Sama Alshaibi’s photographs, videos and immersive installations examine the mechanisms of fragmentation in the aftermath of war and exile. They feature a female figure, often her own, that references a complex site of struggle and identification. Her work also complicates the coding of the Arab female body and confronts an image history of photographs and moving images through an Arab feminist perspective Her monograph, Sama Alshaibi: Sand Rushes In was published by Aperture, NYC. It features her 8-year Silsila series (debuted at the 55th Venice Biennale), which probes the human dimensions of migration, borders, and environmental demise.
Alshaibi’s twenty solo exhibitions and over 150 international group exhibitions include the State of The Art 2020 (Crystal Bridges, Arkansas), 13th Cairo International Biennale (Egypt, 2019), Ayyam Gallery (Dubai, 2019), Artpace (San Antonio, 2019), Pen + Brush (NYC, 2019), 2018 Breda Photo Festival (Netherlands), American University Museum (Washington D.C., 2018), 2017 Honolulu Biennial, Marta Herford Museum (Germany, 2017), Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art (NY, 2017), SMoCA (Scottsdale, 2016), Arab American National Museum (Michigan 2015) and MoMA (NYC, 2012). Alshaibi was born in Basra, Iraq and currently resides in Tucson, Arizona, where she is Professor of Photography, Video and Imaging at University of Arizona.
Join us for a conversation looking back at the origins of photography–how it has been used as a tool of colonialism, and how this legacy still appears today, both culturally and institutionally.
Learn MoreThis website was made possible thanks to the generous support and partnership of 