Jeddah, the second largest city of Saudi Arabia hosts since 8 years “Jeddah Arts 29,31“, the most significant contemporary art show of the region. In 2021, the eigth edition was curated by Fabien Danesi under the title “The Secrets of Alidades” and received broad press coverage. (for a brief video, click here). Featuring 33 well-known Saudi and foreign artists (among them celebrities like Agnieszka Polska, Hicham Berrada, Eija-Liisa Ahtila or Nasser Al-Salem), Danesi also invited the young Saudi talent Basmah Felemban.
While previous work of Felemban was also strongly geometric, she entered the current exhibition with a cosmography-inspired videogame the images of which suggest deep geometric roots. The virtual world created by Felemban revolves around the Gömböc and features characters whose roles are determined by their geometric shapes. We also are confronted with images of such deep geometric and dynamical concepts as the Morse-Smale complex.