Sophia Al Maria

Sophia Al Maria (صافية المرية; born 1983) is an American artist, writer, and filmmaker. Her work has been exhibited at the Gwangju Biennale, the New Museum in New York, and the Architectural Association School of Architecture in London. Her writing has appeared in Harper's Magazine, Five Dials, Triple Canopy, and Bidoun.

She has coined and developed the concept of 'Gulf Futurism', a term intended to capture the Persian Gulf region's unique blend of rapid modernization, global influences, and socio-economic contrasts.

Her memoir The Girl Who Fell To Earth was published by Harper Perennial on November 27, 2012.

Early life
Sophia Al Maria was born to an American mother from Puyallup, Washington and a Qatari father. She spent time in both countries during her childhood. She studied comparative literature at the American University in Cairo, and aural and visual cultures at Goldsmiths, University of London. She then relocated to Qatar, where she worked towards opening the Mathaf contemporary art museum, alongside the curators Wassan Al-Khudhairi and Deena Chalabi. Al Maria cites the experience as being a formative one, where she was "tasked with meeting and interviewing artists like Hassan Sharif or Zineb Sedira—that was my real art education. Having that proximity was, in a weird way, how I got into artmaking."

Career
Al Maria was awarded the Most Promising Filmmaker Award at the 2009 Doha Tribeca Film Festival.

Her memoir The Girl Who Fell to Earth (2012) is the first English-language memoir to be written by a Qatari author. The Girl Who Fell to Earth chronicles Al Maria's upbringing between her "redneck family in Washington State" and her Bedouin family in Qatar. The narrative explores themes of conflicting cultures, immigration, and personal growth.

In 2014, a film being developed by Al Maria called Beretta was shelved due to legal reasons. The story revolved around an Egyptian lingerie salesman going on a murder spree in which all of his targets are male, bearing some similarities to the 1976 film Taxi Driver. She would write a novel, Virgin with a Memory (2014), partially based off of Beretta. It was announced in 2024 that producers Uri Singer and Aimee Peyronnet had purchased the rights to Beretta from Al Maria.

Al Maria has written several films, including The Watcher #1 (2014), The Magical Slate (2017) and Mirror Cookie (2018).

In 2020, Al Maria produced and cowrote the British miniseries Little Bird. The show aired on Sky Atlantic and received generally positive reviews.

Gulf Futurism
In the late-2000s, Al Maria coined the term 'Gulf Futurism' to refer to the rapid modernization of Persian Gulf cities like Dubai and Doha following the discovery of oil. This term encapsulates the construction boom of luxurious hotels, malls, and megaprojects, and the assimilation of Bedouin tribes into an international consumer culture.

This concept posits that aspects of the future, as envisioned by Western societies, are already manifest in the Arab States of the Persian Gulf. Al Maria portrays the Gulf as a focal point of global changes, characterized by rapid development, a petro-capitalist economy, and advanced air-conditioned environments with towering architecture reminiscent of the neon landscapes depicted in 1980s cyberpunk literature.

At the core of Gulf Futurism is the distinctive socio-economic landscape of the Gulf states, particularly the pervasive influence of oil wealth and consumer culture. Teenage life in these countries often revolves around malls, video games, and television. According to Al Maria, this immersion in virtual realities and global media has become a defining trait of Gulf youth culture.

The prevalence of shopping malls in the Gulf region is a significant theme in Gulf Futurism. Malls function as multifunctional spaces where various aspects of social life, including secret meetings and women's exercise routines, occur. Al-Maria recalls seeing women in abayas and Nikes jogging through the mall and teenagers covertly exchanging phone numbers. This environment of disconnection and covert communication illustrates the unique social dynamics of the Gulf.

Al Maria's works, which include videos and writings, often mix sci-fi elements with dystopian themes to critique the socio-environmental impact of rapid development. Her exhibit Black Friday at the Whitney Museum in 2016 portrayed Doha's malls as sites of consumer entrapment and cultural dislocation, emphasizing the disorienting effects of hypermodernity.

An art project of Al Maria's, Sci-fi Wahabi, epitomizes Gulf Futurism’s blend of traditional and futuristic elements. In this project, she adopts an imposing alter ego adorned with laser sunglasses and an abaya. This character embodies the intersection of cultural heritage and futuristic imagination, highlighting the innovative and often surreal nature of Gulf Futurism.