Nila Onda is a New York City-based cross-disciplinary artist. She has produced a multi-faceted body of work ranging from photography and experimental film to painting and printmaking. She is inspired by nature, ideas in quantum physics, eastern philosophy, Zen aesthetics and the complex symbolic language of geometric patterns in Islamic art. She explores the inner workings and subtle realities of life in its infinite varieties of forms, patterns, networks of connections, and processes of transformation. Her images originate from a deep sense of mystery within. Nila creates otherworldly environments, constructing a narrative of opposites, a cyclical continuum where, macrocosm and microcosm, science and mysticism, inner and outer worlds, converge into a vision of an interconnected system. Through her practice she hopes to awaken deeper insights into ourselves and our relationship with the world.

Nila was born in Rome and spent her formative years pursuing her passion for art, music, dance and science. A young cinephile and self-taught photographer, Nila built her first darkroom at age fifteen and developed a strong interest in chemistry, that led her to study alternative processes with Peter Fredrick, inventor of the Tempera Print Process. After attaining her BA from IED (European Institute of Design), she moved to London where she has spent most of her adult life working in film and television production - delivering image content for documentary, news & current affairs - and as a film and photography lecturer at Westminster-Kingsway College. Her work has been exhibited in New York (Urban Space Gallery), London (The Lux Centre) and auctioned for charity in Rome. In 2014 she embarked on a long journey through the Peruvian Amazon. This immersive experience of profound connection with nature and humankind had a powerful personal and artistic impact that resonates in her current work. She returns to the tropical jungle every year. In 2016, she was the recipient of the Black and White Spider Award in the category of silhouette. She has also received nominations in the categories of architectural, nature and still life. In 2017 her work was nominated in the category of wildlife. Her series “As Above So Below” is part of the virtual SciArt Initiative exhibit “The Void and the Cloud.”