Hayaty Diaries’ ‘I Forgot What You Felt Like’ Highlights Four Female Middle Eastern Artists

Violet Goldstone
·2 min read

LONDON — Female-led collective Hayaty Diaries, founded by Kinzy Diab and Christina Shoucair, has opened “I Forgot What You Felt Like,” an exhibition which will run until Tuesday.

Staged in a little gallery off of Hyde Park on 32 Connaught Street, the exhibition features works from Middle Eastern artists Raya Kassisieh, Zahra Holm, Huda Jamal and Yasmina Hilal, each a reminiscence of the past.

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“The vision for this exhibition began with its title. ‘I Forgot What You Felt Like’ was a line I wrote down one afternoon as a passing thought,” Shoucair said.

A mask made by Raya Kassisieh.
A mask made by Raya Kassisieh.

“The words seemed to perfectly capture the complex emotions of forgetting and remembering, of drifting apart and then finding our way back – ideas we had been discussing as potential starting points for a future exhibition,” she added.

Diab said the artists expressed the themes in the showcase “through memories of loved ones, pivotal moments of self-awareness, and explorations of identity formation in the context of migration or displacement.”

Inside the exhibition.
Inside the exhibition.

Jamal’s striking paintings capture women — anxiously sitting on a bed in one, bleeding out on a pink and white checkerboard floor in another — set against swirling cotton candy-colored backgrounds, a reflection on intimate relationships.

"This exhibition marks our first collaboration with Zahra Holm, and we're excited to introduce her work to our Hayaty Diaries community," said Diab, adding, "We chose Zahra for her unique approach to the human form, which she abstracts into fluid, geometric shapes that beautifully capture the complexities of identity, transformation, and self-rediscovery."
“This exhibition marks our first collaboration with Zahra Holm, and we’re excited to introduce her work to our Hayaty Diaries community,” Diab said.

A visceral mask of a face caught mid-scream is from multidisciplinary artist Kassisieh’s oeuvre, her work an emotional reconciliation with her identity and family history.

Other works on display include Holm’s undulating pastels, a sensory depiction of her relationship with her changing body as a new mother.

Hilal took the concept of rediscovery seriously, revisiting unfinished works from 2022 and 2023, such as a delicate analogue image surrounded in a brutalist metal frame, and completing them for the exhibit.

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