سيارة
مقاسات و صدى الصورة في المرآة غير حقيقية
Sayyarah
The size and resonance of the image in the mirror are not real
Bliss Ashley and Deema Alghunaim
Research and visual art
2024-2026
‘Failaka Island is a place where histories emerge and disappear into layers of mud and mist. Characters and structures oscillate between the fictional and the factual blurring any vision put towards the future. We are two artists based in different parts of the world, but share an interest in the relationship between people and place.
In the time spent on the island, we intend to build sculptural conversations with the characters, histories and structures connected to the island. By observing and reflecting on the adjacency of ancient and modern vacuum we would like to create a performative journey that responds to an interactive, perhaps everchanging, script. The work will consist of a website which will act as an archival map of the island and in January/February 2026 we will organise a boat/bus/car ride of specific areas of the island which will interact with a series of kinetic sculptures, drawings, performances, and sonic works.’
Previous projects
Deema Alghunaim
'Arabian Peninsula road trip II, 2014' 2024
From the series Sensations of A Moving Machine
Lenses, video camera with projector, automated slider
Deema Alghunaim
'Sanam and Terriyah' 2023
From the series Sensations of A Moving Machine
Beeswax crayons and coloured pencils on paper, 100 X70 cm
Bliss Ashley
'Cover crop maize, view from train window' 2023
Oil paint on canvas
153cm X 130cm
Bliss Ashley
'restless' 2024
Excerpt from 9min video, apple MacBook Air, flint, laser printed image.
Meet the residents
Bliss Ashley
Bliss Ashley (b. 2003) is a multimedia artist currently based in Oxford and Hertfordshire, UK. Though finalising ideas in many media, Bliss' works start as images, videos and screenshots. Framing, composing and understanding videos through pausing and sitting still with them. Writing becomes an important part to the process of this understanding, these written pieces sometimes make it into the works, sometimes they don’t. Bliss explores the ways in which we frame, compose, and crop the natural world which does not function within these terms. By implementing loose narrative and performance they hope to question the way in which our surroundings have been represented.
Bliss is in their final year of a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree at The Ruskin School of Art, Oxford University. They have completed a Foundation Diploma in Arts and Design from Leeds Arts University (2021).
Deema Alghunaim
Deema Alghunaim (b. Kuwait, 1984) focuses on the tension between language and land in contemporary settings and forms of movement. In her interdisciplinary practice, she instils imaginary modes of living into established urban systems. Deema works with raw footage, automatic writing and living spaces, and builds personal and immediate encounters.
Deema holds a Bachelor's degree in architecture from Kuwait University (2008) and an MFA from The Ruskin School of Art (2024). She is part of Safat Studios community of artists and a founding member of Naktub; an Arabic creative writing programme for children funded by the Promenade Cultural Centre. Deema has been a contributor to the fields of critical conservation, placemaking, local knowledge production and social entrepreneurship through several initiatives including Madeenah, en.v and Loyac.