6 Saudi Artists Shaping the Contemporary Art Scene

by Rebecca Anne Proctor

6 Saudi Artists Shaping the Contemporary Art Scene

16 Sept 2024

Source: ahaad-alamoudi.com

Culture is at the forefront of Saudi Arabia’s present moment of socio-economic change, and these Saudi contemporary artists are pushing the scene forward.

Sarah Brahim (b. 1992)

Long passionate about human movement and the body as an artistic medium for expression, Brahim is a visual and performance artist specialising in large-scale installation works rooted in bodily movements and gestures. She trained as a professional dancer in London and then sought more collaborative approaches to dance by merging the performing arts with multimedia.

Brahim’s installations have been exhibited throughout the Kingdom at the Diriyah Contemporary Art Biennale in Riyadh and Noor Riyadh, the annual Saudi light art festival and beyond Saudi Arabia at the Bally Foundation in Lugano, Switzerland earlier this year, where she used dance to transcend moments of grief and loss.

"De Anima" installation (Noor Riyadh). Photo: Nick Jackson

At the core of Brahim’s creative practice is the human body and how within it manifests great emotions of human suffering. At the same time, as she presents through her art, the body is also a means for hope and healing. Through movement, she states that through her work, individuals can rise up to the challenges and despair of the human experience.

Instagram: @sahrab

Manal Al Dowayan (b. 1973)

One of the Kingdom’s contemporary art pioneers and foremost female artists, Al Dowayan is presently representing Saudi Arabia at the 60th Venice Biennale with the exhibition “Shifting Sands: A Battle Song,” inspired by the evolving role of women in the Kingdom’s public sphere. The works on view for the Venice Biennale, which runs until November 24, were made in collaboration with dozens of women in Saudi Arabia during workshops that Al Dowayan conducted there. Since she began working as an artist, her mission has been to explore the changing state of women in her home country.

Exhibition "Shifting Sands: A Battle Song". Instagram: @manaldowayan

One of her best-known works is “Suspended Together”, revealing a flock of 200 sculptures of doves. On each dove is a permission document allowing a Saudi woman to travel. Before Vision 2030, Crown Prince and Prime Minister Mohammed bin Salman’s ambitious agenda for change was launched, and this document required all women to travel. Al Dowayan’s installation was exhibited at the Sharjah, UAE-based Barjeel Foundation exhibition in 2011 titled “Home Ground”, which presented works associated with navigating geo-political boundaries. Al Dowayan continues to work in a variety of media and has been commissioned to create a large-scale installation for Wadi Al Fann or AlUla’s Valley of the Arts.

“Suspended Together”. Source: manaldowayan.com

Ahmed Mater (b. 1979)

Another crucial pioneer for the Saudi art scene, Ahmed Mater, a former physician who grew up in the city of Abha in the southwest part of the country, is renowned for his contemporary artwork created in a variety of media to explore the socio-political and cultural transformations in the Kingdom. After training as a doctor, Mater studied at Al-Meftaha Arts Village in Abha and began using discarded X-rays from the local hospital to create his work. One of his most well-known works is “Evolution of Man” (2010), a fine art print mounted on Diasec in five parts, in which an X-ray of a man holding a gun is transformed into an oil pump.

X-Ray Illuminations. Source: ahmedmater.com

Most recently, Christie’s in London hosted “Ahmed Mater: Chronicles,” the auction house’s summer exhibition, which traced Mater’s career and presented rarely seen paintings, videos, sculptures and photographs as well the maquette for his forthcoming site-specific work for Wadi Al Fann titled “Ashab Al-Lal” — which takes its name from a poem of nabati poetry on the Arabian desert meaning “fault mirage.” The idea is that the mirage in the desert — always ephemeral and out of reach — also becomes a guide, challenging the idea of a physical landmark.

Cadillac / Ashab Al-Lal: Fault Mirage. Source: ahmedmater.com

Ahaad Alamoudi (b. 1991)

Many who have travelled to Saudi Arabia will be familiar with Alamoudi’s captivating multimedia installations that explore present-day contemporary culture in Saudi Arabia. Raised between Jeddah and London, Alamoudi’s research-based work is both serious and witty, exploring with dynamism and playfulness interpretations of Saudi society and ethnography. Working largely in digital work, her work immediately transfixes and challenges the viewer through her edgy, engaging and performative art. She has shown her work throughout Saudi Arabia, including at Noor Riyadh, ATHR and abroad at the 55th Venice Biennale and Phillips in New York, among other locations. Alamoudi’s mission is to push the boundaries of Saudi historical representation always, offering new modes for viewing past and present Saudi society and culture.

Source: ahaad-alamoudi.com

Daniah Al Saleh (b. 1970)

The large-scale multimedia installations of Riyadh-born and London-based artist Al Saleh explore the effects of cultural conditioning — meaning how beliefs are delivered and absorbed by the media and other information networks and the effects of such messages on human beings. Al Saleh often uses computation and analogies among her various media and ways of expression to explore unexpected perspectives.

"Sawtam"

In 2019, Al Saleh was the recipient of the Ithra Art Prize awarded by Ithra: The King Abdulaziz Center for World Culture in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia. “Sawtam,” her winning work, is an audio-visual installation that explored the intricacies and complexities of language and communication largely through the medium of sound. Language, usually taken for granted, in this case, Arabic, was deconstructed by Al Saleh to show how the 28 letters in the Arabic alphabet have the power to control the entire Arabic language and its literature. Al Saleh, who first worked as a painter for her main medium, moved into using a diversity of media after pursuing her master’s degree in computational arts at Goldsmiths, University of London.

Obaid Al-Safi (b. 1991)

Working in new media installations, video, AI and data-generated projects, Alsafi’s complex and fascinating works of art follow a systematic approach that stems from his training in computer science. Born in Wadi ad-Dawasir and now based in Riyadh, Alsafi was the winner of this year’s Ithra Art Prize, for which he created a massive installation in AlUla titled “Palms in Eternal Embrace,” which explores the importance of the palm tree to Saudi culture and heritage. The installation, made of 33 old palm trees bound together using colourful rope, also aims to raise awareness of the effects of climate change, which are threatening palm trees on the Arabian Peninsula due to rising temperatures.

by Rebecca Anne Proctor