Sophia Al-Maria: Act 1, Scene 1, 2024

Combining film, light, colour and poetry, artist and author Sophia Al-Maria’s work focuses increasingly on the isolation of individuals and technology. 

She explores how agency and chance play in the blinding approach of an uncertain future through the lens of an enduring orientalist gaze and colonial narratives.

Upon the stage where light and shadow dance,
She views the world with eyes in quiet rest.
Not through mere sight does she her craft enhance,
But by the heart where deeper truths are guessed.  

In dreamlike hues, the scenes of love take flight,
As words once penned in Shakespeare’s summer play
Remind us: what is seen is not the height—
The heart perceives where eyes might lose their way.  

“Look not with eyes,” the Bard’s old wisdom sings,
As Jos, with lens in hand, reclaims this creed.
For love and truth exist in subtle things—
In tender shades, in thoughts that far exceed.  

Here fantasy and life entwine as one,
Where visions bloom beyond what light has spun.