Rather than a monograph, alia ali… one of many is a multi-graph, a drawing of many. Ali deconstructs artificial binaries to examine inherited political narratives—diaspora, identity, borders—through the lens of photography, language, textile, and architectural installations. A map of patterns emerges, interwoven with artist statements, research images, exchanges with collaborators, and fragments of her journals. Words and images draw us simultaneously into the micro musings of the artist’s mind and zoom out to a macro reflection of the global and communal nature of the artist’s practice. Ali’s multi-graph is a textural experience in which each page is folded upon itself, leaving one wondering at what is invisible in plain sight. 

“Glitchspace” by Zan Zeller explores the recurring motif of the glitch throughout Ali’s work, as well as themes of space, time, cyclical forces, and beings existing in the in-betweens. Among these are the djinn, intermediary beings and keepers of humanity’s knowledge; prophets, seers, and protectors. 

Excerpt:

“Ali's work endeavors to make visible the invisible—the djinn, the immigrants, the refugees, the queer community, the marginalized—by studying the shapes of such things. She grants us access to the unseen by applying the patterns found throughout the structure of our world to the -cludes, the characters within the portraits. Like the djinn, the -cludes are not of this world and therefore belong nowhere. But, in this liberty of placelessness, they create ruptures, carving out space where none exists, creating expansive new worlds in which to belong.”