arab — Features

Talking Textures: Hairdresser Yasemin Hassan celebrates SWANA curls and coils

The Turkish curly hair specialist tells AZEEMA why she was motivated to create a large-scale collaborative project with her Middle Eastern community not only celebrating the beauty and diversity of curls, but also educating them on how to care for and style their hair.

FASHION & BEAUTYAZEEMA -April 1, 2024hair, curls, curly, culture, swana, arab, turkish, exhibition, photography, event

Mastering engineer Heba Kadry is challenging what we think North African and Arab artists sound like

The New York-based Egyptian tells us why she didn’t “give a sh*t” about sexism as she was coming up in the music industry whilst she explains her experience guest curating an impressive line-up at Le Guess Who? festival 2023 in Utrecht.

SOUND, SPONSORED CONTENTDalia Al-DujailiJanuary 2, 2024music, mena, women, Feminism, arab, cairo, festival, engineering

Hannah Khalil’s demonstration of the uniquely feminine power of oral storytelling

The Palestinian-Irish playwright tells AZEEMA why she wanted to reimagine A Thousand and One Nights from the female perspective, whilst explaining her career-long devotion to subverting the notions of a ‘meek’ Arab woman and redefining the her place onstage.

ARTS & CULTUREAZEEMA -January 4, 2023play, theatre, palestine, ireland, playwright, Feminism, arab, storytelling

Darin J. Sallam’s debut feature film shares “our side of the narrative” of the Palestinian Nakba

As this year’s Safar Film Festival gets underway, we speak to the award-winning Jordanian director on how she tried to epitomise Palestinian joy coupled with imposing social restrictions in her debut feature Farha, which tells the story of a little girl in 1948 Palestine who survives the Nakba and is concealed in a cupboard by her father to protect her from pending danger.

ذكريات و كلوتات – The Transition From Girl to Woman Through the Aesthetics of Underwear

“Let’s start this with an apology to my mother.” In this tender exploration of the transition between girlhood and womanhood, Cairo-born photographer Alia Dessouki dictates the uniquely feminine evolution from the subject of innocence to the subject of the sexualised gaze through her childhood underwear.