Sudanese Artist MAHA's World is a Post-Punk DIY Burst of Colour

MAHA is multidisciplinary artist who truly embodies the term. Based in the Netherlands, the Sudan native makes music, writes, designs and self-publishes her own DIY zine MAHAZINE, approaching each not as separate pursuits, but as different rooms in the same house.

Brought together by an urgent need for solidarity and empathy, MAHA uses her different talents to tell different parts of her story. Her music is the opener: aggressive post-punk vocals over driving basslines and dusty drum machines, groovy and abrasive in equal measure. The zine is where she expands. MAHAZINE started, she explains, out of frustration and a need to represent herself on her own terms, and through it she explores broader themes of identity, justice, and expression.

Visually, MAHA's world is just as deliberate. The zine's designs, her fashion sense, her music videos are all colorful, dense, and personal in a way that makes her work feel like one extended self-portrait across different media.

We caught up with MAHA after her show at Le Guess Who? 2025, where she delivered a driving set full of attitude and energy. Reflecting on the performance, she considers it one of her best shows to date.

MAHA wears her message openly on her sleeve. Her vision of a fairer world is an idealistic one, but watching her talk about it, that's kind of the point. She isn't trying to be subtle. She's trying to bring it to life.