Grand exit

Students at the College of Fine Arts and Design at the University of Sharjah presented their final year projects as part of the annual Exit exhibition for graduating students.

Some projects dewelled on social issues, others put forward alternative perspectives for society to consider. Some students used their projects to take them back to their history, roots and culture and share with the public their own perceptions about it.

From politics to family ties to car accidents, a diverse range of topics was presented at the event, which ended last week.

Car crash

Hayat Al Suwaidi, majoring in fine arts, replicated the aftermath of a car crash in her work. At the exhibition hall, she had scattered the parts of a car wrecked in an accident. "I actually put the parts together, and had some pieces hanging from the ceiling to show that they were blown out from the car. The windshield and two doors were also shown ripped off. The idea was to show how fragile a car is, like paper," she said.

A UAE national, Hayat chose to highlight a national concern through her work. "The highest rate of death in the UAE is caused by accidents. It is an important social cause that I wanted to create awareness about," she told Notes.

Her work evoked the admiration of visitors who praised the idea and boldness of its presentation.

'My Yemen'

Noor Hamid Al Deen is a young producer, writer and editor of film, and a fine arts major at the University of Sharjah. She had produced a film titled Only a Beginning that tells the story of her birth in the US, her move to Saudi Arabia and then to the UAE.

In the film, she speaks of her search for "home", and expulsion from Yemen after the [September 1962] revolution and of striving to find an identity as a young Arab Muslim woman.

"My work is an ongoing process of self-discovery and self-reflection, represented through video art installation. My artistic expression tells the story of how I view my life," she said.

"The movie was a year's work; I tell my story and my reflections about Yemen, a country I loved but visited only once in my life, for 10 days; a country I can never go back to live in," she said.

Hamid Al Deen's inspiration came from her family background. "In the beginning I was trying to understand the history of my family, the previous rulers of Yemen. My family has been in exile since the revolution in the 1960s. That was my starting point: I was never in one place in my life: I was born in the US, I spent my adolescent years in Saudi Arabia and I am now in the UAE."

Her work consisted of an installation that included boxes displaying photos of her ancestors. The faces of female ancestors were not shown out "of respect for the culture at home" Hamid Al Deen explained. Instead, a blank page with small windows was used to represent the veil; a red necklace was hung to symbolise femininity.

Art is a state of mind

Noora Al Mazrouie learned to love art at home. Her mother and sister are both artists.

"I chose fine arts because I love art and have been admiring it for so long; I had to let it out of my system," Al Mazrouie, a UAE national, told Notes.

Her project consisted of huge frames portraying a woman's hair against different backdrops.

The colours in each frame were carefully chosen to depict nature, Noora explained. She had also set up a bird cage to one side, "to signify peace".

"People always imagine themselves in a moment, and we like to imagine ourselves in an exaggerated thought or situation. It relates to me; I like to dream a lot and to fantasise.... My project is all about placing one character in a landscape or a single moment and the idea was that it is about framing your mind, literally through the frames and also mentally," she said.

Education and achievement

Other projects were just as unique in their idea, design, colour and presentation. They told stories of suffering, loss, imagination, injustice, identity and freedom. A whole set of emotions was left for the viewer to feel on their own.

What better way to end the year than to put on view what young minds have learned, and achieved.