Eli is a visual artist and educator. Creating immersive environments via large-scale painting and filling sketchbooks with candid, confessional comics, his socially-engaged practice sits at the intersection of art and activism.Navigate this digital labyrinth to view his portfolio of projects, learn about his workshop facilitation, or contact him for collaborations.

© Eli Delbaere. All rights reserved.

A broader selection of artwork can be found via Eli's instagram at @anomeli__

Shrine to a Gender Heretic, installation view at Temporary Autonomous Arts, 2024

Eli regularly runs art workshops on freelance and voluntary bases, for a broad spectrum of demographics. He sees art as a crucial tool of social connection and therefore, he's particularly keen to host creative spaces for those who face marginalisation and need access to self-expression. Putting this principle into practice, Eli has led art sessions for groups in complex settings - including prisons, psychiatric wards, homeless shelters and more. Emphasising inclusion, he is experienced in supporting participants with SEND and other additional needs.Sustainability and access are also foundational to Eli's work; he strives to design workshops around upcycling wasted or found materials. He can capably facilitate in diverse mediums - from painting, drawing, illustration and zinemaking, to clay modelling, embroidery and textiles, and more.

✶ Eli firmly believes that art is for all, and can be made out of anything by anyone. ✶

Below is a gallery and a list of workshops Eli has delivered for various art organisations, schools, charities, and youth groups. Please get in touch if you want him to facilitate for you!

  • Young Londoners' Archive Zigzag Zine Workshop at Malorees Junior School, 2025

  • Banner Making/Radical Repair Café at Release Harm Reduction Hub, 2025

  • 'Mapping Queer Utopias' Workshop for LGBTQ+ Reading Friends Group, Guildford Library, 2025

  • Participatory Mural at HMP SEND Womens' Prison, delivered with Create Arts, 2025

  • 'Paint Jam' Collaborative Mural Workshops at REinsTate, 2024

  • Nurturing Talent Development Programme with Create Arts, 2023/24

  • Riposte Art Rave Collaborative Painting Workshop, delivered at QUEERCIRCLE Gallery, 2024

  • Sydenham Arts Winter Welcome 'Recyclart' Workshop, 2024

  • 'Queer Utopias' Workshop for Blossom LGBTQ+ CIC, 2022

  • Clay Creatures Workshop for residency at Guildford Library, 2022

Eli has performed as a live painter across a variety of London venues and events - a selection of some is presented above. They are eager to continue exploring performance art, and would love to be contacted for any collaborations.

Eli Delbaere is a visual artist and arts educator. Drawn to creating immersive environments via large-scale painting, his developing mural practice is known for its blend of figuration and abstraction, carving a niche for fact and fantasy to collide. Eli’s idiosyncratic visual language fuses his transsexuality with dense symbolism from his Celtic heritage, combining ancient art-making rituals with pioneering politics.
Primarily self-taught, Eli seeks to create socially-engaged art which, like a form of contemporary folklore, is immersed in living culture - in sharp contrast to the separatist, purist concept of ‘fine art’ which exists as a commodity in cordoned-off elitist spaces. This informs his work in poster design and muralism: artforms which are functional, fundamentally accessible, which act ’in concert with communities’ and carry anti-capitalist histories. Embodying his beliefs that art should radically reclaim and transform space, forge intersectional social bonds, and give a voice to ‘othered’ subcultures, his imperfect work is found in non-institutional, non-hierarchical spaces such as squats, raves, streets, zines, bedrooms and DIY venues.

Tangibly using art to make change, Eli organises with two grassroots collectives which platform the work of independent Trans+ creatives: Trans Video Buffet and Punk 4 Transsexualism - read more about both below!

With years of experience working in arts education, Eli currently teaches primary school children (on a freelance basis). His facilitation style emphasises intuitive play, inclusion and imagination. He has featured artwork in exhibitions across the UK and been selected for both national and international artist residencies.

"I do not want art for a few, any more than education for a few, or freedom for a few." ✶ William Morris

➷ Some artists who influence Eli's work...

Trans Video Buffet #3 at Rio Cinema and #4 at LJ Works, 2025

Trans Video Buffet (TVB) is a DIY film collective with an anti-curational approach. TVB hosts regular screenings across London, making vital space for Trans representation in media and providing a platform for emerging, independent Trans filmmakers. All submissions are accepted and free to make! Follow this link to the TVB instagram to get tickets to the next one, submit your film, or suggest a collaboration:

Contact Eli via email or Instagram DM. He is an open book.

"The Nature you bedevil me with is a lie. Do not trust it to protect you from what I represent" ✦ Susan Stryker

Below is a selection of zines and brief writings which Eli intends to act as a tranarchist primer: the radical politics of insurrectional queerness, autonomous artmaking, and practical guides for community organising. A window unto Eli's own praxis, these resources are for all readers - from the uninitiated to the insurgent.