Ahmed Mater’s Artistic Synthesis Between Local and Global

Ahmed Mater is a Saudi contemporary artist whose multidisciplinary work offers a powerful lens into the intricacies and complexities of contemporary Saudi society. At the core of Ahmed Mater’s practice is his innate ability to wed the local with the global. While his upbringing, education, culture, and heritage are firmly connected to Saudi Arabia, he poses a rare talent to render these distinct Saudi perspectives into works that resonate across cultures. In doing so, he manages to be true to his own culture while cultivating a contemporary universal message.

Early Days

Mater was exposed to art at a young age through his mother, who was skilled in al-Qatt al-Asiri, a traditional form of wall art that is usually done by women to decorate the interiors of a house. The technique is impromptu and is a key cultural element in the region of Asir where Mater grew up. Mater used to observe and partake in this practice with his mother by filling the geometric shapes inspired by Asir’s nature. 

After graduating high school, Mater knew he wanted to develop his artistic practice. So he joined Al-Meftaha Arts Village, founded in Abha in 1989 by the then-Governor of Asir, HRH Prince Khaled bin Faisal. The village is a local cultural centre with artists’ studios, an exhibition space, shops, a public theatre and a mosque.

From 2001 until around 2005, Mater’s modest studio at Al-Meftaha served as his creative sanctuary and a laboratory for artistic experimentation. It was within those walls that his artistic voice began to emerge and take shape under the tutelage of masters. His art was a palimpsest, layers of expression atop influences from traditions like al-Qatt al-Asiri that remained indelibly etched into his creative psyche.

During his time at Al-Meftaha, Mater was taught by Abdulhalim Radwi (1939-2006), a leading Saudi modernist and one of the first artists from the Kingdom to study art academically in Italy.

Mater had a very close relationship with Radwi, that extended beyond the relationship of a mentor and a mentee. Under Radwi’s influence, Mater’s artistic practice shifted from traditional and realistic painting to incorporating symbolism that allowed him later on to transcend cultural boundaries with his work.

Radwi understood that artistic exploration extended beyond the studio’s confines and traditions. He would shepherd his students on voyages into nature, cultivating their aesthetic sensibilities through direct engagement with the environment. In his final days, when Mater was a fifth-year medical student, he was overseeing Radwi’s care and treatment. From this experience, Mater retains a deeply personal memento - a unique X-ray image of him that immortalises their relationship.

In these early days of his artistic career, Mater was also inspired by the Iraqi artist Shaker Hassan Al Said whose books, such as The Jewel of Devotion and Artistic Contemplations, had a great impact on his understanding of art as a form of philosophy. It was during these early days and under the influence of Arab modernists and exposure to international art, that Mater begins to hone his unique Saudi contemporary voice.

A Contemporary Universality

Ahmed’s brilliance in creating work that is simultaneously deeply rooted in his Saudi and Islamic heritage and has universal appeal is evident in his works on Mecca: Magnetism and Desert of Pharan series.

In Magnetism - an installation initially exhibited during 2009 Venice Biennale and later showcased at the British Museum- draws on the specificity of Mater’s Saudi and Muslim background in its referencing of the Hajj pilgrimage and the ritual of tawaf. It showcases the profound spiritual significance of the Kaaba in Islamic tradition and the collective experience of millions of muslims who perform the pilgrimage. At the same time, the work creates a bridge between a religious experience and a scientific phenomenon. Through the use of physics of magnetism as a visual metaphor for a spiritual pull, Mater makes the installation accessible to viewers everywhere. At its core, Magnetism explores universal ideas of centre and periphery, individualism and collective, and the unseen forces that shape human behaviour. 

This piece exemplifies how Mater navigates the interplay between local and global, and traditional and contemporary. By rooting his work in Saudi and Islamic cultural contexts while employing the universal language of physics, Mater creates art that resonates in Saudi Arabia and beyond. 

While Magnetism addressed the experience of Hajj, the artist’s Desert of Pharan project addresses the rapid transformation and reconfiguration of Mecca, Islam’s holiest city.

Through photographs, videos and objects, viewers gain insight into the changes in Mecca’s urban landscape, from construction cranes to signs of encroaching Westernisation. By zooming into these images, Ahmed Mater silently brings forth the relentless interplay of tradition and modernity, loss of heritage, the rapid development and commercialisation of Islam’s holiest city. 

The series includes a video installation titled Leaves Fall in All Seasons, composed of phone video recordings from building sites between 2008 and 2013. These recordings, captured by workers whom Ahmed Mater befriended during the making of this project, give voice to those behind the scenes of Mecca’s transformation. This poignant video documentation addresses the social dynamics at play, offering a unique perspective on the city’s inhabitants.

By unveiling the everyday narrative of the sacred city of Mecca and exploring it through a socio-political and urban lens, Mater was able to delve into universal themes that transcend cultural and religious boundaries. He did not present Mecca as an exotic or an alien place, but rather as a living city, making it accessible to a global audience.

A Collaborative Approach

Mater also globalises the local through his artistic collaborations as exemplified in his latest project, Saudi Futurism. In this project created for the second Diriyah Biennale, After the Rain, Mater partners with the artist Armin Linke to document the transformations across different Saudi cities. Both Mater and Linke use photography and film as a medium, and in this installation they created photographs separately and as a duo.

The photographs capture different urban areas, including Neom, Dhahran, Mecca and Riyadh in Saudi Arabia that are undergoing constant transformation. Some of the photographs were taken twelve years ago by Mater, and some were taken recently by the duo as they journeyed across the Kingdom. At Diriyah they were presented in a labyrinth display, offering two distinct as well as joint perspectives on transformations of different Saudi cities.

Through the investigation of socio-political movements, the rapid urban developments, and his collaborative approach, Mater succeeds in showcasing aspects of Saudi culture, that viewers might overlook or fail to fathom. His multidisciplinary approach, involving an array of mediums such as film, photography, and sculpture, grant him a set of expressive tools to be innovative and experimental, yet also documentative. Mater succeeded in imparting a unique cultural point of view of his country while gaining resonance with a global audience.