Thuraya Al-Baqsami - Forms of Memory

Taymour Grahne Projects is pleased to present Forms of Memory, an online solo show by Kuwait-based artist Thuraya Al-Baqsami (b. 1951), opened virtually on October 2, 2025

Thuraya Al-Baqsami is one of the most compelling figures in contemporary Arab art. A multi-disciplinary artist, whose oeuvre spans painting, printmaking, drawing, writing and illustration, she is celebrated this autumn with a selection of works from the 1980s and 1990s in “Forms of Memory”, an online exhibition taking place between Oct 2 - Nov 25 at Taymour Grahne Projects.

Born in Kuwait City in 1952, Thuraya grew up as one of five children, in a society poised between traditional mores and Kuwait’s dramatic social, economic, and cultural transformations during the 1950s and 1960s. Emerging from this vibrant environment, Al-Baqsami’s creative radar was set from an early age, to the personal and the political, the intimate and the global.

The Al-Baqsamis (literally – “the biscuit-makers”) were of Persian ancestry. Growing up in the Gulf, immersed in Arabic and Farsi literature and visual arts, Thuraya’s ambitions were apparent from an early age. By her mid-teens, she was a prolific prize-winning artist, a member of the Art Association in Kuwait, shown in several exhibitions, and had appeared on national television. She benefitted from an international education, with a spell in Beirut and before moving to Cairo. Having met her husband, a fellow Kuwaiti student at, of all places, a festival of German youth in East Berlin in 1973, the couple relocated deeper behind the Iron Curtain to Moscow, where Al-Baqsami enrolled in the city’s Surikov Art Institute for her undergraduate in Fine Arts and a Masters in Book Illustration and Graphics.

Compared to what she described as an uninspiring curriculum in Egypt, the artist would later eulogise her time in Moscow as inspiring her with a focused, relentless work ethic.

This work ethic drove Al-Baqsami’s artistic evolution over successive decades. Her creative vision quickly exceeded drawing and painting, diversifying into myriad mixed media as well as becoming an acclaimed poet and novelist. As she and her husband (and later, manager) moved around the world, successive immersive experiences enriched her visual vocabulary and allowed her to absorb a multiplicity of aesthetic and cultural influences. Her works often juxtaposed motifs and symbols drawn from diverse cultural landscapes, blending elements of myth, folklore, and history with incisive commentary on contemporary issues. This interplay between local specificity and global dialogue imbued her work with a layered complexity. The artist herself has often spoken of the importance of absorbing the rhythms, gestures, and textures of life wherever she goes, as being a crucial part of her creative process. This attentiveness translates into works that feel alive, resonant with the subtle cadences of human experience.

Take Shahrayar (1983) for example, in which a mythical ‘bird man’ creature perches atop the shoulder of a stylised turbaned character, in a nighttime reverie. Fairytales, mythology, fantasy – this painting carries visible fingerprints of Thuraya’s time in Moscow, where she gravitated towards the dreamlike and sublime, perhaps as a reaction to the austere environment of the Cold War-era city.

Thuraya’s ability to synthesise local inspiration into powerful storytelling is also apparent in Baobab III, executed in 1981, following Al-Baqsami’s move to Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of Congo) and thence Senegal. There, standing proud on the vast dry savannas, the baobab tree is a symbol of strength, a giver of life and sustenance to the local ecosystem, storing and sharing water reserves in its colossal trunk. Al-Baqsami depicts the tree as a powerful symbol of fertility, adding a twist of Russian iconography and her simple striking palette to make one of her most powerful compositions of the era.

In depicting the life-giving strength of the baobab, we come to the predominant theme in Al-Baqsami’s work - her consistent engagement with the female figure. While many Arab artists of her generation explored sociopolitical and national themes, Al-Baqsami consistently foregrounded the experiences of women in ways that were both daring and empathetic. Her female figures inhabit spaces that are simultaneously public and private, corporeal and symbolic. Thuraya’s women aren’t portrayed as passive ciphers but rather, she subtly interrogates the very construction of female identity within both Arab and universal contexts. Her women are often depicted in states of introspection, tension, or quiet rebellion, inviting the viewer to contemplate not only the physical presence of the body but also the psychic and societal forces that shape it.

Thuraya later claimed she had had her fill drawing male life models while in Moscow –her Life Drawing professor refused to hire female life models. Talking to her daughter Monira Al Qadiri for an article in ‘Bidoun’ magazine, Al-Baqsami presented a fascinating insight into her fascination with the female form. “For me women are not just shapes, they are also a theme... There are so many things women are not supposed to talk about. So many taboos! I would vent my frustrations by exploring the female form.”

Thuraya’s women are rarely static or confined to idealised beauty; instead, they resonate with complexity and intrigue. She traces their inner vulnerability, resilience, sensuality, and intellectual agency and in doing so, articulates a broader conversation within Arab visual culture about gender, autonomy, and representation. Shahrazad III (1996) places a female portrait in conjunction with another recurring theme in Al-Baqsami’s work, internal grids and borders organising Thuraya’s characteristic use of symbolism and iconography. 

Shahrazad III also exemplifies another defining aspect of Al-Baqsami’s practice - a rich textural detail in her drawings, prints and paintings display a sophisticated command of colour, composition, and emotive nuance.

These technical approaches demonstrate a remarkable synthesis of discipline and experimentation. Her drawings and lino prints often rely on meticulous line and pattern, evoking both traditional Arab calligraphic aesthetics and Modernist sensibilities. In her paintings, she achieves a delicate balance between figuration and abstraction, allowing the surface to oscillate between narrative clarity and painterly ambiguity. The interplay of light and shadow, the fluidity of colour, and the tension between form and void all contribute to a sense of movement and vitality. Her mastery of these elements enables her to convey complex emotional and intellectual states, particularly in her renderings of female subjects, where subtle gestures, postures, and expressions carry profound significance.

Ultimately, Thuraya Al-Baqsami’s significance lies in her success in synthesising a lifetime of observation, travel, and experimentation into a body of work that is at once profoundly personal and universally resonant. She today occupies a rare position within Arab art: a figure who has not only witnessed the dramatic transformations of the Gulf and the wider Middle East over the past five decades but has also contributed decisively to the cultural imagination of the region. In “Forms of Memory”, we enjoy an accessible and consistent sample of her depictions of women, her technical mastery across media, and her cosmopolitan sensibility. This exhibition presents a snapshot of an oeuvre of remarkable depth and diversity, one that continues to inspire, challenge, and delight audiences around the world. In celebrating Al-Baqsami, Taymour Grahne Projects acknowledges not only her extraordinary skill and vision but also her enduring commitment to exploring the human condition in all its complexity - particularly through the eyes of women who inhabit, negotiate, and redefine the spaces they are given.

Al-Baqsami has exhibited widely, holding more than 60 exhibitions around the world. Notable solo exhibitions include Lasting Impressions at the Sharjah Art Museum (2017), which featured over 300 works; the Korea Foundation in Seoul (2008); Krakow University Museum in Poland (2003); and the Ministry of Culture in Sofia, Bulgaria (2002). She has participated in major group exhibitions such as Theater of Operations: The Gulf Wars 1991–2011 at MoMA PS1 (New York, 2019–2020), the First Biennial of Islamic Arts in Tehran (2000), and the Sharjah Biennials 2 and 4 (1995, 1999). Her works are held in the collections of The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York, The British Museum in London, and UNESCO.

For the Artist's CV please click here