The four parts of Kurdistan have been the site of profound shifts in terms of processes of ‘quasi’-state building, struggles for self-determination, military conflicts, women’s movements and cultural production. Kurdistan’s division between four nation states has also led to the emergence of at least four visions of what a free and independent Kurdistan might look like: from ‘Democratic Confederalism’ in Eastern Turkey and Northeast Syria (NES), to an independent nation state in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI). Women’s mobilisation for gender-based equality and justice and the youth’s demands for transparency, access to resources and public space have been key drivers behind these struggles (Al-Ali & Pratt 2011; Jongerden 2019; Kaya 2017; Mohammad 2021). Amidst ongoing conflicts and insecurities in the KRI, a new generation of young artists and activists have emerged who are no longer organised in party ranks or convinced by the agenda of established women’s organisations, both of whom they consider to be deeply corrupt and ineffective. In their work they problematise issues around gender and sex-based violence (GSBV), religious conservatism and corruption, finding a powerful visual and literary language to address patriarchy, misogyny, the onslaught of ISIS, and how their interconnections impact women’s understanding and sense of space, identity, sexuality and body politics (Mahmoud 2021). Drawing on transnational and post-colonial feminist literature on gender and war (Sjoberg 2014, Cockburn 2004; Al-Ali 2009; Shepherd 2019), and on art and conflict (Salih & Richter-Devroe 2014; Tripp 2016), this paper portrays the main actors behind these emerging dynamics in the KRI and asks how social and political change are imagined and enacted by feminist and youth activists and artists. Based on ethnographic research in Sulaymaniyah, Erbil and Duhok, this paper puts forward the argument that these new initiatives in the post-ISIS KRI have developed alternative discourses and practices, which have the potential to create more gender equal and transparent political spaces that challenge conservative gender norms and relations and go beyond prevailing party politics and regional rivalries.