Rama Duwaji is the wife of Zohran Mamdani, a democratic Socialist vying for New York City mayoral seat after defeating former Governor Andrew Cuomo in the primaries. He is up against incumbent Mayor Eric Adams. Mamdani is in his third term representing New York’s 36th Assembly District. He was born in Uganda and raised in NYC. If elected, he will be the first first South Asian and first Muslim to lead the city.
Rama and Zohran got engaged and held a Nikkah, an Islamic religious ceremony in which a couple signs a marriage contract, on Dec 22, 2024 in Dubai, where he family lives. In February 2025, they got married in a civil ceremony in NYC at the City Clerk’s office. The couple met on the dating app Hinge.
Who is Rama Duwaji
Rama Duwaji is an award winning New York based-Syrian illustrator and animator who examines the nuances of sisterhood and communal experiences. She has worked with VICE, Cartier, Spotify, BBC, The New Yorker, The Washington Post, Apple and Tate Modern. In addition to being an illustrator, she creates hand built ceramics.
During an interview with Shado Magazine, she revealed that her work is heavily influenced by the different stages in her life, the people she meet, the things she is learning as well as the things she is either going through or have gone through.
She has a graphic novel known as Razor Burn, its a silent comic she illustrated about a girl struggling with body dysmorphia as she goes through high school. She’s insecure about things like arm hair, her nose and acne and the comic shows her journey of trying to accept herself for who she is.
She attended Virginia Commonwealth University graduating with a BFA in Communication Design. She then received her Master of Fine Arts in Illustration from the School of Visual Arts in New York.
Rama as an Artist
Rama uses her illustrations to highlight social and political commentary. During an interview with YUNG, she said she uses her voice to speak about what’s happening in the US, Palestine and Syria as much as she can. She added that art has an ability to speak speak out against injustice and spread it. In addition, she said art is inherently political in how it’s made, funded, and shared.
“Even creating art as a refuge from the horrors we see is political to me. It’s a reaction to the world around us. As long as you do the work in spaces outside your art, you’re still engaging with the world. The choice to use art to engage or disengage with the state of the world is a deeply personal one, but it still doesn’t excuse us from acknowledging the injustices that are going on. At the end of the day, it’s all about intentions.”
Some of her illustrations speaking out against injusticies and politics includes:
- In May 2025, she made an illustration that depicts a young Palestinian girl holding a large empty pot with the words “Not a hunger crisis” emblazoned across it, before transitioning into a view from above of several people holding similarly empty vessels overlaid with text reading, “It is deliberate starvation.” According to her caption she made the illustration as Israel continued to bomb Gaza nonstop with consecutive airstrikes. She shared a link to a nonprofit aimed at supporting refugees and displaced people.
- In April 2023, she highlighted the plight of Sudan via an illustration of a woman with text reading “Eyes on Sudan.” She added slides which included information on the plight of Sudanese who have been impacted by the country’s civil war and ways to donate to support refugees and domestic violence victims.
- She also highlighted the experience of Reem Ahmed, an architect from Gaza who was trapped under the rubble of her home for 12 hours after an Israeli airstrike which killed members of her family.
- In 2022, her works appeared in the BBC World Service documentary “Who killed my grandfather” that investigated the assassination of a Yemeni politician in 1974.
FAQ’s
Rama Duwaji Age: She is 27 years born, she was born in 1998 in Houston, Texas.
Rama Duwaji Religion: Muslim
Rama Duwaji Ethnicity: Syrian
Rama Duwaji Nationality: American
Rama Duwaji Parents: Unknown but lives in Dubai
Rama’s Education Background: BFA in Communication Design, Virginia Commonwealth University; Master of Fine Arts in Illustration, School of Visual Arts New York