Hana Al-Saadi: Home Economics

A Solo Show by

24 April - 5 June

Wusum Gallery

Eiwan Al-Gassar, St. Regis Doha

Hana Al-Saadi

Home Economics

‘Home Economics’ brings together the work of Hana Al-Saadi, spanning sculpture, painting, sound, and installation.

Conceived as a domestic space, the exhibition fragments its segments and dissects forecasted identities casted within Khaleeji households. Hana also reflects on the wake of camera-equipped phones and how they altered our privacy and collective consciousness.

An interactive installation, ‘Skin Tiles’ invites visitors to immerse themselves in Hana’s envisioned abode, with marbled rubber tiles mimicking the texture of her own covered skin. Through works like Dress Code 1-4, she explores the systemisation of representation, devising a unique technique of painting that echoes the very topic.

Hana revisits some of her earlier works and childhood memories, as seen in ‘My Best Friend and I’, featuring two curtains torn by casts of Hana’s hands with absurdly long bedazzled nails, or ‘But these are Saudi Colours’; a cutout reminiscent of her primary school uniform of the same fabric. In ‘Endless Work, Unless the Power is Out’, Hana borrows her Converse and revives the memory of her late grandmother by incorporating her sewing machine to operate an installation.

Exhibition Floor Plan

Entrance Zone

Zone 1

a. Skin Tiles

Zone 2

b. Second Skin

c. Etiquette Class

d. Dress Code 1

e. Dress Code 2

f. Dress Code 3

g. Dress Code 4

Zone 3

h. Fulla's Body

i. My Best Friend and I

j. But These are Saudi Colors

k. Endless Work, Unless the Power is Out

Hana Al-Saadi

(b. 1989) is a Qatari artist based in Doha. She holds a BFA in Painting and Printmaking from VCUarts Qatar and an MFA in Sculpture from the Rhode Island School of Design.

Through an interdisciplinary practice, spanning sculpture, painting, and sound, Al-Saadi employs sarcasm and satire to delve into topics encompassing the feminine body, traditions, materiality, and domestic space, all while contemplating the evolving landscape of technology and its influence. Her body of work is rooted in concepts that examine the fluidity of form and the intersection of societal and personal narratives. By finding loopholes within conventional boundaries, she confronts the inherent paradoxes that lie within established societal conventions.

Central to Al-Saadi’s art lies her exploration of dualities, blurring the lines between the living and nonliving. This approach led her to merge dualities, specifically in objectifying the living and personifying the object. Within her studio practice, Al-Saadi morphs objects into living flesh, moulds fragments into forms, experiments with industrial materials, and even takes online screenshots. These diverse processes manifest into a complex sculptural landscape that reflects upon forecasted and performed identities, informed by normative discourse.