Night of Hinnā (Aamti Saadiya) II, 2021

The series Night of Hinnā (2021) is a questioning of the artist’s identity through multiple lenses– that of her innermost self, her Arab family, and the western world. The sculptures, laced with hennā and drawn in a nontraditional, western design, are scaled to the artist’s hands– albeit slightly tight. Like a pair of ill-fitting gloves, Ben Hamouda’s dim memory of decorating limbs reflects the paradox of a gesture that feels at once familiar and alien, the ownership of which is the artist’s key to understanding her own personal history.

Photo by Andrea Rossetti.