"Often working in collaboration with artisans, she focuses on cultural heritage and craft traditions-some of which she herself has trained in. She received a BA from Central St Martins in London but says that while there, she resisted people's expectations about the kind of work she would make, as an Arab woman artist. She subsequently studied Islamic geometry at the Prince's School of Traditional Arts and then undertook an ijaza -a formal Islamic certification-in Turkey, learning the technique of illumination."
""When people talk about heritage sites in places where they're from, it's not just brick and mortar or stone buildings," she says. "It's a place that holds memory. It's a place that gives them a sense of belonging-part of your everyday fabric of life. Especially in the Middle East, we still live with our heritage. You still have people living in Al Balad [Jeddah's Old Town], in its old houses, or in Syria and Palestine, people will still sit in the coliseums and have shisha.""
Dana Awartani will represent Saudi Arabia at the Venice Biennale, with Antonia Carver as curator and Hafsa Alkhudairi as assistant curator. She collaborates with artisans and centers her practice on cultural heritage and craft traditions, some of which she trained in. She earned a BA from Central St Martins, studied Islamic geometry at the Prince's School of Traditional Arts, and completed an ijaza in Turkey in illumination techniques. Her work oscillates between contemporary practice and traditional craft and is informed by cultural heritage and recent Middle Eastern conflicts. She was born and raised in Jeddah to a Saudi father and a mother of Palestinian and Syrian descent.
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