Vera Tamari is an artist, curator, contemporary art historian, and educator. Nature and the rich and complex lived history of Palestine are dominant themes in her multidisciplinary artistic practice. Tamari’s works come from the perspective of her personal encounters with the landscape of Palestine, one that is both filled with awe at the complexity of the land, its ancient olive trees, cacti and rolling hills, but also the brutal occupation of it.
Sultan bin Fahad works with painting and sculpture. A self-taught artist, bin Fahad’s imposing abstract paintings are made with thick strokes of paint, sand, pearl, mica flakes, and powdered glass. Inspired by spirituality as well as the material culture of Mecca in his native Saudi Arabia, this line of inquiry has inspired bin Fahad to imagine his own language for a contemporary yet critical Islamic art. Themes central to his artistic practice revolve around repetition, sound and movement, using symbols that derive from Islam: the five daily prayers, Hajj (pilgrimage) and the Kaaba.