Artiez Blog

Salma, a post graduate in design, in is a self-taught artist who works in oils, pastels, and ink. Her work is an experiment in different processes and unconventional methods and techniques to produce striking textures and patterns.

Islamic lusterware produced between the 9th and the 14th centuries forms the key visual element in almost all of Salma’s paintings. The Islamic potter and historian Abu’l Qasim rightly described this effect in 1300 AD saying, “that which has been evenly fired reflects like red gold and shines like the light of the sun”. Salma captures the visual thrill of light playing across the surface of lusterware.

She uses vegetal patterns and designs and merges and melts them to recreate imagery in brown lustres and blue black under glaze paint. Oil washes serve as glazes, usually in shades of bluish greens, browns and ochres and turquoise stained purples to mimic the ceramics of central Asia.

Pieces and bits of calligraphy; whether the angular Kufic script or the delicate Naskh script, are woven into the rendering of her compositions.  She likes to use ornamental backgrounds, echoing of a bygone ethos, overlaid with a bold and stylized foreground.