Fathima Mohiuddin, aka Fatspatrol, is a phenomenal artist who, when asked about her national identity, describes herself as: "An award-winning artist of Indian origin, with a Dubai upbringing and a Canadian passport."

She creates massive murals, painting sweeping images of giant birds, human faces, and more. Fatspatrol’s work is instantly recognizable by her bold graphic style and signature colour choices. She has a deep love for black and white, believing, "Black and white feel the most raw and honest. There is no hiding in black and white."

Behind everything she paints, there is always a deeply personal story — often a complex one. What are those stories? Why did Fatspatrol first paint birds before shifting to depicting people? And what did she cover the walls of her childhood bedroom with as a teenager, long before she even suspected she would become an artist?

Listen to her story.

— Hello Fathima! I came across an interesting fact about you — you started your artistic journey by painting the walls of your own bedroom, right? Tell me about that!

— Hello! If I think back to my earliest memories of drawing, my older brother played a big role. He is an artist as well — a cartoonist — and had a real natural flair for it. For me, it came a little later. He always jokes that the reason I am an artist now is because I copied everything he did. 

We were both obsessed with comic books — reading them, studying them, and copying all the drawings inside. But my first real urge to create something bigger, like murals and large-scale work, came when I was a teenager. I was very angsty-ridden. When I was 14, my parents were going through a divorce, and I just had this overwhelming urge to paint everything black. My bedroom walls became my canvas.

The first things I painted were patterns I copied from Indian block printed textiles and the tattoos from the photographs in the Red Hot Chili Peppers album Blood Sugar Sex Magik. In art class I also started taping large paper together to make huge canvases. That was probably my first real step into making large-scale art.

— You mentioned that you were very angry as a teenager. Can we pause on that for a moment? 

— Sure. There was a lot going on at the time. 

I was born and raised in Dubai, but my family is Indian, and I was brought up in a very Indian way. That changed when I switched from an Indian school to an international one at around eight or nine. Suddenly, I was surrounded by kids from all over the world, and it made me question my own cultural upbringing. At the same time, things were complicated at home with my parents, which only added to the confusion.

For both me and my brother, art became an escape — a way to create our own identities beyond where we came from or how we were raised. It gave us the freedom to express ourselves in a way that wasn’t defined by labels or expectations.

Back then, I was already a shy, quiet kid, so having an outlet for self-expression was really important. But beyond that, I was also dealing with anxiety. I was diagnosed with an anxiety disorder at 14, and coping with something completely out of my control was tough. Panic attacks became part of my life, and they still are — it is not something that just goes away.

In my early 20s, I was on a lot of medication, but I haven’t taken any for over 12 years now. Instead, I have had to restructure my life to manage it. I am always early; I over-plan; I run things through my head a dozen times — it can be exhausting. But I would rather live like this and stay connected to my creativity than rely on medication. It is not for everyone, but for me, it makes sense.

— Wow, thank you for sharing that. Now, about large-scale painting — you once compared it to dance: “I loved the power of gesture in drawing large. It’s like a dance.” Could you explain that comparison a bit more? 

— I danced when I was younger — ballet as a kid, then contemporary for a while. I also played piano, so music and movement have always been a part of me.

Painting big walls feels a lot like dancing. The small movements of your wrist become sweeping motions of your whole arm. You are using your entire body to occupy space.

I think that is why I have always gravitated toward large-scale work — because I spent so much of my childhood feeling small. I was shy and quiet — still am, honestly. But when I paint big, it is like my alter ego takes over. I might feel small, but I can create something massive. In those moments, I feel like a superhero. 

But what is funny is that I also love painting really tiny pieces. It is such a different experience. It feels like a different part of my body, a different part of my brain, a different emotional sensibility at play. They are both extremes, but they each have their own kind of energy.

— And why Fatspatrol?

— "Fats" is just a nickname my friends have called me since I was a kid — a short version of Fathima.

When I was setting up my Instagram, I wanted to use "Fats," but it was already taken. I was literally driving a Nissan Patrol at the time, and my friend was like, “Just pick another word.” We looked at the car, and I said, Patrol. It just sounded right.

I love that it ties back to where I grew up. If you are from the Middle East, you know the Nissan Patrol is the car — desert drives, dune bashing, camping. It’s part of life here. It is part of our culture. And when I travel to paint, I love telling people about that aspect of living here. 

I also like the ambiguity of the name. When you see Fatspatrol, you don’t immediately know if I am a man or a woman, where I am from, or what culture I represent. And I am not hiding those things — I just don’t want them to define my work before people even see it.

— Colour plays a huge role in your work. Do certain colours hold specific meanings for you? 

— I have loved black for as long as I can remember. Maybe when I was younger, it was about darkness. But over time, it became about power. One of the most important things for me, both in life and in my work, is transforming darkness into strength — turning fire into power, turning chaos into something magical. We can’t avoid darkness. We can’t escape destruction or devastation; they exist. But we can harness their energy and turn them into something meaningful.

For me, black is just power. It is bold, strong, unapologetic. The same thing is with white. Black and white feel the most raw and honest. There is no hiding in black and white. It is blunt, almost brutal. But when I do use colour, it has to be intentional because colour is so emotional. Whether you mean to or not, it makes people feel something. So, if I am going to use it, it has to mean something.

Lately, I have been using this deep, rusty orange in my murals. For me, it represents earthiness, fertility, and something grounded. 

I have never been into anything too bright. Neon pink? Absolutely not. For me, bright colours hurt to look at. 

When I mix colours, they are always toned down — if it is green, it is a grey-green; if it is blue, it is a dusty blue. There is always an earthy, muted quality to it. Anything too intense just doesn’t feel right.

— And what about red?

— Strangely, that is the one colour I actually love to throw in every now and then. I think it is because it feels like fire — intense, powerful, and unpredictable. It is chaos. 

— You had an extremely interesting series of works called The Humans. What was the idea behind it?

— The Humans — actually, all the work I have made over the last five years — has existed under this umbrella title. 

During lockdown, I was in Toronto, living in this tiny apartment with my cats, just watching birds outside my window. For years, I had used birds as symbols in my work, a way to process emotions. But suddenly, I saw this bird — completely free out — while I, a human, was stuck inside. It hit me: I needed to come to terms with being human. I needed to explore what that even meant. And that is how The Humans started. I stopped drawing birds and started drawing people.

But it also came from frustration. In Canada, in the name of equity, there is this constant push to define people — to put everyone into neat little boxes. You are either an immigrant or you are not. You are Indigenous, or you are not. Even when applying for grants, you literally have to check a box stating whether you belong to a marginalised group. And I found that frustrating. How is it inclusion when you are constantly being reminded of your difference? It didn’t make sense to me.

If we keep speaking in the language of the systems that oppress us, we keep reinforcing those systems. I didn’t want to make art that just says, “Oh, as a woman, I feel oppressed, so I’ll paint women.” Or “As an immigrant, I feel different, so I’ll paint my immigrant experience.” That only strengthens the narrative, keeping the divisions exactly where they are.

So The Humans is about reimagining how we see and portray ourselves — not through labels, but through universal experiences: joy, resilience, fear, devastation, hope. These emotions existed long before we created social systems, and they will exist long after.

Because I have travelled so much to paint, I have realised that these are the things that connect us. Even with people I don’t share a language with, even with those whose lives seem so different from mine — we can still talk about hope, about loss, about dreams, about grief.

So I guess The Humans is really about this question: “Why can’t we look at each other with the same curiosity and openness that we bring to a work of art?” Where we accept the complexity of a person instead of reducing them to a single identity marker.

That is what this body of work is about — and still is. It just goes through different phases. Right now, it is in a heavy black-and-white phase, with a lot of humour in the drawings. Because that is another big part of being human — we play.

— That phase of birds you mentioned lasted quite a long time — about seven years. And even now, we can still see traces of them in your work. Could you tell me more about the meaning they hold for you?

— The birds, for me, were never just birds.

I started drawing them after coming out of a really bad relationship — there is always a bad relationship at the turning points in my life. This one was abusive, messy, and left me in a really dark place. That was about 10 or 11 years ago.

I remember one night during that time, my cat went outside, caught a bird, and brought it inside. It was heartbreaking. I felt awful. That same night, I sat down to draw, and suddenly, I was sketching these birds — birds with broken wings, broken legs, in rough shape. And I realised this is how I feel.

Over the next seven years, the bird became my symbol. At first, they were wounded, fragile. But as time passed, as I processed everything, as I asked myself the hard questions, they started to change. The birds grew stronger. By the end, they were in full flight — wings spread, powerful, free.

It was a journey, both for them and for me. They helped me heal. They became a way to transform pain into strength.

The last big project I did with birds was the Yas Island mural — 8,600 square metres. I spent three and a half months painting it, and by the time I finished, I knew this was the end of the birds. That was their finale. 

— And I also noticed that you have a tattoo of a bird! 

— Yeah, most of them are birds because I got them during my bird era. The bird on my leg is an Indian roller, which is funny because it is a bird that lives on my mom’s terrace — and it drives her crazy. My mom and I have a playful relationship, so I was like, “Oh, this bird annoys you, Mom? Cool, I’m getting a tattoo of it.”

I also have ravens. And all of them are my own drawings because I figured if I ever hated them, I could only be mad at myself.

I also have the dragonfly; it is the most special. A few years ago, I started noticing dragonflies everywhere. And now, without fail, every time I am painting a big wall — especially if it is a project that really matters to me — a dragonfly always shows up. It has happened in Hawaii, Sudbury, Mexico City — everywhere. I have no idea what it means, but I take it as a blessing.

— You have created murals in more than 10 countries. Is there a particular experience in a certain country that you will never forget? Since the cultures are so different, maybe there was a moment or a project that really stood out to you.

— Yeah, a couple of years ago, I got to paint a mural in Maui, and that project was really special for a few reasons.

A lot of street art festivals follow the same formula — you fly in, paint for two weeks, and leave. There is barely any real connection to the community, the culture, or the deeper history of the place. But this project was different.

They wanted it to be immersive. For six weeks leading up to it, I had conversations with local historians, musicians, and community members to really understand the place. It wasn’t just about putting a mural on a wall — it was about telling a story that actually mattered to the people there.

And apart from being one of the most unbelievably beautiful places I have ever seen, the experience itself was something else. I was housed in a historic plantation estate, completely surrounded by the culture. I stayed in Kahului, where more of the locals live, instead of the tourist-heavy areas.

Hawaiian culture is deeply spiritual, and their history — especially in terms of occupation and colonisation — has so much weight to it. Being there, hearing those stories, was unexpectedly healing. I left feeling like a different person.

And then, of course, there was the fact that while I was up on a lift painting, I would see, like, 15 rainbows a day. I would just stand there thinking, Where am I? Is this even real?

But beyond all of that, what I appreciated most was the thoughtfulness behind the project. I think street art has, in a lot of ways, been watered down. It has become a spectacle — you show up, paint, and leave with no real engagement. And as it gets more commercialised, it turns into, "We are paying you, so we get to tell you exactly what to paint."

But that completely misses the point of what artists do. We are not just a pair of hands executing someone else’s idea. Artists see the world in a way others don’t, and when you actually give them the space to think, process, and create, that is when you get something truly magical.

— Could you tell me about the projects you are working on now?

— Unfortunately, I can’t reveal much just yet, there are a few things in the works. What I can say is that I am spending a lot of time in the studio, trying to find that balance between my inner world and the outer world. Right now, I feel very much in that inner world — creating work that is personal, free, just for me. And then, when I step outside, it is about society, connection, and those larger conversations.

I try to keep practising in both spaces — making sure I am creating for myself as much as I am creating for the outside world and my career. It has taken a few years to find that balance, but I think it is really important.