Shadia Alem
{{Short description|Saudi Arabian visual artist}}
{{Infobox person
| name = Shadia Alem
| birth_place = Mecca, Saudi Arabia
| website = https://www.shadiaalem.com/
| native_name = شادية عالم
| native_name_lang = ar
| other_names = Shādiyah 'Ālim
| birth_date = {{Birth year and age|1960}}
| known_for = Sculpture, installation art, painting
| notable_works = The Black Arch - Venice Biennale
| alma_mater = King Abdulaziz University
}}
Shadia Alem ({{Langx|ar|شادية عالم|translit=Shādiyah 'Ālim}}; born in Mecca) is a Saudi Arabian visual artist. She is known for her sculpture, installation art, and painting. She lives and works between Paris and Jeddah.{{Cite web |title=Shadia Alem {{!}} Biography {{!}} Athr Gallery |url=https://www.athrart.com/artist/Shadia_Alem/biography/ |access-date=2020-03-26 |website=www.athrart.com}}
Early life
Shadia Alem was born in Makkah.{{Cite web|url=http://edgeofarabia.com/|title=Edge Of Arabia - Contemporary art and creative movements from the Arab World|website=edgeofarabia.com|access-date=2020-03-26}} Her childhood was spent in Taif, where she reportedly painted on doors from a young age.{{Cite web|url=https://www.greenboxmuseum.com/sa-shadiaalem.html|title=Shadia Alem. Greenbox Dictionary of Saudi Arabian Artists.|website=www.greenboxmuseum.com|access-date=2020-03-26}} Her father was a calligrapher and her mother embroidered.{{Cite web|url=https://www.ft.com/content/13c83c0a-87f6-11e0-a6de-00144feabdc0|title=Collecting special: Pilgrims' progress|website=www.ft.com|access-date=2020-03-26}}
Education
Alem graduated with a BA in Art and English Literature from King Abdulaziz University. {{cite web |title=Shadia Alem |url=https://www.athrart.com/artist/Shadia_Alem/biography/ |website=ATHART |access-date=2020-04-02}}
Career
File:G-GBTA_B737-436_British_Aws_MAN_26MAY99_(6302844348)_(cropped).jpg
Since 1985 Alem's work has been exhibited nationally in Saudi Arabia and internationally. Some works are a commentary of the lives of women in Saudi Arabia, using form to demonstrate the anxiety that women may live under.{{Cite book|last=Bates, Linda.|title=Transitions : an interactive reading, writing, and grammar text|date=1998|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=0-521-65782-2|edition=2nd|location=Cambridge, UK|pages=244|oclc=42457877}}
Alem's work, Youm al-Suq, was selected by British Airways to appear on the livery of its aircraft in 1998.{{Cite web|url=https://www.lockonaviation.net/images/info/infoyoum.jpg|title=Youm al-Suq - Shadia Alem|date=2019-01-31|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190131170933/https://www.lockonaviation.net/images/info/infoyoum.jpg|archive-date=2019-01-31|access-date=2020-03-26}}{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IUTcxG1b2HUC&dq=shadia+alem&pg=PT14|title=Saudi Arabia: The Monthly Newsletter of the Royal Embassy of Saudi Arabia|date=1998|publisher=Information Office, Royal Embassy of Saudi Arabia|language=en}} Her 2007 retrospective exhibition at Albareh Gallery demonstrated the development of her work from portraiture, to landscape, to photography.{{Cite web|url=http://www.gulfweekly.com/Articles/14875//Review-Shadia-Alem-–-Albareh-gallery|title=Review: Shadia Alem – Albareh gallery : Gulf Weekly Online|website=www.gulfweekly.com|access-date=2020-03-26}} She has also exhibited at the Kunstmuseum in Bonn,{{Cite web|url=https://universes.art/en/nafas/articles/2005/languages-of-the-desert/fotos/alem-1|title=Shadia Alem. Languages of the Desert|website=universes.art|language=en|access-date=2020-03-26}} at Amum in Tennessee,{{Cite web|url=http://edgeofarabia.com/|title=Edge Of Arabia - Contemporary art and creative movements from the Arab World|website=edgeofarabia.com|access-date=2020-03-26}} in Istanbul as part of its 2010 Capital of Culture programme,{{Cite web|url=http://edgeofarabia.com/|title=Edge Of Arabia - Contemporary art and creative movements from the Arab World|website=edgeofarabia.com|access-date=2020-03-26}} and at the 6th Berlin Biennale.{{Cite web|url=http://edgeofarabia.com/|title=Edge Of Arabia - Contemporary art and creative movements from the Arab World|website=edgeofarabia.com|access-date=2020-03-26}}
= Venice Biennale =
In 2011, Saudi Arabia entered the Venice Biennale for the first time with Alem as the country's representative.{{Cite news|last=Cumming|first=Laura|url=https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2011/jun/05/venice-biennale-review-laura-cumming|title=The 54th Venice biennale – review|date=2011-06-04|work=The Observer|access-date=2020-03-26|language=en-GB|issn=0029-7712}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.wallpaper.com/art/venice-art-biennale-2011|title=Venice Art Biennale 2011|last=Magazine|first=Wallpaper*|date=2011-06-07|website=Wallpaper*|access-date=2020-03-26}}{{Cite news|last=Bharadwaj|first=Vinita|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/19/world/middleeast/contemporary-artists-rock-the-boat-gently-in-saudi-arabia.html|title=Contemporary Artists Rock the Boat Gently in Saudi Arabia|date=2012-01-18|work=The New York Times|access-date=2020-03-26|language=en-US|issn=0362-4331}} Her work, entitled The Black Arch, which draws on folklore, Islam and medieval travel narratives.{{Cite web|url=https://www.dazeddigital.com/artsandculture/article/10554/1/venice-biennale-2011-saudi-arabias-the-black-arch|title=Venice Biennale 2011: Saudi Arabia's The Black Arch|last=Dazed|date=2011-06-08|website=Dazed|language=en|access-date=2020-03-26}} The work was made of up of a dark cube suspended on its point over a sea of iridescent spheres.{{Cite news|last=Smith|first=Sylvia|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-14580858|title=Arab art at Venice Biennale|date=2011-09-07|work=BBC News|access-date=2020-03-26|language=en-GB}} Visitors were encouraged to move around the work and the sphere represented travellers of all kinds.{{Cite journal|last1=Slabbert|first1=Barend|last2=Jordaan|first2=June|date=2016|title=Sustainable ARTiculation: Adapting significant interiors to contemporary art galleries.|url=https://derby.openrepository.com/handle/10545/622199|journal=International Education for Sustainable Development Alliance - Conference Proposal|language=en}} It covered an area of 350 square metres; its scale as an installation has been interpreted as a challenge to spatial order.Al-Sadu as a Way of Understanding the Sociospatial Practices of Contemporary Art by Saudi Women (Thesis) Khulod Mohammed Albugami http://www.open-access.bcu.ac.uk/8696/1/KA-final%20thesis_2019.pdf The colour black was also key to the installation: as the colour of Ka'aba cloth, the colour of the silhouettes of veiled women and of the black stone.
In the same year, Alem was one of the artists chosen to feature in the British Museum's exhibition Hajj.{{Cite news|last=Butt|first=Riazat|url=https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2011/jul/19/british-museum-hajj-exhibition|title=British Museum to stage exhibition dedicated to hajj pilgrimage|date=2011-07-19|work=The Guardian|access-date=2020-03-26|language=en-GB|issn=0261-3077}}{{Cite news|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-14214855|title=Museum to stage Hajj exhibition|date=2011-07-20|work=BBC News|access-date=2020-03-26|language=en-GB}} However, 2011 was not just a year of achievement - it is also the year their mother died, 15 years worth of work was lost in a flood in Jeddah and computer failure lost five further projects.
= Women and art in Saudi Arabia =
In 2011, Shadia Alem and her sister, writer, were featured in Vogue Italia, discussing their work and the role of women in Saudi Arabia.{{Cite web|url=https://www.vogue.it/uomo-vogue/people-stars/2011/05/shadia-e-raja-alem|title=Shadia and Raja Alem - Vogue.it|website=www.vogue.it|date=31 May 2011 |language=it|access-date=2020-03-26}} While Alem tackles gender issues through her work, her sister sees her writing as genderless.{{Cite journal|last=Demerdash|first=Nancy|s2cid=148690561|date=2017-08-07|title=Of "Gray Lists" and Whitewash: An Aesthetics of (Self-)Censorship and Circumvention in the GCC Countries|journal=Journal of Arabian Studies|volume=7|issue=sup1|pages=28–48|doi=10.1080/21534764.2017.1352162|issn=2153-4764}} In Alem's work Negative No More, the pre-and-misconceptions of Saudi women are commented on.{{Cite thesis|last=Kattan|first=Lina M.|date=2015|title=The conflicted living beings: The performative aspect of female bodies' representations in Saudi painting and photography|url=https://ttu-ir.tdl.org/handle/2346/63583|type=PhD thesis}} This installation consisted of 5000 photographic negatives, none of which feature women, to draw attention to the fact that women have been absent from Saudi Arabian political history.{{Cite journal|last=Al-Senan|first=Maha Abdullah|date=2015|title=CONSIDERATIONS ON SOCIETY THROUGH SAUDI WOMEN'S ART|url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/329442734|journal=International Journal of Development Research|volume=5|issue=5|pages=3}}
References
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{{Authority Control}}
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Category:20th-century Saudi Arabian women
Category:20th-century Saudi Arabian people
Category:21st-century Saudi Arabian women artists
Category:21st-century Saudi Arabian artists
Category:King Abdulaziz University alumni
Category:Saudi Arabian women artists
Category:Saudi Arabian sculptors
Category:Saudi Arabian women sculptors
Category:21st-century sculptors
Category:21st-century women sculptors
Category:21st-century painters