Muhannad Shono: ‘This work is fragile. It is not here forever’ 

Muhannad Shono: ‘This work is fragile. It is not here forever’ 
Muhannad Shono at his Desert X 2025 installation What Remains. (Photo courtesy RCU and Desert X)
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Updated 22 March 2025
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Muhannad Shono: ‘This work is fragile. It is not here forever’ 

Muhannad Shono: ‘This work is fragile. It is not here forever’ 
  • The Saudi artist is the sole representative from the Middle East at this year’s Desert X in California

RIYADH: Saudi contemporary artist Muhannad Shono is the sole representative of the Middle East at this year’s Desert X — the site-specific international art exhibition in California’s Coachella Valley — which runs until May 11.  

Shono’s piece, entitled “What Remains,” consists of 60 long strips of locally-sourced synthetic fabric infused with native sand. 

“The fabric strips, orientated to align with the prevailing winds, follow the contours of the ground, fibrillating just above its surface,” a description of the work on the Desert X website reads. “As the wind direction shifts, the natural process of aeolian transportation that forms dunes is interrupted, causing the fabric to tangle and form chaotic bundles. In this way, the ground itself becomes mutable — a restlessly changing relic or memory.” 




Desert X 2025 installation view of Muhannad Shono, What Remains. (Photo by Lance Gerber, courtesy Desert X)

This isn’t the first time Shono has created a large-scale installation in the desert. At Desert X AlUla in 2020, he presented “The Lost Path,” composed of 65,000 black plastic tubes snaking through the Saudi desert — a work exploring themes of transformation, memory and impermanence. And while “What Remains” is an entirely separate piece of art, it also delves into those topics, as has much of Shono’s work over the past decade. 

“I’m first-generation Saudi,” Shono tells Arab News. “A year after I was born, I was given the nationality. For half of my life, I didn’t feel Saudi. I’d say Saudi was an authentic space that had specific motifs and cultural narratives that we were very disconnected from as a family. Why? Because we’re immigrants; my father is not Saudi, and my mom is not Saudi.  

“But now I think the narrative of what is ‘Saudi’ is changing,” he continues. “And it feels like it’s part of this correction.” 




Desert X 2025 installation view of Muhannad Shono, What Remains. (Photo by Lance Gerber, courtesy Desert X)

A feeling of not belonging was apparent in Shono’s early artistic endeavors. He loved comic books and wanted to create his own because he couldn’t find a true representation of himself in them. 

“Saudis expect you to produce a figure they can relate to — with Saudi features or skin color — but I didn’t think they could relate to me,” he says. “I was more referencing myself, and what I thought ‘home’ looked like, or the ‘hero’ looked like, so there was a disconnect there.” 

That disconnect continues to manifest in his work. “You can see it in Desert X and in a lot of my other projects tapping into materiality. I realized I couldn’t really fully connect with the materiality of the narrative of being Saudi. 

“An interesting psychological thing that I haven’t really come to grips with is that I’m more comfortable doing work in Saudi because I’m responding to this natural source material,” he continues. “I’m disrupting — I’m offering divergence, narratives that can spill out from that experience of the work. I’m invested in the narrative of what’s happening (in Saudi). I think it’s the closest I’ve felt to being ‘at home.’ Something that I was missing in the beginning was being connected to the narrative of the place, because if you engage with that narrative, you can call it home. 




Desert X 2025 installation view of Muhannad Shono, What Remains. (Photo by Lance Gerber, courtesy Desert X)

“When I go to California, I miss the landscape (of Saudi) that I’m contrasting. In California, it’s not juxtaposed against the experience of growing up. I’m still figuring out how to take these feelings and be able to show work overseas, because my backdrop is missing — the backdrop of Saudi.” 

His early interest in comic books, he says, was partly down to “being able to create the world, the space, the setting for the story.” That was also a reason he decided to study architecture at university.  

“I felt like it was creative problem solving,” he says. “A lot of my projects that I did in college were in ‘world making.’ My graduation project ended up being the creation of a whole city, and how it would grow on a random landscape. I got kind of caught up in the urban planning of it — the streets, and the rivers flowing through it. I never really got to the architectural part of designing a building.” 

But that willingness to explore ideas in ways others might not has made Shono one of the Kingdom’s most compelling contemporary artists. “I’ve created my own kind of material palette, or language, or library, that I use,” he says. 

In his current work, “The land is holding the narrative on this adventure within the seemingly barren landscape,” he explains. “These land fabrics become this idea of being able to roll up, carry and unroll ideas of belonging: What is home? How do we carry home?” 




Desert X AlUla 2020 installation view of Muhannad Shono, The Lost Path. (Photo by Lance Gerber, courtesy the artist, RCU, and Desert X)

Shono and the team who helped him install “What Remains” had to “constantly adapt expectations” based on understanding the land and the environmental conditions, he says. It took them around a month, working seven or eight hours a day, to put it in place — flattening, aligning, and flipping fabric under Shono’s direction. His vision was clear, but he also allowed instinct to guide him.  

“This work is fragile,” he says. “It’s an expression that is not here forever… that will change. And my ideas will change, the way I think about stories and concepts through my work. It’s important to change.” 

With “What Remains,” he is offering that same opportunity to viewers. He wonders: “What portals will you pass through, through this unrolling of the earth in front of you?” 

And change is a vital part of the work itself. “They’re always different,” Shono says of the fabric strips. “At some points, they’re opaque and earth-like — almost like a rock. But when the wind picks up, they become lightweight — like sails — and they animate and come to life. And when the light hits as they move through the sky, they reveal their translucency and there’s this projection of the trees and bushes and nature that they’re almost wrapped around or sailing past.” 

Although the “What Remains” seen by Desert X visitors on any particular day will not be the same “What Remains” seen by visitors on any other day, or even any other hour, one part of it, at least, is constant.  

“The work is a self-portrait,” Shono says. “Always.”  


In ‘Star Wars: Tales of the Underworld,’ Asajj Ventress finds new depth

In ‘Star Wars: Tales of the Underworld,’ Asajj Ventress finds new depth
Updated 12 May 2025
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In ‘Star Wars: Tales of the Underworld,’ Asajj Ventress finds new depth

In ‘Star Wars: Tales of the Underworld,’ Asajj Ventress finds new depth

DUBAI: In the ever-expanding Star Wars universe, few characters capture the imagination quite like Asajj Ventress. Voice actress Nika Futterman returns to breathe life into this complex anti-hero in “Star Wars: Tales of the Underworld,” offering fans a deeper look into a character who has evolved from a ruthless villain to a nuanced, world-weary survivor.

“After all these years of traveling alone, of killing so many people, her voice has changed,” Futterman explains.

Gone is the regal, sharp-edged character of the past. Instead, audiences will meet a Ventress who is “more about just existing and finding her peace.”

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

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An all-new anthology series of animated shorts, “Star Wars: Tales of the Underworld” premiered May 4 on Disney+. The popular series this time focuses on the criminal underbelly of the Star Wars galaxy through the experiences of two iconic villains. Former assassin and bounty hunter Ventress is given a new chance at life and must go on the run with an unexpected new ally, while outlaw Cad Bane faces his past when he confronts an old friend.

What makes Ventress so compelling? Futterman believes it’s her incredible depth. “She’s like an onion that you keep peeling,” she said.

From her unique origins as a witch raised by pirates, trained by a Jedi, and later mastering the dark side, Ventress defies simple categorization. The new series promises to reveal a softer side of the character. “We started to see that she has this capability of taking care of others,” Futterman said. “She’s not just angry; she actually has a heart.”

Fans of morally complex characters will find much to love in this exploration of Ventress’ journey. As Futterman puts it, Ventress is ultimately “someone who can put good things into the universe, instead of taking them away.”


Quinta Brunson opts for Lebanese gown in Los Angeles

Quinta Brunson opts for Lebanese gown in Los Angeles
Updated 12 May 2025
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Quinta Brunson opts for Lebanese gown in Los Angeles

Quinta Brunson opts for Lebanese gown in Los Angeles

DUBAI: Emmy-winning actress, comedian and writer Quinta Brunson showed off a gown by Lebanese designer Zuhair Murad at the 14th Annual Spring Break Gala by City Year Los Angeles.

Founded in 1988, City Year is a national service program that offers full-time community service. This weekend, the Los Angeles chapter held its annual gala, which was attended by the likes of US actress and film producer Viola Davis and “Abbott Elementary” sitcom creator Brunson.

Brunson’s column gown hailed from Zuhair Murad’s Pre-Fall 2025 collection. The look featured star-like embellishments across the torso, bust and cuffs.

Quinta Brunson’s column gown hailed from Zuhair Murad’s Pre-Fall 2025 collection. (Getty Images)

It is not the first time Brunson has worn a Lebanese creation on the red carpet — in September, she showed off a mermaid sculpted gown from Lebanese designer Georges Chakra’s Fall/Winter 2024-2025 couture collection at the 76th Primetime Emmy Awards in Hollywood.

Meanwhile, Murad has continued to attract celebrity clientele to his eveningwear label.

In late April, Murad made a statement at the 2025 Time 100 Gala with US actress Blake Lively, as well as singer and songwriter Nicole Scherzinger, showcasing his creations on the red carpet.

Lively, who attended the event with her husband Ryan Reynolds, wore a pink taffeta off-the-shoulder gown featuring a corseted bodice and a train detail from Murad’s ready-to-wear Spring 2025 collection.

Scherzinger, meanwhile, chose a black off-the-shoulder sequin gown from Murad’s ready-to-wear Pre-Fall 2025 collection.

One month earlier, Murad unveiled his latest collaboration with Italian label Marina Rinaldi. Murad designed the brand’s Spring/Summer 2025 capsule collection inspired by China’s Tang dynasty. 

Drawing from the dynasty’s introduction of peony cultivation in imperial gardens, Murad infused the collection with images of the flower.

The collection focuses largely on eveningwear.

“Grand evening gowns go beyond the pure object, they are a way of investing in one’s personal history,” the designer said in a released statement. True to his signature style, the collection features hourglass silhouettes and intricate hand-embroidered details.

The collection’s color palette mirrors another element of Tang dynasty artistry — delicate chinaware. Soft shades of cream, sky blue, aquamarine green and pink infuse the flowing chiffon gowns, pleated bodices and long plisse skirts. 


Photographs in Doha’s Tasweer photo festival explore belonging, identity and home in the Arab world

Photographs in Doha’s Tasweer photo festival explore belonging, identity and home in the Arab world
Updated 11 May 2025
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Photographs in Doha’s Tasweer photo festival explore belonging, identity and home in the Arab world

Photographs in Doha’s Tasweer photo festival explore belonging, identity and home in the Arab world

DOHA: A young Sudanese man sits in a chair dressed in an elegant off-white three-piece suit. He holds a small shotgun in one hand which he eyes solemnly while resting against the wall behind him on a crimson red tapestry is a rifle. The photograph is titled “Life Won’t Stop” and is one of several images by Sudanese photographer Mosab Abushama documenting his friend’s wedding in Omdurman, Sudan, a city constantly targeted by airstrikes.

The photograph is on view as part of the show “Tadween,” referring to the concept of recording of news and emotions through writing, photography, audio or video, and is one of several exhibitions in the third edition of Doha’s Tasweer Photo Festival, which runs until June 20.

“Life Won’t Stop” is one of several images by Sudanese photographer Mosab Abushama documenting his friend’s wedding in Omdurman, Sudan. (Supplied)

“Despite the clashes and random shelling in the city, the wedding was a simple but joyous occasion with family and friends,” wrote in the caption for the work. “The war in Sudan, which began in April 2023, brought horrors and displacement, forcing me to leave my childhood home and move to another part of the city. It was a time none of us ever expected to live through. Yet, this wedding was a reminder of the joy of everyday life still possible amidst the tragedy and despair.”

Abushama’s photograph earned recognition at the 2025 World Press Photo Awards in the Singles Africa category.

Abushama’s poignant image is one of many on show this year in the Tasweer Photo Festival that prompt deep reflection and compassion.

One of the numerous exhibitions on view is “Obliteration — Surviving The Inferno: Gaza’s Battle for Existence.” The images are displayed outside in Doha’s Katara Cultural Village unfolding in five stages to capture each chapter thus far of the war on Gaza. Each image, such as Abdulrahman Zaqout’s “When Food and Water Become Weapons,” has been shot by a Gazan photographer on the ground to witness and experience the catastrophe. From children extending bowls for food to mothers comforting terrified children, each image recounts the tales of horror that continue to unfold as the war in Gaza continues.

One of the numerous exhibitions on view is “Obliteration — Surviving The Inferno: Gaza’s Battle for Existence.” (Supplied)

“As I Lay Between Two Seas,” another exhibition in the festival, is at the Doha Fire Station. Curated by Meriem Berrada, an independent curator and artistic director of the Museum of Contemporary African Art Al Maaden in Marrakech, the exhibition is a poignant and poetic display of 25 photographers from the Arab world and its diasporas grappling and coming to terms with ideas of identity, belonging and home.

“(The exhibition) approaches belonging not as a fixed state, but as a fluid, evolving condition shaped by memory, distance, rupture, and imagination,” Berrada told Arab News. “The exhibition unfolds through a non-linear narrative that invites diverse temporalities and perspectives to coexist.”

“As I Lay Between Two Seas,” another exhibition in the festival, is at the Doha Fire Station. (Supplied)

The title of the exhibition is drawn from a photographic series by Ali Al-Shehabi that conjures up a metaphor that speaks to the fluid, ever changing idea of understanding the self.

“Guided by the metaphor of the sea — shifting, unstable, and expansive — it draws inspiration from poets of the region whose writings on exile and longing offer a conceptual and emotional foundation,” Berrada said. “The selected works span a wide spectrum from documentary to conceptual and abstract practices. These works examine family and community dynamics, spiritual and philosophical relationships, and the sociopolitical structures that influence selfhood. They explore the symbolic ties to one’s roots, often shaped by personal memory and collective histories.”

From Lebanese artist Ziad Antar’s dreamy and edgy photographs of abandoned and unfinished buildings in Beirut and on the Lebanese coast and Saudi artist Moath Alofi’s series of desolated mosques along the winding road to Madinah, Saudi Arabia, to Palestinian Taysir Batniji’s “Just in Case #2” (2024), portraying images of a series of keys representative of feelings of loss and exile, the photographic works on show oscillate between feelings of pride, belonging, loss and longing.

The "Al Mihrab" exhibition at Doha Fire Station. (Supplied)

A poem by Palestinian poet and author Mahmoud Darwish titled “I Belong There,” appears on one wall between the display of several photographs reflecting through words many of the feelings expressed in the images on display. “I belong there. I have many memories. I was born as everyone is born […] I have lived on the land long before swords turned man into prey. I belong there.”

Elsewhere in Tasweer, a solo exhibition at Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art on the works of Moroccan photographer and filmmaker Daoud Aoulad-Syad titled “Territories of the Instant” presents the essence of Moroccan popular culture and remote regions in the country. Another exhibition, “Threads of Light: Stories from the Tasweer Single Image Awards,” presents 31 captivating images from 2023 and 2024 awards highlighting the extraordinary in daily life, including sacred traditions in Oman, dynamic street scenes in Yemen and moments of contemporary change in Iraq and picturesque marine views of traditional boats in Doha.

As Berrada said of the festival, which can arguably apply to numerous works and shows in Tasweer this year: “It also reflects on the photographic medium itself — how image-making can question fixed and often deterministic categories of belonging and become a powerful tool for reimagining identity in a deeply interconnected world.”

 


Loli Bahia fronts Chanel’s latest jewelry campaign

Loli Bahia fronts Chanel’s latest jewelry campaign
Updated 10 May 2025
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Loli Bahia fronts Chanel’s latest jewelry campaign

Loli Bahia fronts Chanel’s latest jewelry campaign

DUBAI: Chanel cannot get enough of French Algerian model Loli Bahia. The French luxury house has tapped the model once again to front its latest campaign for the Chanel No. 5 jewelry collection.

The new pieces combine gold and diamonds to form the shape of the number five, a symbol closely associated with the brand’s identity. The collection includes rings, bracelets, necklaces and earrings, all inspired by the enduring allure of the No. 5 brand.

In the campaign images, Bahia was seen wearing various pieces from the line, including number five-shaped drop earrings, a diamond pendant necklace, a gold bracelet featuring the numeral and matching rings. The designs incorporate both yellow and white gold and are detailed with diamonds.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

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Bahia has collaborated with Chanel on several occasions. Most recently, in January, she opened the runway show during Paris Haute Couture Week wearing an ensemble that combined the house’s signature tweed with pastel quilting.

The look featured a jacket with a quilted front panel in soft shades of pink, blue, yellow and green, contrasted with white tweed sleeves. The jacket was detailed with front pockets and Chanel’s signature buttons.

The in-demand model also wore a white tweed mini skirt, paired with a slim black belt featuring a gold buckle. The outfit was completed with two-tone Mary Jane heels in black and white, secured with gold buckle-adorned ankle straps.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

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In May 2024, she walked the Chanel Cruise 2024/2025 show in Marseille, France.

Bahia donned a green ensemble, composed of a knee-length pencil skirt paired with a matching top, layered over a white shirt boasting a hoodie collar.

That same year, in June, she walked for the brand during Paris Fashion Week as part of its fall/winter 2024-2025 collection unveiling.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

A post shared by CHANEL (@chanelofficial)

She graced the runway in a two-piece ensemble comprising a tailored buttoned jacket complemented by a matching knee-length skirt in a delicate tweed fabric. Both garments were adorned with subtle black tassel details.

The model’s first campaign with Chanel was in 2022, when she was just 19 years old. It was Chanel’s Metiers d’Art spring 2022 campaign, shot by fashion photographer Mikael Jansson.

In the campaign, Bahia displayed the savoir faire of artisans via tailored jackets, logo-emblazoned leather gloves, wide-brimmed hats, embellished mini-dresses and ornate bangles, necklaces and earrings.


Where We Are Going Today: Matcha Cloud

Where We Are Going Today: Matcha Cloud
Updated 10 May 2025
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Where We Are Going Today: Matcha Cloud

Where We Are Going Today: Matcha Cloud

There is something instantly charming about Matcha Cloud — from the soft pink packaging to the handwritten “To the matcha lover only” on the box.

This brand knows its audience, and it delivers an experience that feels like a warm, cozy hug.

I ordered everything separately: the Premium Ceremonial Grade Matcha that came with a cute sleeve, and four flavor syrups — Apple Pie, Gingerbread, Caramel Gingerbread, and Cinnamon Cookie.

Each item came in one box, with themed packaging that made the whole order feel cohesive and thoughtful.

The matcha itself is fresh, smooth and vibrant — exactly what you want from ceremonial grade.

It blended well with oat milk and delivered a balanced, clean taste without bitterness. The sleeve was perfect for holding my cup around.

Now to the flavor syrups, they are playful and creative. Especially the cinnamon cookie one, which gave cozy winter vibes.

But if I am being honest, the taste of the syrups was not as deep or rich as I hoped. They add sweetness and aroma, but I found myself wishing they had more natural flavor and less artificial aftertaste.

Still, for matcha lovers who enjoy a touch of customization or want to try fun new twists, Matcha Cloud offers a refreshing take.

It is not just about quality, it is about joy — and this brand knows how to deliver that.

For more information, check their Instagram @matcha.cloud.ksa.