Kawkaba meaning “constellation” is part of the largest exhibition series of Arab art in London. It focuses on a gender-balanced approach and more than half of the artwork displayed is by Arab women.
More than half the pieces in recent Christie’s show were by female artists
Growing up between Jordan and Lebanon in the 1980s and ’90s, Dia Al Batal would often hear the repetitive “tick-tick-tick … tick-tick” of a hammer and chisel as her mother, Mona Saudi, worked for hours on her stone sculptures.
As an Arab female artist, the path for Saudi wasn’t easy. Al Batal said her mother was turned down by exhibitors in Europe and the United States multiple times.
The Jordanian sculptor died in 2022, but one of her abstract sculptures, called “Continuity,” was part of a recent exhibition at Christie’s auction house in London called Kawkaba (“constellation” in Arabic).
“This is how my mom always wanted for her work to be displayed, in collections where the public would be able to access them, and not kind of hidden and tucked away,” Al Batal said in an interview in London.