Stephen Akpo makes paintings and sculptures by hand, pressing, wearing back and rebuilding surfaces across extended periods of time. Based in London, his practice moves between abstraction and figuration without settling in either, producing forms that emerge slowly and refuse fixed interpretation.

Akpo works almost entirely through touch. His practice is oriented around proximity and duration rather than optical distance, the body close to the surface, sensation preceding image, time accumulated in the material itself. Paint is not applied so much as negotiated: built, eroded and rebuilt until something true becomes visible.

His practice is shaped by his experience of partial sight and by his sustained work with vulnerable and displaced communities in London. Rather than depicting specific narratives, Akpo's compositions hold the imprint of psychological states and bodily memory, articulating endurance, fragility and the shifting terrain of lived experience.

Akpo has exhibited across the UK, with a residency and solo presentation at the Sarabande Foundation and participation in the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition. His work has been presented during Frieze Week and London Fashion Week, and featured by BBC The One Show, Wallpaper, The Standard and Grazia. He was shortlisted for the Mosaic Art Awards and his work is held in private collections.