Mohammad AlFaraj is an artist, film director, storyteller, and writer, who graduated with a BA in mechanical engineering from King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals (KFUPM) in Dhahran in 2017. After his studies, he began turning his attention to the natural world and making art steeped in metaphor, drawing on agricultural practices, oral histories, and legends recorded from the elders of his community. Fantastical creatures as well as the fauna and flora of his environment appear in his work. By using local and natural materials, such as soil, palm fronds, and date extracts, AlFaraj conveys a deep-rooted connection to the oasis of Al Ahsa, where he was born and raised and where much of his exploration began.

The Whispers of Today are Heard in the Garden of Tomorrow (2024) is a newly commissioned work installed outdoors, which comprises sculptures, drawings made with natural materials, and photographs installed in a wooden pavilion enclosed on all sides with the heavy tarps typically used in agriculture. The floor is covered with soil.  Recreating the environment of an open field, the setting reflects AlFaraj’s conception of life and human history as a garden filled with memories and experiences. Like the plants, trees, and creatures that populate it, this metaphorical garden needs nurturing and care to enable beauty and goodness to flourish. Elements from a previous work, Fossils of Knowledge (2020) have been placed on the floor. Made from palm branches, they recall the backbones or fossils of large animals, and for the artist are a eulogy to a past that needs to be overcome. New sculptures, which AlFaraj calls “new palms” made of the grounded wood and fibers of old palms, recycled books on mythology and history and the fronds of baby palms sit on metal plinths, rising to the sky to suggest rejuvenation and growth. The walls are covered with drawings and ghostly imprints of words. For AlFaraj, the essence of the work is a deconstruction of the past to build the future. Past, present, and future form a dynamic continuum of shared responsibility and hope.