An artist who dares to code: Palestinian painter Samia Halaby opens up about her pioneering digital work

Before becoming known for her bright abstracts, Halaby was programming colours on computers.

Born in Jerusalem in 1936, Palestinian artist Samia Halaby is known for her strong, joyful abstractions: chunky shards of colour that abut one another, eliciting excitement and compassion in the viewer. She is also intensely political, working as an activist in support of Palestine and other social justice causes in the US, where she has lived since the 1950s. 

But in an online cultural forum run by Sultan Al Qassemi – a new version of his Cultural Majlis series of events being held amid the coronavirus outbreak – Halaby opened a window into a lesser-known part of her practice: her early computer works.