Member Spotlight: Meshal Al-Obaidallah

Olivia Sherman
Who are you, and where are you currently located?

Meshal Al-Obaidallah
I am Meshal Al-Obaidallah, an artist and curator, currently based in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

Olivia Sherman
What is your practice about? What do you explore?

Meshal Al-Obaidallah
I experiment with archiving narratives, to face ‘collective amnesia’ in Saudi Arabia—that which is deliberately forgotten by society. I actively investigate the Internet, archives, and social media. Using cultural artifacts (whether physical or digital), I document current issues and affairs of Saudi Arabia—and the Arab homeland. My practice centers around the question: Before it is forgotten, how can our ever-changing present-day culture be preserved?

Olivia Sherman
What factors led to the development of your style and use of new media rather than traditional media?

Meshal Al-Obaidallah
My earlier work centered around physical artifacts, but looking back I realized that even these works are embedded within the Internet and shaped by social media. For example, my street sign artwork, So Where Are You Going? (2015), continues to circulate on Saudi and Arab social media. It gained traction as a viral poston Tumblr (originally a photo taken from the gallery’s Instagram account). Since then, it has been reposted across platforms like Instagram, Twitter, WhatsApp, Snapchat, and TikTok. A decade later, a new photo of the artwork (from Sultan Bin Rashed Al Darmaki) is being shared by meme accounts.
My practice shifted significantly during an online residency at the Arab British Centre in London, amid the COVID lockdown in 2021. This experience was transformative, prompting me to focus more on new media and collaboration. I worked with the sound artist Carolin Schnurrer and the web developer ch3rr1 to create an experimental website as an artwork. The outcome, FarewellArabia.com (2021–ongoing), is a digital collage of soundscapes and text. By recycling history, the narrator tells of the sudden development of Arabia, its impact on society, and the uncertain future.
This collaborative approach to new media continues in my project,IMG_0220: Physical Preservations of a Once-Lost Internet Video(2023–ongoing), which is currently in the New Media Caucus (NMC) exhibition. The project centers around a single piece of lost media, a Twitter video. Originally conceived as a photographic series in 2019, IMG_0220 evolved into a library of various archive materials (videos, photos, tapes, booklets, postcards and more). To realize the library installation, teams across 7 cities on 4 continents worked on the production.

Olivia Sherman
Expand on the narrative depicted in IMG_0220. What do you want the audience to think about?

Meshal Al-Obaidallah
I want audiences to reconsider the common misconception: Everything on the Internet stays there forever. In reality, some media are deleted and lost without a trace.
IMG_0220 is not on the Internet anymore—except for the IMG_0220 website and now the New Media Caucus exhibition. The original video—circa 2016(?)—is from Saudi Twitter. A saved copy of the video was recovered from an old iPhone. The video was then clipped to 7 seconds, looped, captioned, and stylized with stock media. All done as means to re-enter circulation.
Although the original video is only a few years old, it feels from the distant past—the ‘90s or ‘00s. It is reminiscent of the previous dominant narrative. It represents the changing times in the sociopolitical landscape of Saudi Arabia.
The artwork, IMG_0220, is a deliberate anachronism in both content and form: digital media on analog tapes. It is stored in different formats: audio cassettes, VHS tapes, and 9 still images. They are all post-Internet physical preservations of the once-lost video. They capture the character’s performativity in his declamation.
In the IMG_0220 library, visitors are invited to sit, read, and watch. It hosts the archive of videos, photos, tapes, booklets, postcards and more. Visitors can browse and interact with the materials on display. While the physical installation is currently dismantled, a 3D tour of the library is available online. All archive materials are downloadable on the website.
In the age of digital file sharing, audiences become authors and distributors, by copying, editing, and recirculating media. On the Internet, copies transcend; provenance is trivialized. As a traveling library around the world, IMG_0220 mimics the spread of Internet media and memes in real life.
Now, IMG_0220 is publicly available again, as both a traveling library and a multimedia website. Audiences are invited to not only consume these pieces of media, but to actively reflect and re-share. In today’s affairs and transformations in Saudi Arabia, IMG_0220 is recontextualized. And it raises many questions:
Is he acting? Is he sincere?
Is it a performance? Is it a sermon?
Should it be taken literally or figuratively?
Who is he? Does it even matter?
Does meaning ultimately lie in the speaker’s intent, in audiences’ interpretation, or in the text itself? Or elsewhere?

Olivia Sherman
Is there anything else about the IMG_0220 project you would like to elaborate/expand on?

Meshal Al-Obaidallah
During the 2-month-long BIENALSUR exhibition at the Saudi Arabia Museum of Contemporary Art (SAMoCA), around 1,000 IMG_0220 art booklets and 5,000 postcards were given to visitors. Outside the museum, the booklet and postcard reached people all over the world, such as UAE, Qatar, Jordan, Lebanon, Turkey, Russia, Germany, UK, Portugal, South Africa, Mexico, USA, and South Korea.
I invite readers to contact me through my website, if they are interested in the physical archive material from the IMG_0220 library. I have been exchanging works with creatives from different fields.
Also, I would like to acknowledge the various entities that supported the IMG_0220 project, including the Ministry of Culture of Saudi Arabia, BIENALSUR (the International Biennial of Contemporary Art of the South), the Saudi Arabia Museum of Contemporary Art (SAMoCA), and JAX District.
Specials thanks to the creative practitioners whose work was integral to the IMG_0220 project:
– Bader Awwad AlBalawi (of Marsala Studio), 3D producer
– Arif Al Nomay, lead photographer
– Abdullah Salem, videographer
– Thamer Altoimi, web developer

Olivia Sherman
What does receiving the award mean to you?

Meshal Al-Obaidallah
The award has excited me to continue developing the IMG_0220 project: producing an experimental short film, completing the website, and printing the 2nd edition of the art booklet.

Olivia Sherman
Do you have any new projects you’re working on that you would like to share with us?

Meshal Al-Obaidallah
Currently, I am working on a new project, D.I.Y. (Do It, Yousef), in partnership with Joseph Vadakkumchery. The community-driven initiative involves various collaborators across the Arab homeland. It is supported by a grant from the Culture Resource foundation in Beirut, Lebanon.
Since 2021, Joseph and I have been discreetly developing the DIY project in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. For over 3 years, I have been documenting on Instagram the do-it-yourself repairs led by Joseph Vadakkumchery (aka Yousef). Our goal is to restore an old abandoned building, amidst the ongoing construction of new high-rises in the northern part of the city.
D.I.Y. (Do It, Yousef) is an expanded transmedia experience. It is exhibited as a multi-channel video installation with found objects, a livestream, a phoneline, 3D models, and more. It engages the community online, via the Instagram account, and offline, via street flyers asking for contributions.
Additionally, I am working on the aforementioned IMG_0220 experimental short film. The aim is to complete it by late 2025 or early 2026.

Olivia Sherman
Do you have a website or a location that I can link in this interview so that readers can view your work?

Meshal Al-Obaidallah
Website: kmeshal.carbonmade.com
Instagram: instagram.com/kmeshal