BRADFORD’S Impressions Gallery presents the work of Rawiya, the first all-female photographic collective to emerge from the Middle East.

With a specific focus on gender and identity, the exhibition, which starts next month, presents a thoughtful view of a region in flux, balancing its contradictions while reflecting on social and political issues and stereotypes.

Rawiya, which translates from Arabic as ‘she who tells a story’, is made up of artists who established their careers as photojournalists by working for news agencies and publications across the Arab world. By living and reporting in the region, they gained an insider’s view of the extremities of these settings, while also observing how their reportage could become reframed in the international media’s final edit of events.

Realism in Rawiya is rich with untold stories, from a Palestinian all-female auto racing team and transsexuals in Jerusalem, to cluster bomb survivors trying to rebuild their lives, Iranian mothers of martyrs who visit their son’s grave twice a week and parents in Lebanon who continue to wait for the 17,000 missing to come home.

The photographers see internationally newsworthy events through a local eye, resulting in a personal photographic insight into everyday life in the Middle East. Many artists in Rawiya have also lived the stories they tell.

Artist Newsha Tavakolian states that the work of Rawiya offers “a way of breathing within the smothering world of censorship”.

Realism in Rawiya is a touring exhibition by New Art Exchange (NAE), Nottingham, curated by NAE and Saleem Arif Quadry. This is the first time the entire exhibition will be seen outside Nottingham.

It’s on at Impressions Gallery, City Park, from February 18 to May 16, open Tuesday to Thursday 10am to 6pm and Friday and Saturday 10am to 5pm.