ALIA AHMAD

Early Years

Born in Jeddah in 1986, Alia Ahmad grew up in a family deeply engaged with both the visual and literary arts. Her early exposure to Persian miniatures, Islamic geometry, and contemporary Arab poetry laid the groundwork for her distinct visual lexicon. Ahmad pursued a BA in Fine Art at Dar Al-Hekma University in Jeddah, followed by an MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.

The artist currently lives and works between Jeddah and London, where she continues to develop a practice that draws on diasporic memory and mystical symbolism. Ahmad’s multicultural upbringing and exposure to diverse religious and artistic histories have shaped her singular visual language.

Artworks

Alia Ahmad’s art practice bridges the visual language of Islamic art with contemporary approaches to storytelling, symbolism, and feminism, resulting in richly detailed paintings and drawings that reflect on personal and collective memory, myth, and mysticism.

Spiritual Architectures

Ahmad’s earlier artworks are rooted in architectural motifs and sacred geometries. Works such as Whispering Domes (2012) and Gate of the Listening Heart (2014) reveal a preoccupation with the meditative possibilities of symmetry, repetition, and abstraction. These paintings reference mosque ornamentation and Persian manuscript painting while remaining unbound by historical accuracy. Ahmad uses gouache and pigment on paper to create luminous, layered surfaces that appear suspended in time—part devotion, part dream. Across these works, Ahmad integrates vegetal patterns, calligraphic flourishes, and decorative borders that mimic religious texts. However, she destabilises these traditional forms by fragmenting the architecture or inserting ghostly outlines of female figures. The result is a delicate tension between reverence and subversion, inviting viewers to consider the spiritual significance of space and memory.

Symbols and Storytelling

Beginning around 2016, Ahmad’s work shifted towards more overtly narrative compositions. In paintings such as Desert Oracle (2018) and The Sleepwalker’s Garden (2019), symbolic imagery—crescent moons, serpents, hands, birds, and desert flora—populate twilight landscapes inhabited by androgynous figures. These artworks are often described as visual parables, blending folklore, mysticism, and autobiography. Here, Ahmad’s use of colour deepens: rich indigos, ochres, and vermilions recall night skies and desert sand, while gold leaf is used sparingly to mark the divine or hidden. The female form becomes central—not objectified, but rather presented as prophet, witness, or scribe. These figures often lack facial features, lending them an archetypal quality while maintaining intimacy and mystery.

Ahmad’s storytelling also draws upon Arabic poetry, particularly the ghazal form, which informs her fragmented yet lyrical compositions. In some works, she embeds script or invented alphabets that resist legibility, heightening the aura of secrecy and enchantment.

Feminised Cosmologies

Ahmad’s most recent body of work, including the Moon Letters (2020–2022) and She Who Watches the Stars (2023–2024) series, expands her vocabulary into a distinctly cosmological terrain. Here, the artist imagines a universe structured by feminine knowledge systems, where celestial cycles, emotional states, and ancestral memory converge.

In Moon Letters, Ahmad creates intimate gouache and ink drawings on handmade paper. These works are characterised by intricate patterning, moon phases, floating text, and dreamlike landscapes. Repeating motifs—mirrors, veils, ladders, and planetary bodies—appear across the series, forming a kind of visual grammar through which the artist constructs her own mythopoetics.

In She Who Watches the Stars, a digital tapestry installation commissioned by the Jameel Arts Centre in 2024, Ahmad combines textile traditions with animated light and sound. The viewer is enveloped in a cosmic narrative of creation, exile, and return, told through a matrix of embroidered constellations. This work signals a move into expanded media while remaining faithful to Ahmad’s core concerns: the mystical, the maternal, and the migratory.

Exhibitions

Alia Ahmad has been the subject of both solo exhibitions and group exhibitions at important institutions and blue-chip galleries. A selection of important exhibitions are provided below.

Solo Exhibitions

• Fields / ﻣ ﯾ ﺎ د ﯾ ن , White Cube, Mason’s Yard, London (2025)
• _Aspects [ ﻣ ظ ﺎ ھ ر,_ White Cube, Lawrie Shabibi, Dubai (2024)
• With Time, Pièce Unique, MASSIMODECARLO, Paris (2023)
• A meadow ... from a dream, Kohn Gallery, Los Angeles (2022)
• From Our Paths, Gallery BAWA, Kuwait City, Kuwait (2021)

Group Exhibitions

• Alien Shores, White Cube, London (2025)
• AIR, Aspen Art Museum, Colorada (2025)
• ALCHEMISTS, Pond Society, Shanghai, China (2024)
• After Rain, Diriyah Contemporary Art Biennale 2024, Diriyah-Riyadh, Saudi Arabia (2024)
• Considering Female Abstraction, Green Family Art Foundation, Dallas, Texas (2023)
• Memory Deposit, Fenaa Al-Awwal, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia (2022)

Website and Instagram

Alia Ahmad’s website can be found here, and Alia Ahmad’s Instagram can be found here.

Critical Reception

Alia Ahmad’s work has been featured in international publications such asArab News, Galerie Magazine, and Ocula. In a 2023 interview with Ocula Magazine, Ahmad remarked: ‘I grew up around Arabic calligraphy, Arabic modernist paintings, and Islamic art, and the balance they portray has fed into my work today. For me, it’s about how well different elements balance.’

Alia Ahmad FAQs

Ocula | 2025