CRUCIAL VIEWING

London based painter Shadi Al-Atallah creates powerful, important and thought-provoking pieces that can be political, empowering and unsettling. Inspired by spiritual practices, family history and childhood, they focus on conveying messages around mental health, racial identity, sexuality and queerness.

Born in Saudi Arabia, Al-Atallah uses this along with growing up mixed-race, identifying as queer and memories of childhood and mental health struggles to present energetic and distorted self-portraits.

Shadi Al-Atallah via instagram @ramenate

‘ecg’ - Shadi Al-Atallah via instagram @ramenate

One of our favourite pieces was labelled on Al-Atallah’s instagram feed as ‘Happy Saudi-Women-Can-Finally-Fucking-Drive-Day’, a vibrant portrayal of fury, relief and equality. One of their more harrowing paintings is named ‘don’t bury me in a grave my mother can’t visit’, and arouses feelings of distress, anxiety and uneasiness. The artist has already had many successes since graduating, most notably being commissioned by Kanye West to work on the artwork for his single XTCY.

‘Prayer’ - Shadi Al-Atallah via instagram @ramenate

‘don’t bury me in a grave my mother can’t visit’ - Shadi Al-Atallah via instagram @ramenate

Find out more about the artist at https://www.shadistudio.com/ and see more images on instagram at @ramenate