Alia Al Shamsi

Alia Al Shamsi (born 1982) is an Emirati author and poet. She is the Cultural Programming Manager at the Louvre Abu Dhabi. In 2011 she was the Emirates Woman Artist of the Year and she is identified as a role model. Her fourth book is a book of poetry.

Life
Al Shamsi is an Emarati Italian. She was born in Dubai in 1982. She gained a degree in photography from Durham University in 2008. She had made films with Khadija Hussein al-Buloshi.

In 2011 she was the Emirates Woman Artist of the Year. Al Shamsi graduated with a photography degree in 2014 from Griffith University in Brisbane, Australia. Four years later she was awarded a master's degree from Durham University.

In 2021 she was the Acting Cultural Programming Manager at the Louvre Abu Dhabi art museum. She said that this did not define her because more importantly she was a poet, artist and photographer.

In 2021 Harpars Bazaar magazine decided to arrange for six women to be given mentors. Six leading women achievers were chosen and Alia Al Shamsi was one of them. It was said to be an exercise in "women empowerment". She was asked about "women empowerment" and she said that the important idea was empowerment and there was no need to give it a gender. The May 2021 issue of Harper's Bazaar Arabia was devoted to this demonstration. In 2021 she was profiled as a female leaders of note in the MENA region by Entrepreneur magazine.

In 2024 she was still at the Louvre Abu Dhabi as the Cultural Programming Manager.

Works
In 2014 her children's book Alayah was published. It was illustrated and it concerned a story about a girl with sand in her hair. The book was included in "Reading in Arabic Challenge" by Dubai Culture. This was the first of four books she was involved in. In 2020 her fourth book was of poetry. The Ocean Sees Through My Soul, was published at the Sharjah International Book Fair.