Today's Edition
MAYS IBRAHIM (ABU DHABI)
Week after week, Reem Hamid commuted back and forth between Abu Dhabi and Dibba.
The repeated journey – a nearly 3-hour drive – became a meditation on motion, stillness, and the spaces in between, shaping her latest work of art.
Her project “Between Movement and Stillness (2025)” traces this cycle through photographs, sound and text.
The works are on display at Manarat Al Saadiyat, Abu Dhabi, from 10am to 8pm through September 1.
The 28-year-old artist often draws on personal and collective experience to examine love, grief and the notion of home.
Her practice spans poetry, visual art and performance, and she is now expanding into sound to evoke what she calls “spiritual and emotional transformations”.
The idea for this project emerged from her journals.
“I realised this repetitive journey was more than just travel,” she told Aletihad. “It was a spiritual and emotional cycle I was living through. The physical and mental shifts became so vivid in writing that I felt ‘called’ to translate them into visual and sonic form.”
The contrasts she encounters on the road continue to shape her creative process.
“What draws me to this commute are the interruptions I witness along the way, moments that make me pause, wonder, and remind me of the present movement,” she explained.
“It takes days for my body and mind to adjust, and just as I begin to settle into that calm, I have to return to motion.”
For Hamid, this rhythm also reframes the idea of home.
“Because I am in constant movement, the idea of home becomes fluid,” she said. “It’s not fixed to one place, but rather shaped by how my body and emotions respond to each environment.”
Through repetition, she hopes viewers recognise something in their own lives.
“I want them to reflect on how their environments shape them, and to recognise the quiet power of in-betweenness,” she said.
“The project isn’t just about my commute – it’s about the spaces we all occupy between motion and stillness.”
