelli: Mosaic Morphologies, developed with Katherine Palella and presented by Outer Space, reimagines traditional tile-making practices to craft a contemporary visual conversation with the aesthetics of the Levant and Mediterranean and the various waves of migration to Australia since the 1960s. 

Photograph by Thomas Oliver www.thomasoliver.photo

Writing by Lamisse Hamouda

Artboard 16 copy 10.png
Artboard 16 copy 4.png
Artboard 16.png
Artboard 16 copy 12.png
Artboard 16 copy 3.png
Artboard 16 copy 6.png
Artboard 16 copy 11.png
Artboard 16 copy 2.png
Artboard 16 copy 7.png
Artboard 16 copy.png
Artboard 16 copy 5.png
Artboard 16 copy 9.png

CV

  • 2015 - Present
    Lead Designer & Co-founder, Twig Collaborative

    2021 - 2024 
    Senior Graphic Designer, Performance Frontiers. Brisbane, QLD 

    2020 - Present
    Guest Lecturer, Parsons School of Design.  

    2014 - 2015
    Architect, Khatib & Alami. Beirut, Lebanon  

    2013 
    Junior Architect, Polypod. Beirut, Lebanon

  • 2009 - 2014
    Bachelor of Architecture, American University of Beirut  

  • 2026
    q/g(h)alibi: A Collective Process, Outer Space, Brisbane, QLD

    2025 
    Blatt & Matonelli: Public Art Installation, Fish Lane Town Square Vitrines. Brisbane, QLD

    2025 
    Blatt & Matonelli: Mosaic Morphologies, Judith Wright Arts Centre, Outer Space 2025 Façade Exhibition Program. Brisbane, QLD

    2024 
    Magan-djin Creatives for Palestine: 12 Months of Solidarity, Kepk. Brisbane, QLD

    2024 
    Magan-djin Creatives for Palestine:The First Gathering, Vacant Assembly. Brisbane, QLD

    2022 
    Beirut Octet, Saleh Barakat Gallery. Beirut, Lebanon

    2020 
    Art in Isolation: Creativity in the time of COVID19, Middle East Institute’s Arts & Culture Center. Washington D.C., USA

    2019 
    Return Journeys Retrospective, Saleh Barakat Gallery. Beirut, Lebanon

    2018
    50th Architecture Anniversary, American University of Beirut. Beirut, Lebanon

    2017 
    Shifting Lights Exhibition, Beit Beirut. Beirut, Lebanon

  • 2025
    Zine: A Breath, Afaf Zurayk

    2022 
    Beirut Octet, A Generation’s Journey of Resilience & Faith by Afaf Zurayk 

    2021 
    The View From Within by Afaf Zurayk 

    2020 
    Beyond Art by Afaf Zurayk

    2019 
    Return Journeys Monograph by Afaf Zurayk

    2019 
    Drawn By Light by Afaf Zurayk

    2017 
    Shifting Lights Monograph by Afaf Zurayk, Noel Nasr, and Twig Collaborative

  • 2024   
    Wearable Objects, Institute of Modern Art Gallery Shop, Open House. Brisbane, QLD

    2022 
    Twig Kit, Dutch Design Week 2022. 

    2017 - 2022 
    Modular Thing, Dutch Design Week 2022, Beirut Design Week 2017 

    2020   
    Permutable Kit, Beirut Art Center. Beirut, Lebanon

  • 2025
    Special guest interview with artist & graphic designer, Sirena Varma, Reclaiming the Me in Mine Podcast

    2025
    Blatt & Matonelli: Paint, Carve, and Pattern Workshops, House Conspiracy, Brisbane, QLD

    2025
    Why Collectives, Panel Discussion, Brisbane Multicultural Arts Centre, Brisbane, QLD