ArtDayME - Alia Zaal’s latest solo exhibition, ‘In Plain Sight,’ is currently on view at Gallery Isabelle, presenting a body of paintings, works on paper and ceramic pieces through which the Emirati artist explores the ways we see, remember and experience our surroundings.

Rather than depicting broad landscapes, Zaal focuses on intimate details of nature, from familiar trees and plants to fragments of the UAE’s natural environments. Inspired by locations including Al Khawaneej in Dubai and the mangroves and mudflats of Abu Dhabi, the artist creates works shaped by the relationship between observation, memory and personal experience.

Many of the works in the exhibition begin with photographs captured by the artist on her smartphone, which are then digitally altered through processes such as cropping, zooming and distortion before becoming the foundation for her paintings. These digital interventions become part of the final works, reflecting Zaal’s interest in how vision is shaped by technology, context and individual experience.

‘In Plain Sight’ is also informed by the ideas of Ibn Al Haytham, the 11th-century scholar whose pioneering studies of optics explored the role of perception in the act of seeing. Through this exhibition, Zaal examines vision as an active process, suggesting that the way we perceive our surroundings is influenced by memory, interpretation and lived experience.

Personal history also plays a role in the exhibition. Inspired in part by her father’s difficulty in distinguishing certain colours, Zaal approaches vision as an individual experience rather than a universal one.

Through close-up views of ghaf trees, native vegetation and natural environments, ‘In Plain Sight’ transforms familiar landscapes into reflections on memory, perception and emotional connection to place.

Born in 1989 in Dubai, Alia Zaal is a painter whose practice is grounded in perception, particularly in observing how light and its movement shape moments. ‘In Plain Sight’ marks her first solo exhibition at Gallery Isabelle.

The exhibition is on view at Gallery Isabelle, Dubai, until September 15, 2026.