Changing Saudi Arabia: Art, Culture, and Society in the Kingdom 9781626377868

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Changing Saudi Arabia

Changing Saudi Arabia Art, Culture, and Society in the Kingdom

Sean Foley

b o u l d e r l o n d o n

Published in the United States of America in 2019 by Lynne Rienner Publishers, Inc. 1800 30th Street, Boulder, Colorado 80301 www.rienner.com

and in the United Kingdom by Lynne Rienner Publishers, Inc. Gray’s Inn House, 127 Clerkenwell Road, London EC1 5DB

© 2019 by Lynne Rienner Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Foley, Sean, 1974– author. Title: Changing Saudi Arabia : art, culture, and society in the Kingdom / Sean Foley. Description: Boulder, Colorado : Lynne Rienner Publishers, Inc., 2019. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2018039686 (print) | LCCN 2018046279 (ebook) | ISBN 9781626377868 (ebook) | ISBN 9781626377561 | ISBN 9781626377561(hardcover :alk. paper) Subjects: LCSH: Arts—Saudi Arabia. | Art—Saudi Arabia. | Stand-up comedy—Saudi Arabia. | Mass media—Saudi Arabia. | Motion pictures—Saudi Arabia. | Arts and society—Saudi Arabia. Classification: LCC NX573.6.S2 (ebook) | LCC NX573.6.S2 F65 2019 (print) | DDC 709.538—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018039686 British Cataloguing in Publication Data A Cataloguing in Publication record for this book is available from the British Library.

Printed and bound in the United States of America

The paper used in this publication meets the requirements of the American National Standard for Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials Z39.48-1992.

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Contents

Preface

vii

1

Creating Change in Saudi Arabia

2

The Modern Saudi Visual Arts Movement

3

The Emerging Comedy Scene

4

Media Companies and Filmmakers

5

Shaping the Future

1

21 73

113

163

Bibliography Index About the Book

189 211 221

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Preface

Over the course of ten years, our lives changed completely. It is a drastic change that I experience every day. The Cowboy Code is something I have thought about for years. When I was a child, the cowboy was always a symbol of freedom and adventure, an ideology that came from the West and assimilated itself into my culture. Like many of my generation, I have taken a lot from the West—the food we eat, clothes we wear, even our language, and so I wanted to present this code as a way of reclaiming these qualities, as opposed to purely commodity driven influences. I want to move these compatible beliefs away from the politics, from the media, and give them back to the people. —Ahmed Mater

When I was in Great Britain for a friend’s wedding in October 2012, I spent an extra day in London to see #Cometogether, an exhibit of modern Saudi artists held on Brick Lane in East London. Because I would be spending the next year in Riyadh, I hoped that the exhibit could prepare me for my time there. Going to that exhibit was a life-changing decision, radically altering how I understood Saudi Arabia and providing me with an invaluable preview of the many forces that are now rapidly changing that kingdom. At the time of the exhibit, the reforms that we associate with today’s “new Saudi Arabia” were still many years away.1 But the men and women whose works were on display in East London had already started to imagine what a future kingdom might look like—a country in which women might drive and other cultural and social reforms might be implemented. The title that they chose for the exhibit reflected their spirt of reimagining: #Cometogether evokes the famous Beatles song and idealism, but in a fresh way for a new generation by turning it into a Twitter hashtag.2 Although female Saudi activists had already staged public driving protests to spark a dialogue on gender, these modern artists took a different route to talk about sensitive issues: instead of insisting on one point of view, they made collages that simultaneously displayed many perspectives, including contradictory ones. Several of the works tied Saudi aesthetics and

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Preface

socioreligious traditions to global ones as diverse as Asian calligraphy, Cubism, film, and hip-hop art. Following the directive of the Beatles song, they had “come together, right now.”3 I was intrigued by the aesthetics of those works and by the provocative questions they raised about issues central to my scholarship on the kingdom. This was a vision of culture different from mine in America: it presented dialogue and an entity in motion that were always open to interpretation and reinterpretation by others. Nor was the discussion about Saudi art limited to the gallery in East London. Viewers were asked to make comments on social media, using the exhibition title, the Twitter hashtag: #Cometogether. No piece in the exhibit was more thought-provoking than Ahmed Mater’s The Cowboy Code (Hadith) (see Photo 1). The work, which is 415 by 800 centimeters, or 163 by 315 inches, occupies a vast canvas composed of thousands of plastic toy-gun caps, a field of red caps upon which white caps compose two different parallel written sections in English and Arabic. The two sections, which have similar meanings, combine two entities that few would see as having anything in common or even coexisting in the same space. One entity gives Mater the first part of his title, The Cowboy Code. In the late 1940s, the popular American singing cowboy Gene Autry (1907– 1998) issued a formal code of ethics for his fans, most of whom were children. It was called “Gene Autry’s Cowboy Code,” or “The Cowboy Commandments,” of which there were ten. These commandments included injunctions such as “The Cowboy must never shoot first, hit a smaller man, or take unfair advantage” and “He must be gentle with children, the elderly, and animals.”4 The second entity is the Waṣāya as-Islām fī al-Ḥarb, Islam’s ten commandments in war, which are attributed to the Prophet Muhammad (570– 632 CE).5 This code explains the second part of the piece’s title, Hadith, the term that Muslims use to refer to the statements and actions of the Prophet Muhammad. In a handout provided by the organizers of #Cometogether, Mater explained that as a child, he often played cowboy with toy guns that shot the type of caps he used in the piece.6 As I sought to come to terms with Mater’s paradoxical work, I remembered Sayyid Qutb, the Islamic intellectual, who certainly knew both Autry’s music and midcentury America. Between 1948 and 1950, Qutb lived in Greeley, Colorado, where he familiarized himself with the nation’s society, including what he characterized as Americans’ “primitive” tastes in art and in music.7 Over the next two decades, he became disillusioned with the whole of American art and culture, and, in 1964, wrote Milestones—a book whose ideas inspired scores of Muslims to wage violent jihad against America and its allies in the Middle East.8 In Qutb’s world-

Preface

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Photo 1. The Cowboy Code (Hadith) (Landscape), 2012, Ahmed Mater. Plastic toy gun-caps glued together into sheets. Copyright © 2012 by Ahmed Mater. Courtesy Ahmed Mater.

view, The Cowboy Code (Hadith) makes little sense and might even be seen as offensive, as the work places a code written by an American movie star on the same plane as the revered holy words of Islam’s Prophet. But as I looked more intensively at Cowboy Code (Hadith), it was clear to me that Mater had developed a poignant answer to Qutb. There are phrases in the piece, some in Arabic and some in English, with similar meanings, which are presented side by side. (For example, in English, there is “A cowboy respects womanhood,” and, in Arabic, there is “He advised that you should not kill a woman.”)9 By juxtaposing these phrases, Mater asks the viewer to ponder whether America’s cultural collision with Islam, including one composed of toy gun caps, can produce something other than discord—namely, coexistence and the emergence of common values. For Mater, this was a profound proposal. Not only had many Saudi men his age revered Qutb’s book,10 but Mater and his countrymen had also lived for over a decade in the shadow of September 11, 2001, one of the worst examples of cultural collision in the twenty-first century. Upon reflection, I realized that Mater’s willingness to raise this question showed that he and his fellow artists could successfully negotiate contexts that Westerners and many Middle Easterners view as being in a state of tension, even to the point of contradiction. These artists see such contexts as part of the many faces of reality. It was clear to me that this vision allows such artists to express sophisticated opinions in a way that is different from

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the state-society dynamic and the other dualistic structures that my colleagues and I had long used to describe Saudi Arabia. What I was discovering in East London was a grassroots social discourse—one that reflected a cross section of Saudi public opinion, drew on foreign and domestic sources, and explored the present and possible futures of the kingdom. Changing Saudi Arabia: Art, Culture, and Society in the Kingdom charts the emergence of this discourse as a national force while highlighting the role of artists in the transformation of the kingdom during the first two decades of the twenty-first century. As mirrors of society and as cultural leaders, artists have often stood at the forefront of social change, offering innovative ways to approach contradiction, dissonance, and diversity. Their work is less an answer to the problems of a kingdom long seen as paradoxical than it is a fresh questioning, a constant reminder of the complexities of life in the twenty-first century. * * * Foremost among those who have helped me to write this book is John Voll, who remains one of my most valued advisers. I cannot thank him enough for his constant encouragement and helpful suggestions for improving the draft manuscript. Another early proponent of the book was Lynne Rienner, who helped me develop a structure for my manuscript, provided useful feedback while I was writing, and devised a fantastic title for it. I appreciate her ongoing faith in my scholarship and am proud to be publishing my second book with the Colorado-based press that bears her name—one of the last independent publishers in the United States. I owe an enormous debt to Matthew Gray for his companionship and humor. Through countless conversations in person and online, he gave invaluable advice, helping me to sharpen my arguments and better formulate my ideas. I cannot thank him enough for the opportunity to be a research scholar in 2014 with the Center for Arab and Islamic Studies at the Australian National University. I was fortunate enough to work there for three months with Gray and his talented colleagues, including Raihan Ismail, who shared with me her vast knowledge of Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, and Islamic law. Terima kasih banyak banyak, Raihan! Since Matthew moved to Waseda University in 2016, I have regularly traveled to Japan, where I have benefited from working with some of the country’s foremost Middle East experts, especially Namie Tsujigami. Few scholars have a better sense of humor or understanding of gender in Saudi Arabia. Her insights into both the Middle East and Japan have greatly enriched my scholarship. Arigatō gozaimasu! In addition to my presentations in Japan, I benefited from feedback from a wide variety of scholars at international and domestic conferences

Preface

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and other forums: Paul Aarts, Sultan Alamer, Nora Abdulkarim, Muhammad al-Atawneh, Hesham al-Ghannam, Yahya al-Zahrani, Natana DeLongBas, Jonathan Fulton, Geoffrey F. Gresh, Victoria Hightower, Minerva Nasser-Eddine, Nor Faridah Abdul Manaf, Md. Muddassir Quamar, JeanFrançois Seznec, Amin Saikal, Mary Ann Tétreault, Kristian Ulrichsen, Scott Weiner, and Luciano Zaccara. I pay special thanks to Heidi Minshall, who organized a presentation on Saudi artists at the British Foreign Office, and to Jocelyn Sage Mitchell, who co-organized five Middle East Studies Association panels with me. Shukran jazilan, Jocelyn, for your advice, friendship, and expertise on Middle Eastern politics. This book would not have been possible without the friendship and support of a broad cross section of the Saudi artistic community. Among the most significant individuals are Hisham Fageeh and Raneen Bukhari: I am in awe of their courage, intelligence, and commitment to creating a better world. Through their work and many conversations, they have educated me about Saudi Arabia and opened my eyes to what art can achieve there. From the start of my research until today, Adnan Manjal has been an invaluable source, sharing his knowledge of and contacts with the artistic community. During my time in Saudi Arabia and in the years that have followed, Malik Nejer has helped both me and my students to understand the nation, its art, and online media. My interviews with Ahmed Mater, Arwa al-Neami, and Abdulnasser Gharem were highly informative, and I greatly appreciate how these Saudis allowed me into their lives, both in the United States and Saudi Arabia. In addition, Rehman Akhtar, Manal al-Dowayan, Lina Gazzaz, Basil al-Hilal, Peter Howarth-Lees, Khalid Moss, Ahd Kamel, Abdullah Qandeel, Mississippi Ibrahim, and Todd Nims gave me fascinating interviews while granting me special access to their work. Finally, Stephen Stapleton shared his knowledge of the Saudi art scene, provided invaluable resources, and published some of my earliest work on Saudi artists. I thank #LuxuryKSA (formerly Luxury Productions) and Telfaz11, both of which graciously allowed me to visit their offices and talk extensively with their talented staff members and performers. There is no question that my two visits to Telfaz11 and my extended talks with Alaa Yousef Faden, Ali Kalthami, Abd al-Aziz Aziz as-Shalan, Alaa Wardi, and others were pivotal in the creation of the book. Beyond the artistic movement in Saudi Arabia, I benefited from a wide network of friends, some of whom provided contacts in the arts community: Thuraya al-Arrayed, Fahd al-Homoudi, Azim Mabrook, Abdullah Mohammed al-Kobraish, Mohanad Jamal, Abdullah Nidal Mohiuddin, and Mahdi Talal. I especially thank Abdullah al-Arrak, Amal Almouallimi, Ali Ganjelou, Noriko Ganjelou, Lili Ganjelou, and Weiman Guo for their ongoing friendship. I also thank Abdulaziz S. A. al-Mathami for allowing me to visit Al-Waṭan newspaper offices in Abha in October 2013.

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Of course, my research in Saudi Arabia would not have been possible without the help of Saud al-Tamamy, who initially contacted me in 2011 about writing a book on Saudi Arabia. Over the next two years, he reached a unique joint agreement between his Saudi colleagues and my home university, Middle Tennessee State University (MTSU), which allowed me to live and work in Saudi Arabia in 2013 and 2014. I especially appreciate his efforts to act as liaison on my family’s behalf with the bureaucracy at King Saud University. I will never forget that he and his colleagues were the first to encourage me to publish my work on Saudi arts as a separate study, rather than making it part of a larger project on Saudi politics. During my multiple trips to the United Arab Emirates in 2013, Sultan al-Qassemi generously shared his experiences about Middle Eastern art as he was hosting me and my family in Dubai. Ahmad Barakat, Ahmed Cirro, John Curry, Manav Jain, Ahmad Jeddeeni, Bert Kirby, Geoffrey Martin, Paul du Quenoy, and Dan Stigall are invaluable friends. Their knowledge, humor, and companionship helped me through the many trials of writing the book. I especially thank John Curry for arranging my visit to the University of Nevada, Las Vegas in 2015. I also thank Dan Stigall for his expert help with both Islamic and international law. Alizi Alias, Gabriele Frömming, Ahmad Khaldun Ismail, and Ahmad Saifuddin have helped keep me grounded and regularly reminded me of my passion for working in Malaysia. Along the way, Elizabeth Bishop, Gökser Gökçay, Tawane Pierre, and Nicholas Spencer became good friends. In addition, I thank Tugrul Keskin, P. R. Kumaraswamy, and Scott Lucas for their friendship and commitment to my work and career. All three of you always inspire me to do my best. Since coming to Tennessee in 2006, I have benefited from working with a wide variety of people at MTSU and beyond. I thank my former department chair, Bob Hunt, whose support was essential to my taking advantage of the opportunity to go to Saudi Arabia. Provost Mark Byrnes and the Office of Research Services were no less supportive of my work. Dean Karen Petersen has also strongly supported my research. David Schmidt, who ably represents the university overseas, kindly introduced me to MTSU’s alumni network in Saudi Arabia. I particularly thank Louis Haas for his companionship, intellect, and invaluable insights. No one could ask for a finer colleague. Finally, I remain forever grateful to Belle Morgan, Kristian Morgan, Chris Chwirut, Megan Chwirut, Bo Gabbert, and the staff at Porkbelly Café for providing me with a wonderful place to think and write. Through the magic of Skype, Paul Weisser, my manuscript editor, provided a valuable sounding board for my ideas and writing style from 2,000 miles away. I am grateful for the friendship of Jol Silversmith and Elizabeth Kimmons, who generously shared their home with me whenever I made re-

Preface xiii

search trips to the nation’s capital. I always appreciated their acid wit, good cheer, and superb counsel. I am deeply grateful to my father, Jack Foley, and to my mother, the late Adelle Foley, whose love and support fundamentally shaped my life. It saddens me greatly that my mom did not live to see this project come to fruition. Still, it is my fervent hope that my second “grandbook” brings some joy to our family, which is still grappling with mom’s sudden illness and death in the summer of 2016. My final and most heartfelt acknowledgment goes to my wife, Kerry Foley, whose imprint is on virtually every page of my manuscript. No one could have done a better job of keeping me happy and motivated while I faced the many challenges of completing my second book. It is to Kerry and to the memory of my late mother that this book is dedicated. Notes 1. For example, see how the term is used in Vivian Nereim, Matthew Martin, and Glen Carey, “Ritz-Carlton Crackdown Still Haunts the New Saudi Arabia,” Bloomberg, June 15, 2018, www.bloomberg.com. 2. Stephen Stapleton, Facebook Instant Message to the author, June 29, 2018. 3. John Lennon and Paul McCartney, “Abbey Road,” in John Lennon Lyrics, by New Planets (Morrisville, NC: Lulu.Com, 2017), 53. 4. Tracey Owens Patton and Sally M. Schedlock, Gender, Power, and Whiteness in Rodeo: Breaking Away from the Ties of Sexism and Racism (New York: Lexington Books, 2012), xix. 5. For more on Islam’s rules of war, see Dan E. Stigall, The Santillana Codes: The Civil Codes of Tunisia, Morocco, and Mauritania (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2017), 20; Patrick B. Grant, “Islamic Law, International Law, and Non-International Armed Conflict in Syria,” Boston University International Law Journal 35, no. 1: 1–37; and Qasim Rashid, “Qur’an Lesson: Prophet Muhammad’s Rules of War,” Daily Beast, November 20, 2012, www.thedailybeast.com. 6. The caps were called “Western Gun Caps” and were available everywhere in Saudi Arabia. Edge of Arabia, Cowboy Code (Hadith): Ahmed Mater (London: Edge of Arabia, 2012). 7. James Nolan, What They Saw in America: Alexis de Tocqueville, Max Weber, G. K. Chesterton, and Sayyid Qutb (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016), 196. 8. For one of the best overviews of Qutb’s influence on modern Islamist thinking, see John Calvert, Sayyid Qutb and the Origins of Radical Islamism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009). 9. In Arabic, Wa kāna yuṣī wa lā taqtulū imra’a. 10. Among those influenced by Qutb’s writings was Osama bin Laden. For more on Qutb and bin Laden, see Natana J. DeLong-Bas, Wahhabi Islam: From Revival and Reform to Global Islam (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), 260–273; and Calvert, Sayyid Qutb, 275–280.

1 Creating Change in Saudi Arabia

“Suspended Together” is a powerful installation that gives the impression of movement and freedom. However, a closer look at the 200 doves allows the viewer to realize that the doves are actually frozen and suspended with no hope of flight. If you examine it even more minutely, it shows that each dove carries on its body a permission document that allows a Saudi woman to travel. Notwithstanding their circumstances, all Saudi women are required to have this document, issued by their appointed male guardian. —Manal al-Dowayan

The power of the arts to anticipate future social and technological developments, by a generation and more, has long been recognized. In this century, Ezra Pound called artists “the antennae of the race.” Art as radar acts as “an early alarm system,” as it were, enabling us to discover social and psychic targets in lots of time to prepare to cope with them. This concept of the arts as prophetic contrasts with the popular idea of them as mere self-expression. —Marshall McLuhan

In late September 2017, the colors green and white dominated everyday life in Riyadh, the capital of Saudi Arabia. Although it was only a week after the Eid holiday, this profusion of color had little to do with religion. It was because of National Day, which is celebrated on September 23 to commemorate the day in 1932 when King Abdulaziz ibn Saud issued the proclamation announcing the unification of the kingdom of Saudi Arabia.1 While the days leading up to the holiday were tense, dominated by a diplomatic dispute with Qatar,2 the holiday featured large governmentsponsored events throughout the country, with men and women intermingling freely, a rare sight in this conservative society. Equally remarkable was the central place of the arts and a new class of male and female Saudi 1

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Changing Saudi Arabia

artists in the celebrations throughout a country where, in the words of the Saudi sociologist Abdulsalam al-Wayel, the “contempt for the arts lies at the heart of its values.”3 In Riyadh, Saudi men and women, including some women who were unveiled, sat together to see an operetta about Saudi history at King Fahd Stadium, the large football (soccer) stadium that usually only allows men into its stands.4 Eighteen miles (30 kilometers) away from the stadium, thousands of young men and women were dancing to a music-and-light show with a live DJ on Taḥliya Street—a central shopping district, which is loosely modeled on the Champs-Élysées in Paris.5 Throughout the festive evening, large color images of female Olympians, members of the royal family, and other prominent Saudis appeared on the side of the Kingdom Tower, the ninety-nine-story skyscraper in central Riyadh, not far from Taḥliya Street.6 Further adding to the festive atmosphere in the country surrounding the national celebration, King Salman issued a royal decree on September 26, 2017, directing the country’s legislature to develop regulations to issue driver’s licenses to both men and women.7 On Saudi National Day and the day of the announcement about women driving, Saudis turned to social media to express their opinions and to post memes, photos, and videos. Among the most popular items posted on Saudi National Day was a music video produced by Majed Alesa, one of the country’s emerging artists. Sponsored by the MiSK Foundation, a nonprofit organization closely linked to Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman,8 the video is a collage of oppositional images—Western and Saudi, old and new—in a black-and-white landscape periodically accentuated by brightly colored objects.9 Set to stirring patriotic Saudi music, the video opens with an image of a young Saudi man wearing a tuxedo as he plays the piano. It then cuts to a Western orchestra, a stallion, an old warrior in traditional clothing with a sword, a falcon, Bedouin warriors riding camels, and men dancing traditional sword dances. The video concludes with a black curtain covering the screen that is adorned with the images of three generations of Saudi leaders: King Abdulaziz ibn Saud; his son, King Salman; and Salman’s son, Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. In sum, although Alesa’s video is clearly Saudi, referencing the country’s culture and history, it nonetheless has the feel of the American popular music videos that are watched by young people around the globe.10 The online discussions about Saudi National Day, the king’s decision to allow women to drive, and Alesa’s National Day video accounted for thousands of posts on Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Twitter, and other social media platforms. Collectively, those posts resemble the discussions that Saudis conduct in a majlis, a forum for debates and problem solving that exists throughout the kingdom. Virtually every Saudi home and public insti-

Creating Change in Saudi Arabia

3

tution, including the offices of senior government officials, has a large space set aside for a majlis. Some of these spaces are segregated by gender; others are open to both men and women. Notably, one sees similar segregation online. Although many discussions on Twitter are open to anyone, the same is not true for Instagram and other social media platforms that allow users to limit who can see feeds or even specific posts. Indeed, it is common for Saudi women, including public figures with large followings online, to limit who has access to their social media sites. Surprisingly absent from these online discussions about Saudi National Day were the Western experts on Saudi Arabia and the Gulf, many of whom are active on Twitter, frequently commenting on the country’s affairs. Even during the days following the announcement on women’s driving, many of these scholars focused on state/elite concerns or the reactions of both women’s rights and conservative activists—often overlooking the rest of Saudi society.11 The absence of these scholars from these discussions reflects their general focus on Saudi economic and political issues rather than online or cultural/social issues, many of which are seen as less important or as ancillary to the country’s “real” politics in the royal family and among the religious and commercial elites. As Kristin Diwan lamented in a tweet on August 22, 2017, Gulf politics “is a very immature field of study. Most Gulf scholars . . . have a shallow understanding of Gulf cultural history.”12 There are sound reasons that many Western scholars of Saudi politics focus on the kingdom’s elites—what Steffen Hertog identified as the princes, bureaucrats, and others who have shaped the country’s economy and politics.13 For decades, these elites have constructed a centralized bureaucratic and hierarchical governing system—or regime—in which the monarchy, individual royal family members, and those with close links to them retain vast wealth and wield power through both unofficial and official channels. As we will see, unofficial elite power takes a variety of forms, from funding new private cultural institutions to securing allies’ preferred access to the media or to the state’s bureaucracy. Nonetheless, the royal family retains enormous power, which can be used to deliver massive social change. It was King Salman who issued the royal decree permitting women to drive, and his son, Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman, appeared on state television shortly afterward to explain how the new regulations would be implemented.14 As Dale Eickelman and James Piscatori have stated, the monarchy has used decrees like Salman’s to circumvent the authority of the ulama, the kingdom’s clerical class, when making major “administrative, economic, and social changes.”15 Saudi jurists believe that they serve as “social leaders who strive to preserve the Islamic image of the Saudi nation”—one consistent with the ideals of Hanbali Sunni scholar Muḥammad ibn Abd al-Wahhāb (1703–1792),16 which have defined the Saudi nation since its inception.

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Changing Saudi Arabia

(These ideals are widely known outside of the Kingdom as “Wahhabism.”) For decades, the Saudi state’s commitment to upholding that vision, including restrictions on women, have been, in Bernard Haykel’s words, “intimately entwined with its own legitimacy.”17 For many in the kingdom, 1979 was a watershed moment in that relationship: Following the seizure of the Grand Mosque in Mecca that year by a group of religious extremists seeking to overthrow the monarchy, the Saudi government reaffirmed its commitment to those conservative values by strongly supporting forces tied to a movement widely known among Saudis as the “Ṣaḥwa.”18 Although Riyadh has significantly scaled back that commitment in recent years,19 some ulama still have a public voice and, as we will see, have played a role in determining what type of cultural production is acceptable in public settings.20 However, focusing on the governing or the religious elites, no matter how important they are or have been, can overlook a critical element in Saudi politics, especially in the age of social media—namely, the intense debate about women’s driving and other issues among the country’s masses online. This is the type of debate that Deborah Wheeler recently identified as occurring “beneath the surfaces of power” in Saudi Arabia and other Arab states.21 Indeed, since the start of the twenty-first century, both male and female artists have played a key but overlooked role in the debate online over women driving and other controversial issues. Through art that is either abstract or a collage of oppositional elements, including Saudi and Western ones, as in Alesa’s video, artists in the kingdom have expressed both the views and the experiences of their fellow Saudis. We can see this clearly with the issue of women driving. For example, many Saudi artists, including Arwa al-Neami and Manal al-Dowayan, have explored the issue of women driving in their art.22 Saudi artists also play a large role in debates online, where they are leading personalities, with millions of followers on social media.23 Many Saudi artists maintain close ties to members of the royal family,24 including Crown Prince Muhammad Bin Salman. Not only have some artists met with the crown prince,25 but Ahmed Mater, a leading visual artist, also serves as the CEO of MiSK’s Art Institute.26 At the same time, Saudi artists have ties to female activists who lobbied online and elsewhere to allow women to drive. For example, Saudi stand-up comedian Fahad Albutairi has stated on his Twitter account that he is the “proud husband” of Loujain al-Hathloul,27 the female and driving rights activist with a global following.28 She has been imprisoned multiple times by Saudi authorities, and has seen her cases referred to a special terrorism court.29 In fact, she was most recently arrested just before the driving ban was lifted in 2018.30 Moreover, Manal al-Sharif, a leading Saudi driving activist, talks at length about the role of drawing during her coming of age in her memoir, Daring to Drive: A Saudi Woman’s Awakening.31

Creating Change in Saudi Arabia

5

Thus, it should come as no surprise that two works of art, which combined Western and Saudi cultural norms and were released online, played an important role in the debate on women driving in Saudi Arabia. The first was “No Woman, No Drive,” a satirical music video from 2013 that starred Albutairi, Hisham Fageeh, and other men at Riyadh’s Telfaz11 studios.32 The second was “Hawājis” (“Concerns”), a satirical music video starring a group of Saudi women, which was produced in 2016 by Majed Alesa’s 8IES Studios.33 The two satirical music videos, which have been viewed on YouTube around the world over 38 million times, received extensive coverage outside the kingdom.34 Together, the two videos reveal both the global appeal of Saudi Arabia’s art and, more important, its role as a barometer of the prevailing cultural and political winds in the country. Remarkably, 8IES released “Hawājis” on YouTube on December 23, 2016—almost nine months to the day before King Salman announced that he was lifting the restriction on women driving in Saudi Arabia.35 Although one would not suggest that “Hawājis” prompted the king to lift the ban, the proximity of its release to the announcement points to how Saudi works of art can be prophetic and reveal key social debates that are not visible using other forms of political or social analysis. * * * In this book, I investigate the rise of the modern Saudi arts movement in order to shed light on what Diwan has correctly identified as an understudied but important aspect of Gulf politics—namely, how the region’s culture and society shape and reflect its contemporary politics. Building on the work of Mark LeVine and others on the importance of art and popular culture in Middle East politics,36 I argue that artists play a role in Saudi society akin to Antonio Gramsci’s concept of organic intellectuals: Saudi artists are not part of the society’s traditional intellectual elite, but through the language of their culture, they articulate feelings and experiences that the masses cannot easily express.37 To paraphrase Ezra Pound, Saudi artists are the “antennae” of the kingdom’s society,38 whose work is not “mere self-expression” but, in the words of Marshall McLuhan, the “distant early warning system that can always be relied upon to tell the old culture what is beginning to happen to it.”39 Although Saudi artists are deeply tied to their society, and most of them live there, they also travel abroad, read foreign books and journals, and are closely linked to foreign artistic and cultural networks. Some have also studied abroad and lent their voices to political movements in the West, such as the Standing Rock protests in North Dakota.40 Collectively, they resemble the stratum of young globally minded activists whom Sidney Tarrow has called the “rooted cosmopolitans.”41 These activists, Tarrow has argued, are distinguished by their linkage of the “global with the local” and

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the use of “domestic and international resources and opportunities” to realize significant change at home.42 These activists are also fluent in modern ideas and communication technologies—viewing the latter as tools of “collective action” that permit them to employ “their skills and artistic talents” to further their goals.43 Despite their association with foreign ideas, however, these rooted cosmopolitans define themselves in clearly nationalistic terms, advancing a political vision that is analogous to what Kwame Anthony Appiah calls “rooted cosmopolitanism” or “cosmopolitan patriotism.”44 As we saw with Alesa’s video, it is possible to create art that is recognizably Saudi while still adhering to global norms.45 The success of these rooted cosmopolitans in winning a permanent place for their work in the kingdom suggests that although oil revenues and the ruling bargain between the state and society may shape the nation’s politics at a structural level, Saudi society retains a significant amount of political agency. Saudi art and society beyond the traditional political structures are characterized by the many opposing social norms, systems of belief, and social spheres that exist alongside each other in the nation. As the late Saddeka Arebi, a sociologist who studied the Middle East, once observed about Saudi Arabia: “These contradictory elements have had deep and lasting effects on society, if only because they have led to a type of ‘collage culture’ that manifested itself in both the material as well as the symbolic. The collage can be observed in all aspects of life—in architecture, in marriage and weddings, in leisure, and even in the media’s coverage of international sports events.”46 Thanks to these oppositional forces, there are cultural and social issues for which there is no common ground among the people living in the kingdom’s fragmented society. Rather than selecting a single answer that might threaten social stability, Saudis and their leaders have instead sought frameworks to achieve harmony among divergent social groups and to permit the nation to be both for and against the same issues. Within this process of presenting conflicting groups and views, Saudi artists regularly offer fresh awareness-raising questions while simultaneously bringing forth a reevaluation of the assumptions and terms that Saudis use to discuss critical issues. For example, Manal al-Dowayan’s Suspended Together can take on diametrically opposed meanings depending on how a viewer looks at it. It can portray either freedom of movement and travel, or figures frozen in place without any hope of escape.47 As Rajaa al-Sanea, a Saudi novelist, observed, artists not only alter what is discussed in public in Saudi Arabia, but also how issues are discussed in the kingdom.48 We can see this process unfold in the public’s reaction to works on subjects as different as the absence of public space open to men and women, US president Donald Trump’s rhetoric, and women’s right to drive—prompting Ahmed Mater, a leading artist, to declare in Al-Ḥayāt that the Saudi artist “is now a political and social activist.”49

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These examples demonstrate how Saudi artistic and cultural figures can, in certain contexts, shape how the kingdom looks at seminal political issues. This leads us to three key insights. The first insight, to quote LeVine, is that to understand the people and politics of the Muslim world, we need to follow the artists and “the musicians, and their fans, as much as the mullahs and their followers.”50 The second insight is that the mainstream West’s view of popular culture in the Middle East rests on a series of basic errors and “orientalist” stereotypes—primarily the notion that popular culture in the Middle East is both “secular” and “Western.” Westerners largely assume that popular culture in the Middle East is an oppositional force within authoritarian societies that are steeped in Islam and are hostile to the contemporary world.51 That viewpoint reflects a long-standing principle of Western analysis—the “secular-religious analytical binary”—which, as John Voll has noted, can lead to misleading conclusions about the politics of a region in which secular and religious forces have become increasingly intertwined since 2011.52 Indeed, in the Middle East, it is just as likely for Saudis and others who are outwardly conservative in both dress and demeanor to be liberal and open to the West as it is for outwardly secular peoples to advocate illiberal positions hostile to the West. As we will learn, Saudi artists help us see that pious men and women can be advocates for cultural and social change that is consistent with global norms in the twenty-first century. The third insight is that popular culture, including art and cultural production, can, in the words of Karin Van Nieuwkerk, Mark LeVine, and Martin Stokes, “no longer simply be viewed—and dismissed—merely as a decoration of, or distraction from, ‘real politics’ in the Muslim World.”53 Thomas Hegghammer has made a very similar argument about the politics of militant Islamists, noting that they “have a rich aesthetic culture that is essential to understanding their mindset and worldview.”54 My text aims to build on these insights, showing that an alternative vision is possible for art and popular culture in Saudi Arabia. I will argue that the kingdom’s artists make the surprising intellectual leap of linking conservative Islam with comedy and modern art, genres of culture that are often associated by Westerners with cosmopolitanism and secularism, not to say subversion. As Nasser al-Qasabi, a leading Saudi actor and comedian, stated on television in 2015, “The artist’s essential role is to reveal society’s challenges. . . . Warning the people about ISIS [the Islamic State] is the true jihad, because we’re fighting them with art, not war.”55 But I am not contending that Saudi artists are attempting to imitate that very Western figure: the solitary individual who speaks to the world through comedy, film, music, painting, photography, poetry and other writing, or sculpture. Saudi artists reject the central tenet of Western modernity that there is a natural and inevitable progression of humanity to abandon

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tribalism in favor of individualism. They are artists, but they are not individuals in the Western sense. Indeed, it is precisely the fact that they are not attempting to be individuals—that is, unified entities—that allows them to remain open to disparate, even contradictory, forces. My argument builds on my extensive experience with and scholarship about Saudi Arabia and the Muslim world—in particular, the time I lived in the kingdom from March 2013 to January 2014. From my base in Riyadh, I traveled throughout the kingdom, visiting regions that few other Western scholars ever get to see, including Asir, the southern province situated along the Yemen border and the birthplace of the Modern Saudi Visual Arts Movement. Throughout my time in the kingdom, I met not only many of the Saudis whom Western experts usually interview, but also organic intellectuals and other cultural and social actors who are not part of the traditional ruling elite or the opposition. At the same time, my approach recognizes that conducting in-country research is not enough by itself for a scholar to understand Saudi society and its art—a view made clear by Mater in 2003. After he read an article about Saudi Arabia that had been published in National Geographic by an American who visited the kingdom, the Saudi artist lamented to British artist Stephen Stapleton, “It is always the same perspective. . . . [Westerners] come here, spend one week in our country, and go away with a distorted reality.”56 To transcend the “perspective” that Mater commented on, I have supplemented my in-country research with extensive work in two sources that provide invaluable insights into social change and mass opinion in that country. The first source, fatāwā, or the responses of the ulama to the questions posed by citizens, illustrates the views of the clerical elite and of ordinary people—especially because many of the questions begin with a request to reaffirm an individual’s beliefs. Although scholars have often used this type of documents to understand Saudi clerical opinions,57 the present author is one of the first to stress the limitations of the power of fatāwā—that is, the possibility that Saudis can ignore the edicts of clerical elites. For instance, although Saudi clerics classify any art that features animals or humans as ḥarām (forbidden),58 Saudi artists have produced cartoons for the kingdom’s media and state-funded art shows that utilize both humans and animals as tools of cultural and social critique. Among the gifts that the Saudi government presented Donald Trump during his trip to Riyadh in May 2017 was a “large canvas depicting a Saudi woman” and an artwork by a Saudi artist “featuring a picture of President Trump.”59 The second unconventional source for my research is the body of work of the contemporary Saudi arts movement, and their posts and professionally made videos on Saudi social media, two cultural spheres that are now merging into a single world. Over the past several years, I have conducted in-depth interviews with many of the top Saudi cultural and social fig-

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ures—including visual artists, stand-up comedians, actors, actresses, and male and female film directors. In a country that lacks a free press or national participatory politics, the work of artists provides us with a fresh view of the way many Saudis discuss the key issues impacting their lives. As Abdulnasser Gharem, a leading Saudi visual artist, has observed, “The media cannot talk about these issues, but art has a language that needs no translator.”60 My approach to these types of sources seeks to complement the growing literature on public opinion in the Gulf monarchies61 and Mohamed Zayani’s Networked Publics and Digital Contention. I especially build on Zayani’s insights on the importance of online media and other “less formal spaces” of everyday social engagement, and on the different forms that online activism takes throughout the Arab world.62 Whereas intense online engagement in Tunisia, the subject of Zayani’s study, helped to produce a political movement that toppled the regime in 2011,63 online engagement in Saudi Arabia has produced quite a different political result. There, sensitive issues are discussed online but in a way that has privileged rather than undermined existing structures of power in the kingdom.64 This dynamic echoes Sean Yom’s recent insight about the benefits of broad coalitions in Middle East politics, where “critics tend to complain not if but how regimes should reign.”65 Indeed, to paraphrase Yom, the Saudi state uses online media to communicate with rather than through Saudi society, including the kingdom’s artists.66 Ultimately, I aim to introduce readers to Saudi art along with the social context out of which both works of art and artists emerge. By doing so, I build on the work of Nada Shabout, who has called on scholars to research the artistic movements of specific Arab states, linking the visual arts to film and to other artistic genres.67 In particular, I explore a paradox that lies at the heart of Saudi art and the kingdom’s society as a whole in the twentyfirst century—namely, how a socially conservative nation can simultaneously be the home of one of the most vibrant artistic movements in the Middle East today. My approach questions a widely held view that Saudi culture and society are inherently hostile to art and modernity68—a perspective that is reinforced in the West by media coverage of public beheadings, radicalized young men bent on terror, and an absolute monarchy that rejects democratic institutions. In short, I am challenging both the preeminence and the single-mindedness of these views. * * * To understand the existing literature on Saudi Arabia and where this book fits into the discourse, it will be helpful to start with Ahmed Mater’s explanation of how art has emerged in Saudi Arabia.69 Mater draws parallels between his work as an artist and as a physician, arguing that both of these activities call

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upon him to diagnose and solve complicated problems. A key part of addressing those problems, he says, is to understand Saudi Arabia’s unique social landscape, which has little in common with America’s. Whereas individual choice and liberty are sacrosanct in the United States, religious and other traditional norms take precedence over everything else in Saudi Arabia.70 It is ironic that for Mater, the conservative environment, which many Western artists would regard as a threat to creative freedom, is a source of artistic inspiration. Some of Mater’s most provocative photographs of Mecca were taken as he flew on a Saudi military helicopter above the city—an experience that would not have been possible had he not secured government permits to film the holy city, the Kaaba, and other religious sites. Winning those approvals was, of course, one of the many impediments he had to overcome to conduct his work in the nation. As he notes, “It is more interesting to be an artist surrounded by challenges like ours than to be an artist surrounded by too much choice and unrestricted opportunity.”71 Understanding the meaning of this seemingly paradoxical statement and the position of Mater and others like him in Saudi society requires us to transcend the usual binary divisions that many journalists and popular scholars employ to understand Saudi Arabia, such as conservative versus liberal or state versus civil society.72 As Stéphane Lacroix correctly observes, these types of divisions “are of little relevance” to Saudi Arabia,73 a country that Madawi al-Rasheed, a leading scholar of Saudi Arabia, has labeled a “postmodern pastiche.”74 In this pastiche, there is an absolute monarchy that upholds Arab, Islamic, and tribal values in public, but, in Greg Gause’s words, is really “little different from other authoritarian regimes” elsewhere in the world.75 Thanks to the earnings generated by the kingdom’s oil, the Saudi royal family and its allies dominate a conservative society in which Islam is omnipresent but exists alongside a veritable cornucopia of groups, some of which are modern and others of which, like the ulama, blend modern and pre-modern elements.76 For decades, scholars have understood this political dynamic through the lens of rentier theory. According to that theory, since the rise of the Saudi oil economy, the state has dominated the kingdom’s politics, thanks to its wealth, which has allowed it to co-opt society, control the media, build an impressive security infrastructure, and capture the symbolic power of Islam and national myths.77 Rentier scholars have focused on the views of the following categories of groups in Saudi society: the clerics and governing elites,78 women,79 and groups seeking systemic change.80 Two areas of inquiry are central to many of these studies: first, whether the state and the monarchy can maintain their legitimacy and the “ruling bargain” during periods of low oil prices and regional turmoil; and second, whether the state can resolve the tension between modernity and Islam in the country. 81 Indeed, in 2012, the Arab Spring prompted one

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scholar to predict that the tensions between modernity and Islam and the revolts in neighboring Arab states would inspire Saudis to overthrow the monarchy by 2015.82 Over the last several years, however, several scholars have sought to broaden rentier analysis to include the views of groups that have been overlooked in previous studies of Saudi politics, while integrating the insights provided by in-country field research. Four scholars are important to this study. The first scholar, American anthropologist Loring M. Danforth, gives his readers the results of interviews he conducted in English during a brief visit to the kingdom in 2012. Although Danforth’s work is more of a travel log than a formal academic study, some of the people he interviewed during his trip to the kingdom were conceptual artists who are important to my study, such as Ahmed Mater and Abdulnasser Gharem.83 The second scholar, Robert Kluijver, briefly covers a few of the Saudi artists discussed in Danforth’s book along with artists in other Gulf states in a self-published text. Although the text provides some useful historical background, its analysis of the contemporary Saudi art scene dates from 2012 and is now largely out of date.84 The third scholar, Namie Tsujigami, has used intense in-country field research along with postmodernist theory to demonstrate a critical factor of Saudi life that has been overlooked in other studies: namely, how Saudi women retain significant agency and ability to negotiate boundaries while still facing systemic inequality.85 The fourth scholar is the French sociologist Pascal Ménoret. Two of his works in particular are important to my study. In the first, “Saudi TV’s Dangerous Hit,” Ménoret explores what Ṭāš mā Ṭāš (No Big Deal), a popular Saudi TV show, reveals about the country’s politics. Using a combination of interviews and analysis of specific episodes, Ménoret clearly demonstrates that Saudi Arabia, “a country long believed to be monolithic and mute,”86 can have energetic public debates through both art and comedy. In his second work, Joyriding in Riyadh, Ménoret investigates the young men who rebel against the existing Saudi order by “drifting”—that is, by driving cars through the streets at high speed.87 According to Ménoret, joyriding is a “thriving subculture” and a serious political movement that offers “a way of confronting the state in its most basic operations: managing public spaces, protecting private property, and enforcing the law.”88 In Ménoret’s eyes, joyriders operate in a space in the kingdom’s society analogous to what Jürgen Habermas has labeled the “plebeian public space”—that is, the political and social space in eighteenth-century France in which ordinary people voiced their political opinions and made demands of their government.89 The opinions expressed in this space, Ménoret continues, “burrowed through” absolutism and the legitimacy of the French monarchy, preparing the way for the French Revolution.90

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For the young men who operate in Saudi Arabia’s plebeian public space, Ménoret argues, the central issue is not the absolutism of the king, but the interlocking system of repression that the state uses to control young men and the country’s sprawling cities. That system, Ménoret reveals, emerged out of a partnership between the Saudi state and modernizing European urban planners, whose ideas for cities were applied throughout the kingdom. To support his argument, Ménoret draws on the records of the Western planners who designed Riyadh and other modern Saudi cities, along with conducting extensive field research, largely in Riyadh, over a period of several years in the early 2000s.91 I seek to dramatically expand on the limited interviews conducted by Danforth and build on Ménoret’s and Tsujigami’s approaches through an argument that combines four components: The first component is intensive field research that focuses on artists—a critical social group that is not part of the ruling elite or the political opposition. The second component is the work of LeVine, Ménoret, Van Nieuwkerk, and others on the definition and importance of popular culture in the Middle East, and Saudi Arabia in particular.92 The third component includes the ideas of Gramsci, McLuhan, and Tarrow on the place of artists and of globally connected but still nationally oriented intellectuals and social movements. The fourth component is a rigorous analysis of Saudi art and online media sources. Visual art plays an expressive function in virtually all societies, but the creative works studied in this book serve two additional social roles in Saudi Arabia, where there is an absence of a free press and mass politics: they are a barometer of public opinion, and a tool for discussing issues as sensitive as the environment, gender, poverty, and religious extremism. Again, as LeVine and his colleagues have correctly noted, art and cultural production are integral to the “real politics” in the Middle East.93 I should emphasize, however, that the artists whom I describe in this book do not see their role as one of instigating direct political change, or even marked social transformation that might have political implications. Rather, they nearly always position their expression in spaces consistent with the cultural and religious values of society, and as part of a qualified discourse with the state and society—not in opposition to either. They neither inhabit a “plebeian public space,” as joyriders do, nor are they rebels or revolutionaries: they do not seek to challenge or to overthrow the governing system or the ruling hierarchies. In fact, artists have openly allied with the ruling elites and have integrated into their work the language and themes that reflect their country’s values. These choices of course reflect the artists’ aim to channel the views of their society organically and have shaped how they present their work publicly. Indeed, some have tied art to terms like jihad, and others have utilized concepts with deep historical significance for

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their country—such as the principle that Muslims should periodically revive (tajdīd) and reform (iṣlāḥ) their societies to conform to the behavior and the ideals of the Prophet’s society in seventh-century Medina.94 The presence of these groups in the kingdom points to a larger set of questions. Why do they remain in the kingdom rather than moving to countries that more rigorously protect individual rights? Many of these Saudi men and women are highly educated, speak English, frequently spend time abroad, and have access to financial resources. How, then, do we explain their willingness to interact with a society that is often suspicious of anything that strays from religious and tribal norms? What gives them the confidence to challenge those norms, expecting cultural and social transformation in a kingdom that strongly resists such change? The answer to these questions, I contend, is that while the country is governed by a strong centralized monarchy, the society is far more flexible, allowing for the coexistence—however tenuous—of a powerful clerical elite and a number of informal spaces and channels for group action. These spaces and channels, in which the state can intervene, reflect an understudied but critical aspect of daily life in the kingdom. Here, too, my analysis builds on the work of Zayani’s Networked Publics and Digital Contention by stressing the politics of everyday life instead of formal institutions and structures. Among the hundreds of tribes and other groups that live in the vast kingdom, there are many views, some of which may appear contradictory, on cultural and social issues, which are played out daily in a variety of contexts. In the Saudi model, society is the site of a network of disparate and constantly changing elements that resemble Michel Foucault’s definition of absolute chaos: “the disorder in which a large number of possible orders glitter separately.”95 Saudis have made their seemingly paradoxical social system function by seeking harmony over uniformity and multiplicity over dualism. Their approach, which exists in many aspects of this “collage-like culture,” recognizes that there are cultural and social issues for which there is no common ground among the peoples who live in the kingdom, including the religious elites. Rather than selecting a single answer that would threaten social stability, Saudis and their leaders choose frameworks that link everyone in society together, permitting their country to be both for and against the same issues. This approach rejects the chief argument of Islamist activists and the secular argument of the activists who led the Arab Spring in Tahrir Square— namely, that the only way to reform any Arab nation is by overthrowing its systems of power from the top. This Saudi view is based on a very different understanding of power, reflecting a desire to avoid the instability and mass violence that has plagued the Arab world for the last thirty years, when governing systems collapsed and institutions vanished.

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Rather than overthrowing the systems of power in a revolution that takes place only once, with uncertain outcomes, Saudi artists have aimed to continue to operate under evolving cultural and social norms that they help to shape. The tactical choice not to challenge the system has given Saudi artists the social space to explore controversial topics while appearing to be apolitical. At the same time, this approach has compelled them to address the views of all of society, not just the members of the royal family and that portion of the public that happens to share their outlook. Saudi artists cannot cherry-pick views on social media that support their position and assume that they are in the right. Their vision can only work if everyone is included and invested in it, a process that is facilitated by a conception of art and culture that is the product of a group rather than a single person. Indeed, the approach of Saudi artists implicitly rejects a central tenet of Western history and modernity— that is, the abandonment of tribalism in favor of individualism. This is a critical choice, for tribalism and religion are viewed with deep suspicion among many in the West. Yet individualism has its weaknesses, just as tribalism and religion have their strengths. In fact, tribalism and religion even address some of the problems inherent in individualism—as in “the lonely crowd.” The people I discuss in this book wish to maintain elements of tribalism, while functioning in the contemporary secular world. In both their art and social media, Saudi artists have created a vision that contains political elements but which can nevertheless be presented as “apolitical.” Their art is clear, sophisticated, and sometimes critical, but it is never confrontational toward the state or the political system. It is a dance of intellect and feeling that rouses its audience, including the rulers of Saudi Arabia, to thought. Such artists perhaps aspire to be in some sense—to use the British poet Percy Bysshe Shelley’s famous phrase—“the unacknowledged legislators” of their country. In their work, complex issues are brought into the strong light of art and laughter. Nonetheless, recent events in Saudi Arabia and the serious questions raised about the death of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018 have adversely affected many people’s perspectives of Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman and the artistic movement that his government has championed. Not only have Western cultural institutions reevaluated their cooperation with Saudi artists and artistic organizations, but some analysts have dismissed the kingdom’s recent artistic and cultural initiatives as mere “window dressing” for an authoritarian regime.96 But the issues raised in this book point in a different direction. They do not reflect the machinations of kings and princes but are concerned with the productions of an extraordinary group of artists whose work gives rise to an image of what might be called the deep consciousness of Saudi Arabia— something quite different from any of the political activities that dominate headlines around the world. Remarkably, it was Khashoggi, recognizing art’s

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ability to express a multiplicity of viewpoints, who first brought together four of the pioneering individuals whose work and ideas give rise to this text. * * *

I have divided this book into five chapters: In Chapter 1, I chart the factors in Saudi society that explain the rise of a vibrant artistic movement in a country that is said to despise art and artists. In Chapter 2, by contrast, I present a study of the Modern Saudi Visual Arts Movement, which emerged around the year 2000 among a group of professionals in Asir. In Chapter 3, I discuss the second generation of contemporary Saudi artists, many of whom explore the same questions that the Modern Saudi Visual Arts Movement has, but do so in new artistic genres, especially stand-up comedy. In Chapter 4, I discuss the third generation of Saudi artists, who have adopted the descriptor “creatives” and have moved comedy and other forms of art from the gallery and the stage to the screen and YouTube. In Chapter 5, I discuss how Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman has sought to utilize the kingdom’s artists and their movement to promote his political goals and to start a national dialogue about socioeconomic reform. Discourse among different groups is central to the worldview of Saudi artists and reflects the centrality of collective discussion and action in the kingdom. Indeed, as Saudi comedian and actor Hisham Fageeh is fond of saying, “Our work is an invitation to start a conversation.”97 Notes

1. Hassan Cheruppa, “A Day of National Pride and Patriotism,” Saudi Gazette, September 23, 2017. 2. “Qatar, Neighbors Trade Barbs at Arab League over Boycott,” Reuters, September 12, 2017, https://reuters.com. 3. Abdulsalam al-Wayel, “‘An iḥtiqārna al-Fann . . . fauz Muhammad ‘Asāf baina al-Ḥaḍīf wa al-Ḡabaran,” As-Šarq, June 29, 2013, www.alsharq.net. 4. “Sa‘ūdīyiāt yahḍurna ‘urūḍan fannīa fī mal‘ab Riyāḍī lilmarra al-Ūlā biMunāsibad al-‘Īd al-Waṭanī,” France24, September 24, 2017, http://bit.ly/2y2vGgy. 5. For video of the event, see Ahmed! (@Ahmadooovich), “Iḥtifālāt Mūsīqīa šārī‘ Attaḥliya bial-Yaum al-Waṭanī.. ‘aṣr jadīd tāmān fī as-Sa‘ūdīya,” Twitter, September 23, 2017, https://twitter.com/Ahmadooovich/status/911646243314683904. 6. Al Jazeera, “Iḥtifālāt al-Yaum al-Waṭanī lil-Sa‘ūdīya binakha jadīda,” Al Jazeera, September 25, 2017, http://bit.ly/2y1Gknx. For pictures of Saudi women on Kingdom Tower, see Israa Garatli (@DameIsraa), “Ba‘da murūr ‘uqūd ṭamsa fīh wajh al-mar’a, al-Ān yahtafilu biḥā li’anahā faḵr,” Twitter, September 26, 2017, https://twitter.com/DameIsraa/status/912729089370415104. 7. Ben Hubbard, “Saudi Arabia Agrees to Let Women Drive,” New York Times, September 26, 2017, https://mobile.nytimes.com.

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8. MiSK is the Prince Muhammad bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Philanthropic Foundation for the Encouragement of Creativity (MiSK, Mu’assasa Muhammad bin Salman bin Abdulaziz “Misk” Ḵarīya . . . At-Tašjī ‘alā Al-Ibdā‘). 9. MiskKSA (@MiskKSA), “Kull ‘ām wa waṭannā wa arḍnā biḵayyiran wa šumūḵ; #87_‘āmā_min_al-Majd,” Twitter, September 23, 2017, https://twitter.com /MiskKSA/status/911641102066823168. 10. MiskKSA, “Kull ‘ām wa waṭannā wa arḍnā biḵayyiran wa šumūḵ.” 11. For example, see: Peter Bergen, “Bergen: Saudi Women Driving a Sign Bigger Change Is Coming,” CNN, September 27, 2017, www.cnn.com; Malaysian Reserve, “Saudi Arabia Lifts Ban on Women Driving, Ending Isolation,” Malaysian Reserve, September 27, 2017, https://themalaysianreserve.com; and Jane Kinninmont, “Scrapping the Ban on Women Driving Shows Mohammed bin Salman Is Something New,” Prospect Magazine, September 27, 2017, www.prospectmagazine.co.uk. 12. Kristin Diwan (@kdiwaniya), “It is true. It is a very immature field of study,” Twitter, August 22, 2017, https://twitter.com/kdiwaniya/status/900052071742885888. 13. Steffen Hertog, Princes, Brokers, and Bureaucrats: Oil and the State in Saudi Arabia (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2010), 3. 14. Arwa al-Neami, “Women Are Allowed to Drive Cars in Saudi Now,” Facebook, September 26, 2017, www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1607327719287973 &set=a.101608766526550.3569.100000322800023&type=3&theater. 15. Dale Eickelman and James Piscatori, “Sacred Authority in Contemporary Muslim Societies,” in Muslim Politics, 2nd ed. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004), 60. 16. Raihan Ismail, Saudi Clerics and Shi‘a Islam (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016), 25; Nabil Mouline, The Clerics of Islam: Religious Authority and Political Power in Saudi Arabia, trans. Ethan S. Rundell (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2014), 14. 17. Bernard Haykel, “Afterword,” in Saudi Arabia in Transition: Insights on Social, Political, Economic, and Religious Change, ed. Bernard Haykel, Thomas Hegghammer, and Stéphane Lacroix (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015), 334. 18. Although this definition of Ṣaḥwa is less precise than the one employed by many Western scholars, it was frequently used by Saudis during my time researching in the Kingdom in 2013 and 2014. Today, one frequently sees Ṣaḥwa used this way in Arabic and Saudi media. Saudi officials, including Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman, have also used Ṣaḥwa in this way in public statements. For more on this topic, see Mūnālīza Frīḥa, “As-sa‘ūdīya qablu as-Ṣaḥwa,” An-Nahār, December 30, 2017, www.annahar.com, and Fāya‘ āl Mušīra ‘Asīrī, “Al-‘Āṣūf . . . Ḥarāk Ṯaqāfī!” al-Makka, April 27, 2018, http://makkahnewspaper.com. 19. For more on this issue and the scholarly arguments linked to it, see Ismail, Saudi Clerics and Shi‘a Islam, 15; “A Year After Curbing Its Power, the Saudi Religious Police Is Deemed Redundant by Many,” Arab News, April 1, 2017, and Kareem Fahim, “Saudi Arabia’s Once Powerful Conservatives Silenced by Reforms and Repression,” Washington Post, June 5, 2018. 20. For an excellent discussion of Saudi religious scholars and their “savvy use” of technology and the media to broaden their influence in twenty-first-century Saudi Arabia, see Ismail’s Saudi Clerics and Shi‘a Islam, especially chap. 1, 25–26. 21. Deborah Wheeler, Digital Resistance in the Middle East: New Media Activism in Everyday Life (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2017), 2. 22. Two examples are Arwa al-Neami’s Never, Never Land and Manal alDowayan’s The Choice. Another Saudi artist who has explored these themes is Sarah Abu Abdallah.

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23. Fahad Albutairi, for instance, had over 3 million followers on Twitter, and Malek Nejer has nearly 1.3 million followers on Twitter. Fahad Albutairi (@Fahad), Twitter, https://twitter.com/Fahad and Malek Nejer (@nejer), Twitter, https://twitter .com/nejer?lang=en. 24. Manal al-Dowayan, Abdulnasser Gharem, and Ahmed Mater have stated that they have “strong backing from members of the Saudi ruling family.” Aya Batrawy, “Saudi Artists Cautiously Push Against Red Lines,” San Diego Union Tribune, April 4, 2014. 25. Malek Nejer tweeted on September 26, 2017, that he had personally met with the prince ten months earlier and discussed a variety of reforms. Malek Nejer (@nejer), “Qābaltu Walīy al-‘Ahd qablu 10 ašhur wa aḵabarnā biašyā‘ kaṯīra, waqtahā ḵarajtu ‘alā Twitter wa katabtu ‘anā mutafā’il bi al-Mustaqbal,’ fat‘araḍat lihujūm salbī wa qāsī jiddan min al-Mukaḍibīn,” Twitter, September 26, 2017, https:// twitter.com/Nejer/status/912762909855485954. 26. Ahmed Mater, “CEO MiSK Art Institute,” LinkedIn, June 2018, www .linkedin.com/in/dr-ahmed-mater-ab594193/. 27. Fahad Albutairi (@Fahad), “Fahad Albutairi,” Twitter, https://twitter.com /Fahad. 28. In October 2018, Manal al-Sharif claimed that Albutairi had been expelled from Jordan and faced considerable pressure because of his marriage to AlHathloul. Manal al-Sharif, “Jamal Kashoggi’s Disappearance Spreads Fear Worldwide, but We Won’t Be Silenced,” Washington Post, October 8, 2018. 29. Heather Saul, “Saudi Women Jailed for Driving ‘Released from Prison’ After Two Months,” Independent, February 13, 2015, www.independent.co.uk; “Loujain al-Hathloul: Saudi Women’s Driving Activist Arrested,” BBC News, June 6, 2017, www.bbc.com. 30. Vaishnavi Vaidyanathan, “Women’s Rights Activists Arrested in Saudi Ahead of Lifting of Driving Ban,” International Business Times, May 19, 2018. 31. Manal al-Sharif, Daring to Drive: A Saudi Woman’s Awakening (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2017), 68–70, 107–108. 32. Alaa Wardi (@Alaa Wardi), “No Woman, No Drive,” YouTube, October 26, 2013, www.youtube.com. 33. Majed Alesa (@Majedalesa), “Hawājis,” YouTube, December 23, 2016, www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rUn2j1hLOo. 34. For example, see “Trending: The Story Behind No Woman, No Drive,” BBC Trending, October 28, 2013, www.bbc.com, and Adam Taylor, “A Music Video Featuring Skateboarding Women Has Saudi Arabia Entranced,” Washington Post, January 3, 2017. 35. Majed Alesa, Hawājis. 36. See Mark LeVine, Heavy Metal Islam: Rock, Resistance, and the Struggle for the Soul of Islam (New York: Three Rivers Press, 2008); Karin Van Nieuwkerk, ed., Muslim Rap, Halal Soaps, and Revolutionary Theater (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2011); and Karin Van Nieuwkerk, Mark LeVine, and Martin Stokes, Islam and Popular Culture (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2016). 37. Harold Entwistle, Antonio Gramsci: Conservative Schooling for Radical Politics (New York: Routledge, 2009), 72. 38. Christine Froula, “Ezra Pound and the Contemporary Literature of the Present, or Triptych Rome/London/Pisa,” in Ezra Pound in the Present: Essays on Pound’s Contemporaneity, ed. Paul Stasi, Josephine Park (New York: Bloomsbury, 2016), 151. 39. Douglas Coupland, Marshall McLuhan: You Know Nothing of My Work! (New York: Atlas, 2010), 168.

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40. Hrag Vartanian, “A Saudi Artist Hoists Flags at Standing Rock to Bring Attention to the Environmental Crisis,” Hyperallergic, December 1, 2016, https:// hyperallergic.com. 41. Sidney Tarrow, The New Transnational Activism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), xiii. 42. Ibid., 34. 43. Ibid., 137. 44. Ibid., 42. 45. In her 2017 master’s thesis, Brenda Campbell describes Ahmed Mater in terms that are similar to but different in one critical way from how I define Saudi rooted cosmopolitans. Although I agree with her that Mater draws on local and global forces in his work, I see no evidence—as she asserts—that he also employs individualism in his art. Brenda Campbell, “Contemporary Art of the Arabian Peninsula in a Globalized Art World” (master’s thesis, Utrecht University, 2017), 58. 46. Saddeka Arebi, Women and Writing in Saudi Arabia: The Politics of Literary Discourse (New York: Columbia University Press, 1994), 16. 47. “Art Reviews: A Great Saudi Art Instillation, Suspended Together,” Mutant Space, February 9, 2012. 48. Author in discussion with Rajaa al-Sanea, December 2013. 49. Ahmed Mater, “Ahmed Māṭar: Al-Fann tajāwaz ‘al-Ḵāma’ . . . Al-Fannān alal-Ān nāšiṭ siyāsī wa ijtimā‘ ī,” interview with Turki al-Jundabi, Al-Ḥayāt, December 23, 2013, https://bit.ly/2NDRMLT. 50. LeVine, Heavy Metal Islam, 3. 51. Karin Van Nieuwkerk, Mark LeVine, and Martin Stokes, “Introduction,” in Islam and Popular Culture, ed. Karin Van Nieuwkerk, Mark LeVine, and Martin Stokes (Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 2016), 7. 52. Abdullah al-Arian, “Roundtable on Political Islam After the Uprisings,” Maydan: Politics and Society, May 2, 2018, www.themaydan.com. 53. Van Nieuwkerk, LeVine, and Stokes, “Introduction,” 14. 54. Thomas Hegghammer, “Introduction: What Is Jihad Culture and Why Should We Study It?” in Jihadi Culture: The Art and Social Practices of Militant Islamists, ed. Thomas Hegghammer (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017), 1. 55. Taghreed Almadani, “Death Threats for Saudi Satire Star Who Fights Islamic State with Laughs,” Reuters, June 22, 2015, http://reuters.com. 56. Stephen Stapleton, “Border Crossing,” in Edge of Arabia, ed. Stephen Stapleton and Edward Booth-Clibborn (London: Booth-Clibborn Editions, 2012), 23. 57. While writing this book, I benefited from the insights of two leading scholars of Saudi fatāwā and the country’s clerical elite—namely, Raihan Ismail and Muhammad al-Atawneh. 58. For instance, see Bakr Abu Zayd, Salih al-Fawzan, ‘Abdul-‘Aziz Al alShaykh, and ‘Abdul-‘Aziz ibn ‘Abdullah ibn Baz, “Fatwa no. 19933” (part no. 1, page no. 323), Fatwas of the Permanent Committee, group 2, vol. 1: ‘Aqidah, Taswir, Making and Buying Cartoons, http://bit.ly/2bUbWQ0; and ‘Abdullah ibn Qa`ud, ‘Abdullah ibn Ghudayyan, ‘Abdul-Razzaq ‘Afify, and ‘Abdul-`Aziz ibn ‘Abdullah ibn Baz, “What Is the Islamic Position on Sculpture, Classical Paintings, and Abstract Art?” (part no. 1, page no. 696), Fatwas of the Permanent Committee, group 1, vol. 1: ‘Aqidah (1), Creeds, Taswir, Sculpture, Classical Paintings, and Abstract Art, http://bit.ly/2c3uf8F. 59. Ken Klippenstein, “The Insane Gifts Saudi Arabia Gave President Trump,” Daily Beast, September 4, 2017, www.thedailybeast.com. 60. Batrawy, “Saudi Artists Cautiously Push Against Red Lines.”

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61. Recent examples of this literature include Justin Gengler, Group Conflict and Political Mobilization in Bahrain and the Arab Gulf: Rethinking the Rentier State (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2015); Calvert Jones, Bedouins into Bourgeois: Remaking Citizens for Globalization (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017); Jocelyn Sage Mitchell and Justin Gengler, “A Hard Test of Individual Heterogeneity in Response Scale Usage: Evidence from Qatar,” International Journal of Public Opinion Research, August 29, 2016; and Jocelyn Sage Mitchell and Justin Gengler, “What Money Can’t Buy: Wealth, Inequality, and Economic Satisfaction in the Rentier State,” Political Research Quarterly, May 30, 2018: 1–15. 62. Mohamed Zayani, Networked Publics and Digital Contention: The Politics of Everyday Life in Tunisia (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015), 13. 63. Ibid. 64. In understanding Saudi Arabia’s Twittersphere, I have benefited from conversations with Geoffrey Martin, a PhD student at the University of Toronto, whose ongoing field research in Kuwait has dealt with the influence of Twitter and other social media on social movements in the country and the Gulf. For a recent example of his work, see Geoffrey Martin, “Researching Twitter,” in Political Science Research in the Middle East and North Africa, ed. Jannie A. Clark and Francesco Cavatorta (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018), 218–232. 65. Sean Yom, From Resilience to Revolution: How Foreign Interventions Destabilize the Middle East (New York: Columbia University Press, 2016), 5. 66. Sylvia Westall and Angus McDowall, “Saudi Arabia’s Rulers Adapt Message for Social Media Age,” Reuters, May 24, 2016, https://reuters.com. 67. Nada M. Shabout, Modern Arab Art: Formation of Arab Aesthetics (Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 2007), 154. 68. For instance, Noah Feldman, in a 2012 article in the Wall Street Journal, noted that the United Arab Emirates is “next-door to Wahhabi, art-despising Saudi Arabia.” Noah Feldman, “Taking It to the Street,” Wall Street Journal, October 25, 2012. 69. Ahmed Mater, “Symbolic Cities,” lecture, Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Washington, DC, March 20, 2016. 70. Ibid. 71. Ibid., and Ahmed Mater, “A Conversation with Ahmed Mater, Co-Founder of Edge of Arabia,” interview by James Scarborough, Huffpost, July 21, 2014, www .huffingtonpost.com. 72. For examples of this type of literature, see Frank Viviano, “Kingdom on Edge,” National Geographic, October 2003, or Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines—and Future (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2012). 73. Stéphane Lacroix, Awakening Islam, trans. George Holoch (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2011), 6. 74. Madawi al-Rasheed, Contesting the Saudi State (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 59. 75. F. Gregory Gause, Kings for All Seasons: How the Middle East Monarchies Survived the Arab Spring, Brookings Doha Analysis Paper (Doha, Qatar: Brookings Doha Center, 2013), 1. 76. Lacroix, Awakening Islam, 6. 77. Two texts that have recently made this argument are: Bernard Haykel, Stéphane Lacroix, and Thomas Hegghammer, “Introduction,” Saudi Arabia in Transition, ed. Haykel, Lacroix, and Hegghammer (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015), 1–6, and David Commins, Islam in Saudi Arabia (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2015). 78. Examples of this literature are: Hertog, Princes, Brokers, and Bureaucrats; Ismail, Saudi Clerics and Shi‘a Islam; and Mouline, The Clerics of Islam.

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79. An example is Madawi al-Rasheed, A Most Masculine State: Gender, Politics, and Religion in Saudi Arabia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013). 80. Two recent examples of this literature are: Thomas Hegghammer, Jihad in Saudi Arabia: Violence and Pan-Islamism Since 1979 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), and Toby Matthiesen, The Other Saudis: Shiism, Dissent and Sectarianism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015). 81. This issue is central to a number of texts, including Paul Aarts and Carolien Roelants, Saudi Arabia: A Kingdom in Peril (London: Hurst, 2014). 82. Christopher Davidson, After the Sheikhs: The Coming Collapse of the Gulf Monarchies (London: Hurst, 2012). 83. Loring M. Danforth, Crossing the Kingdom: Portraits of Saudi Arabia (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2016), 89–111. 84. Robert Kluijver, Contemporary Art in the Gulf Context and Perspectives (selfpublished, 2013), www.sciencespo.fr/psia/sites/sciencespo.fr.psia/files/Contemporary %20Art%20in%20the%20Gulf%20for%20print.pdf. 85. For an excellent recent example of her work, see Namie Tsujigami, “A ‘Gender Backlash’ in the Midst of Globalization: The Dynamic of the ‘anti-Cedawīyāt’ in Contemporary Saudi Arabia,” Global Studies Journal 2, no. 4 (2009): 17–29; Namie Tsujigami, “Higher Education and the Changing Aspirations of Women in Saudi Arabia,” in Higher Education Investment in the Arab States of the Gulf: Strategies for Excellence and Diversity, ed. Dale F. Eickelman and Rogaia Mustafa Abusharaf (Berlin, Germany: Gerlach Press, 2017), 42–54; and Namie Tsujigami, “Stealth Revolution: Saudi Women’s Ongoing Social Battles,” in Arab Women’s Activism and Socio-Political Transformation: Unfinished Gendered Revolutions, ed. Sahar Khamis and Amel Mili (Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018), 149–166. 86. Pascal Ménoret, “Saudi TV’s Dangerous Hit,” Le Monde diplomatique, trans. Pascale Ghazaleh, September 2004, http://kit.mondediplo.com/spip.php?article3990. 87. Pascal Ménoret, Joyriding in Riyadh (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 5–6. 88. Ibid., 11. 89. Ibid., 10. 90. Ibid. 91. Ibid. 92. LeVine, Heavy Metal Islam; Van Nieuwkerk, ed., Muslim Rap, Halal Soaps, and Revolutionary Theater; and Van Nieuwkerk, LeVine, and Stokes, Islam and Popular Culture. 93. Van Nieuwkerk, LeVine, and Stokes, “Introduction,” 14. 94. For more on tajdīd, iṣlāḥ, and their role in the Wahhabi tradition, see John Esposito and Natana DeLong-Bas, “Seven: Modern Islam,” in God’s Rule: The Politics of World Religions, ed. Jacob Neusner (Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 2003), 160–165; DeLong-Bas, “The Origins of Wahhabism” in Wahhabi Islam: From Revival and Reform to Modern Jihad (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), 7–40; and Mansoor Jassem Alshamsi, Islam and Political Reform in Saudi Arabia: The Quest for Political Change and Reform (London and New York: Routledge, 2010). 95. James Harkness, translator’s introduction to This Is Not a Pipe with Illustrations and Letters by René Magritte, trans. and ed. James Harkness (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1982), 4. 96. Jasmine Weber, “Major Arts Institutions Navigate Ties to Saudi Arabia After Disappearance of Journalist.” Hyperallergic, October 17, 2018, www.hyperallergic.com. 97. Author in conversation with Hisham Fageeh, Ali Kalthami, et al., September 2013.

2 The Modern Saudi Visual Arts Movement

I didn’t want it to be a beautiful artwork, I wanted to create debate. . . . People took photos [of my work] and shared them on Facebook and Twitter. . . . Some people related to it because it was straight to the point; other people didn’t care. It’s interesting to hear the different views every time someone comes up and asks me if I did it. —Sarah Mohanna al-Abdali Social media is the best tool we have available to showcase and express our art. When I do a new piece of street art, I will take a photo and share it on social media. This enables all of my followers, friends, and fans to comment, share, and like the work I do. But also provide criticism. You can’t create this type of dialogue on the streets. —Shaweesh

On May 19, 2017, Air Force One arrived in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, marking the start of President Donald Trump’s first trip overseas as US president. The three-day visit featured a series of bilateral and multilateral meetings on strategic issues, along with events highlighting cultural and social ties. One of the most important of the cultural events, Saudi Contemporary Art, was held at the Diwan al-Malik (Al-Yamama Palace), the site of Trump’s talks with King Salman and other world leaders.1 On the second day of the trip, the Saudi king accompanied the president and his wife, Melania, on an official tour of the exhibit, which displayed the work of forty male and female artists.2 Television cameras attentively recorded the US president and his wife speaking with male and female Saudi artists.3 In particular, Saudi journalists focused on President Trump shaking hands with and congratulating Abdullah al-Othman, one of the young artists featured in the show.4 Another exhibit, held at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel,5 where the American delegation was staying during the visit, showed the “iconic” pieces by Ahmed Mater, 21

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Abdulnasser Gharem, and the other artists who had founded the Modern Saudi Visual Arts Movement, or Saudi Arts Movement, for short.6 Echoing the enthusiastic response on Saudi social media to Trump’s visit to the exhibit Saudi Contemporary Art,7 King Salman publicly “stressed the importance of culture and art in Saudi Arabia and his support for Saudi artists.”8 The king’s comments signaled the importance of modern artists to contemporary Saudi society and to the vision of Muhammad bin Salman, the king’s son and crown prince—widely known by his initials MbS. The foundation he chairs, the Prince Muhammad bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Philanthropic Foundation for the Encouragement of Creativity (MiSK), had funded the art exhibit that Trump saw. MiSK looked to the arts as a vehicle to help realize Vision 2030, the prince’s plan, announced in 2016, to both reform the economy and end its dependence on oil exports. 9 As Mater explained during a TV interview about his life that aired in June 2017 on US television, he has partnered with MiSK to start a new arts institute in Riyadh to promote grassroots artists.10 Mater expressed the hope that he and MiSK would establish the country’s first college of art and open its first museum of modern art.11 Notably, Mater, who became the CEO of the MiSK art institute in 2018,12 plans to complement the work of the Saudi General Entertainment Authority, the newly formed government agency to promote the arts and entertainment. The authority’s former chair, Ahmed al-Khatib, aimed to re-create the cultural scene of London or New York in Riyadh and other Saudi cities.13 However, the story of the Saudi Arts Movement began in Asir—a fertile and mountainous province 521 miles (839 kilometers) away from the pageantry and palaces of the Saudi capital, and a world away from London and New York. There, Gharem, an officer in the Saudi military, and Mater, an emergency room physician, founded a new arts movement in 2003. That movement has redefined culture in the kingdom and created a new vehicle to educate Saudis, allowing them to discuss the challenges that face them. In the words of Rajaa al-Sanea, a Saudi novelist and dentist, that achievement “raised the bar” for public debate, “opening doors and breaking taboos.”14 During the first decade of the twenty-first century, the Saudi Arts Movement, which included men and women, benefited from two trends in the kingdom: new communication technologies, including the internet and smartphones; and the opening of art galleries and other social spaces that are uniquely accessible to both genders simultaneously. These visual artists have also taken advantage of established practices that have nothing to do with technology: especially, the custom of discussing matters collectively in the majlis, and the tradition that poets, singers, and other Saudi artists address social concerns while remaining apolitical. Although some Saudi literati and singers are discussed in the scholarly literature,15 many others, such as Muhammad Abdu, the singer

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known as the “voice of the Arabs,” have been overlooked. Equally important to the rise of visual artists in Saudi Arabia has been the patronage of the country’s elites—individuals and institutions that are related to, but separate from, the state. These structures have provided resources for artists to develop their talents and maintain spaces from which they can publicly voice their ideas. They have also helped artists to respond to the objections of religious groups, while disseminating their work around the globe. Through these channels at home and abroad, Saudi visual artists in the twenty-first century have become famous around the world, adopting a role in the kingdom’s sprawling cities that is analogous to Antonio Gramsci’s concept of organic intellectuals—namely, individuals who are not part of the traditional country’s intellectual elite, but who, through the language of culture, nonetheless articulate feelings and experiences that the masses accept but cannot easily articulate. Notably, artists have voiced cultural and social views that are at once both clear and sophisticated without being confrontational toward the Saudi state or political system. These artists seek to go with the grain.16 Their approach has little in common with the modern Western ideals of art for art’s sake or artists as godlike individuals who singularly create new culture in their studios and then share it with others at public showings. As Mater remarked in 2013, “To tell you the truth, I don’t like all from Ai Wei Wei. For one, I don’t want to be a star nor a martyr.”17 Instead, he seeks to inhabit the “grass roots” of Saudi society’s “ecosystem”—a phrase that brings to mind the term “organic”—and to serve as “a networker, sharing ownership of ideas and images with many others.”18 Ultimately, Mater aims “to give a voice” to his people, and to “create images and visual narratives that can articulate” their “hopes and fears for the future.”19 At the same time, Mater and other Saudi artists frequently draw on modern technologies and foreign ideas, especially those in the West. By combining indigenous and global sources, he and his colleagues have also created a movement that closely resembles Tarrow’s idea of rooted cosmopolitanism—meaning a social movement that is local and promotes important indigenous issues but which also adheres to worldwide norms. Indeed, the work of Saudi visual artists speaks powerfully to life in the contemporary kingdom while also easily fitting into the permanent collections of many of the world’s elite museum in Asia, Europe, and North America. Equally important, the Saudi approach to visual art, which deliberately engages the audience and other artists, has been remarkably successful when artists present questions through photographs, conceptual sculptures, and other visual forms of expression. All of these graphic genres of art, whose implications are better understood by younger rather than older Saudis, provide far wider latitude for self-expression than written forms of art. “Visually,” Gharem observed, “you can say it because no one can accuse you

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with an image.” By contrast, “If you are going to write or text or say something, it’s easy to accuse you.”20 In other words, visual arts allow one to present multiple ideas, including militant ones, as exoteric, for artists never assign meaning or truth, or both, to their work. Instead, they leave that up to the audience, and more broadly up to society itself. As Mater notes, others in Saudi society “want” to see “the critique” in his art “to happen,” and he doesn’t “want to be in the position to benefit” from his critique.21 He and others embrace a vision of culture as dialogue and as an entity in motion, always open to interpretation and reinterpretation by others. For instance, Mater allows people “to read into his work what they want . . . to have their own take, so to speak.”22 He views art as a force that can have many definitions, including ones that are mutually exclusive, such as tradition and modernity. As he told the pan-Arabic daily Al-Ḥayāt in 2013,23 “Art emerges in the intellectual space shared by subjectivity and objectivity.”24 Again, this statement challenges a fundamental principle of modern art—namely, that a work of art must have a single meaning defined by the artist who produced it.25 Even the most basic comments of Mater and his colleagues on social issues have embodied a similar exoteric outlook. Throughout 2013, Gharem’s personal status on the social media WhatsApp was “At the movies,” a near impossibility in a kingdom without any public movie theaters at that time. His biography on Twitter, which is in both English and Arabic, alludes to religious and secular visions of reform: “Abdulnasser Gharem’s (1973) mission is to restore behaviour al-Fann nūfūz [through art we succeed].”26 Notably, the expression in English—“restore behavior”—is an allusion to a concept with deep roots in Saudi history: the Islamic principle that Muslims should periodically revive (tajdīd) and reform (iṣlāḥ) society to conform to the behavior and ideals of the Prophet’s society in seventh-century Medina. No less important is Gharem’s use of the word mission, for it suggests that his work as an artist is analogous to his service in the military, in which he was regularly asked to carry out dangerous assignments to protect the nation. This vision of the arts is critical to understanding why Gharem and other visual artists can discuss culturally sensitive issues in their work without running afoul of the law, whereas poets and other writers, whose goals and intentions are often far clearer, cannot, because that places them within a political realm. Thanks to an approach that blends subtlety and respect, visual artists have demonstrated to Saudis that visual art can speak powerfully to them and inspire them to action without violating their core principles. This has allowed Saudi visual artists to engineer a gradual revision of what constitutes acceptable culture in Saudi Arabia, bending seemingly

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immutable cultural and social red lines. For the kingdom’s visual artists, these restrictions, in the words of journalist Henry Hemming, “are delicate, papery things that can be manipulated—but only with great care.”27 Nonetheless, Saudi visual artists have successfully created a permanent social space for themselves and other artists to comment on the most sensitive issues. Again, this prompted Mater, in 2013, to tell Al-Ḥayāt: “The artist is now a political and social activist.”28 A Framework for Understanding the Modern Saudi Visual Arts Movement For many Arabs and most scholars of Saudi Arabia, the rise of a visual arts movement in the kingdom probably comes as a great surprise. In their view, Saudis are an intolerant, highly religious people who have vigorously sought to preserve their society’s cultural and Hanbali Islamic traditions, which are analogous to those of evangelical Christian Americans in their puritanism. Among those who make this argument most forcibly is Karen Elliott House, a Pulitzer Prize–winning American journalist, who frequently compares the culture of Saudi Arabia to that of her small Texas hometown, where the people are supposedly hostile both to each other and to strangers.29 In her eyes, the high walls of Saudi cities permit people to live in “cocoons,” where they can raise their children in environments that are “largely devoid of art and enjoyment of beauty.”30 Even recent studies that acknowledge the presence of the Saudi Arts Movement31 begin with a statement analogous to the one that opened a June 2017 story about Saudi art on CNBC, the US business cable news channel: “Until recently, art only played a minor role in the culture of Saudi Arabia.”32 “Contempt for the Arts Lies at the Heart of [Saudi Society’s] Values”

Such statements reinforce a vision of Saudi Arabia as devoid of art—a view that was eloquently voiced by T. E. Lawrence when he observed, “There was so little Arab art that one could say Arab art did not exist.”33 One hears a similar perspective among some contemporary Saudis. For example, writing in the Saudi daily newspaper As-Šarq in 2013, Abdulsalam al-Wayel declared: “If we can say that there is a ‘Saudi culture,’ and it has value, then we can also say with high confidence that the contempt for the arts lies at the heart of its values.”34 This observation is reminiscent of Michael Cook’s description of Wahhabism: “Wahhabism was the classic example of going to see what people were doing and telling them to stop it.”35

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This dour view of Saudi society and Wahhabism is widely shared by the cultural and intellectual elites of the Arab world. These people view the Gulf states, and the kingdom in particular, as regions of the Middle East that are inhabited by uncivilized Bedouins who were enriched by oil and protected by the West, but who resist all forms of modernity, including art, as vigorously as they can.36 The dictum of never showing human forms— enforced far more vigorously in the kingdom than in other parts of the Arab and Muslim worlds—has only added to the perception that the visual arts are unwelcome in Saudi Arabia. Typical is the view of an Egyptian man who lives in the kingdom’s south, who told me in 2013 that there was no civilization or culture in southern Saudi Arabia. Then, with a wry smile and pausing for maximum effect, he noted that the situation was only marginally better in Riyadh, the kingdom’s capital, where “there is just a little bit of civilization” (Fī ḥaḍāra . . . šai’).37 In an article in 2001, Saad Albazei, one of the kingdom’s foremost literary experts, observed: Despite some increased familiarity in recent years, the literature of the area is still excluded from the majority of studies and anthologies published in most other Arab countries. In 1988, Salma K. Jayyusi edited the only comprehensive anthology of the literature of Arabia in translation. . . . Yet, despite her valuable contribution, Dr. Jayyusi has unfortunately continued to pay little attention to the literature of the area, as in her essay on modern Arabic poetry in Modern Arabic Literature . . . which almost completely ignores the entire poetic output of the countries of the Peninsula. Her attitude is representative of a general stance in the Arab world.38

Nearly three decades later, little has changed—even as Saudi artists have received global attention in the media and from academics. One need only look at the intense reaction throughout the Arab world and elsewhere to Sultan al-Qassemi’s piece in the online magazine Al-Monitor, which stated that cities in the Gulf had emerged as new centers of culture in the entire Middle East, while historical capitals such as Baghdad, Cairo, and Damascus have descended into civil strife.39 For many of those who responded to Al-Qassemi’s article, the suggestion that Dubai (let alone Riyadh) could produce anything of cultural value and be compared to cities with centuries of history was preposterous by definition.40 Indeed, AlQassemi’s article was written in response to a Wall Street Journal column that noted that the Arabic-speaking states of the Gulf had no “indigenous tradition of visual or plastic arts” and were situated “next-door to Wahhabi, art-despising Saudi Arabia.”41 Not surprisingly, the one work of art that Western and Arab scholars employ to discuss Saudi Arabia, Abdul Rahman Munif’s Cities of Salt, published in Beirut in 1984, confirms many Arab and Western stereotypes

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about the kingdom’s society and the art that defines it. The novel and its two sequels were immediately recognized as seminal contributions to Arab and global literature, akin to the collective works of Egypt’s Naguib Mahfouz.42 In particular, readers have been drawn to how Munif portrayed the intersection of tradition and modernity that accompanied the discovery of oil in a fictional Arab state modeled on Saudi Arabia. In Munif’s eyes, the events that followed the discovery of oil were profoundly negative for traditional Saudi society, creating a paradoxical urban landscape in which modern and traditional cultures exist side by side in conflict. This new landscape, Munif argued, is inherently unstable and liable to collapse at a moment’s notice—much as a city made of salt on a beach would be washed away if it were ever hit by an incoming wave. Munif, who supported Arab nationalism and spent his entire adult career outside of the kingdom, meant his work to be a warning to Saudi leaders that it was only a matter of time before the winds of change in the contemporary world would sweep the kingdom’s monarchy into the dustbin of history.43 Following the publication of the book, Saudi leaders banned all Munif’s works and stripped him of his citizenship.44 Although Munif’s trilogy retains a central place in Arab literature and continues to influence how many Western and Saudi scholars view the kingdom, the author’s apocalyptic vision about the kingdom’s future has yet to be realized. In part, that reflects the fact that neither modernity nor the novel offers the possibility that modernity might not completely vanquish traditional authority. In Munif’s view, there is no middle ground, no mode for traditional structures to resist or to evolve, and no contexts in which modernity and preexisting structures exist simultaneously without conflict.45 Within this social narrative, there is no place for Gharem to be both a “good artist and a good soldier”—an individual who, as Paul Aarts and Carolien Roelants have correctly noted, must balance the traditional “notion of being obedient to orders” with the “spiritual and intellectual freedom” of modern art.46 Although there are many Saudis who have accepted this binary worldview as valid, many others have not, having devised ways to interact with the contemporary world whereby they neither jettison preexisting values nor completely adopt modernity. Indeed, the response of these Saudis to modernity mirrors Martin Luther King Jr.’s insight into how “integration” and “desegregation” might work in US society: “It is not either/or,” King once explained, “it is both/and.”47 The crucial thing to understand here is that however much logic may cry “foul,” an entity that appears to be “contradictory” to another entity may in fact neither eliminate its opposite nor force it into some sort of new “synthesis.” It may simply exist with it side by side in a not necessarily harmonious, ongoing balance. As Mater noted, art can be simultaneously objective and subjective.

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Poetry

Saudi poetry provides an excellent example of the interaction of contradictory intellectual currents in the kingdom’s society, an example that offers key lessons for how twenty-first-century visual artists in Saudi Arabia can integrate multiple worldviews in their work while defining themselves and their art in relation to all of Saudi society. For centuries, poetry has enjoyed immense prestige across the country. No less a figure than Shaikh Abdulaaziz bin Abdullah bin Baz (or Ibn Baz), a leading Saudi cleric with a mass following in the kingdom, wrote in a fatwa: “The Prophet Muhammad . . . said, ‘In poetry, there is wisdom.’”48 Traditionally, Saudi poets have fallen into two basic categories. Al-Ḥijā’ poets specialize in satire or political critique, a role analogous to the worldviews of Gharem, Mater, and other modern Saudi visual artists. Al-Madīḥ poets, on the other hand, praise and pay tribute to their subjects. Both types of poets have enjoyed far greater latitude than ordinary Saudis when it comes to speaking about political issues. There are two key reasons for this. First, the religious elites in Saudi Arabia see poetry, when written in the “Arabic style” and promoting the values of the umma, as consistent with their vision of Islam and the life of the Prophet Muhammad.49 Second, poets in Saudi Arabia have traditionally served as vehicles for public opinion, and they are allowed to speak truth to the elite. Indeed, as Albazei has observed, “In poetry we can see the rapid changes that affected not only Saudi literature, but also Saudi life and culture as well.”50 The rise of modernist poets in the kingdom confirms Albazei’s observation. In the decades following the unification of the kingdom in 1932, poetry witnessed a profound debate between “traditional” and “modernist” visions. The debate extended into the society at large, because many Saudis saw the basic unit of classical Arab poetry, the bait (“stanza” or “house”), as a metaphor for the desert tents in which Bedouin tribes live. Saudi poets often refer to the thematic progress of a given classical poem by using a term also drawn from the same desert source: the ‘amūd (“pillar”) that props up a tent. The critical role of tents extends to Saudi architecture and family life. The villas modeled on Western homes that arose in Riyadh and other Saudi cities after the oil boom were built around either a tent or a tentlike meeting structure. Some wealthier homes feature separate tents for men and women.51 By the early 1950s, the modernists had won the debate—just as large oil revenues allowed the Saudi government to begin modernizing Saudi society for the first time. During this period, the modernist poets introduced romanticism, symbolism, and free verse (taf‘īla), mirroring the innovations of poets elsewhere in the Arab world.52 But the success of modernism did not result in the unchecked progress envisioned by Munif and other Arab modernists, who would have liked to destroy tradition. Instead, accepting the responsibility to

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address all of society,53 Saudi modernist poets aimed to produce art that simultaneously forwarded modernist goals while connecting with the rest of Saudi society through what Saad Albazei describes as a “genuine attachment to local culture.”54 Significantly, they created a framework that was later used by Saudi visual artists in the twenty-first century to attract all of society to their work by drawing on widely recognized cultural and religious symbols from ancient oral poetry, colloquial Arabic expressions, stories drawn from folklore and the Quran, and traditional Bedouin life.55 An example of this process is Muhammad al-Thubayti’s “Taḡrībāt alQawāfil wa al-Maṭar” (The westward movement of caravans and rain), which synthesizes metaphors drawn from the English Romantic poet John Keats (1795–1821) with the Jahiliyya tradition of a soothsayer in a wellknown story about a tribe exiled to North Africa from Qassim, a central region of Saudi Arabia.56 One sees a similar use of both a soothsayer and a dramatic Jahiliyya story set in the desert in “Aina ittjijāh as-Šajar?” (Where are the trees heading) by Thuraya al-Arrayed.57 The poem, written in the late 1980s, is a subtle warning to secular Arab leaders about the dangers facing their governments from radical political change if they are not careful.58 Although political themes of this type are not unusual in contemporary Arab poetry, Al-Arrayed differs in one critical way from poets in Lebanon and other Arab states by not principally identifying herself and her role in society as a poet. For decades, she worked as an executive at Aramco, the Saudi state oil company. Like most other Saudi poets, she is a self-taught writer, having earned degrees in the United States in business administration. Even Saudi Arabia’s two most famous modern poets, Ghazi alGosaibi (1940–2010) and Ibrahim Khafaji (1928–2016), received modern Western educations and worked for the state as senior bureaucrats. In fact, Al-Gosaibi entitled his memoir Yes, (Saudi) Minister! A Life in Administration—an important indication of what role he thought was the most important one in his life.59 Nonetheless, Al-Gosaibi and Khafaji both earned international fame as poets and literati. Al-Gosaibi wrote poetry, short stories, and studies of Islamic law and history, and he has seen his work, much of which is critical of Saudi society, translated into English. By contrast, Khafaji, who is not as well known in the West, penned the words for the Saudi national anthem and wrote ‘Arā’is Al-Mamlīka (Brides of the kingdom), a Westernstyle operetta that celebrates the diversity of the country’s many regions. Thanks to his poems praising the Al-Hilāl football club, the most successful sports franchise in the kingdom, Khafaji also earned the sobriquet “Šā’ir Al-Hilāl” (the poet of Al-Hilāl).60 These poems demonstrated how the traditional poetry form Al-Madīḥ could be used in support of football, a sport that is closely identified throughout the world with the rise of both modernity and postmodernity.61

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Equally important, Al-Gosaibi’s and Khafaji’s success in government and literature, professions that often have conflicting worldviews and expectations, gave Saudi visual artists a model that they could emulate in their own professional and artistic lives in the twenty-first century. For both of these poets, the question of modernity and tradition was not a simple either/or choice, but rather an opportunity for an expansion and creative redefinition. At the same time, Al-Gosaibi’s experience as a writer and poet shows the limitations of poetry and writing in general as vehicles for political expression. His work is especially important for our discussion because it aligns with the critical and progressive worldview that Saudi visual artists hold in the twenty-first century—despite the fact that his writings were banned in the kingdom for most of his life, and he was dismissed from senior government positions after he wrote poems that were seen as overly critical of the government. In one celebrated instance in 1984, Al-Gosaibi, who was the Saudi minister of health at the time, was frustrated by his inability to get a meeting with King Fahd. To get the monarch’s attention, he sent a poem entitled “A Pen Bought and Sold” to Al-Jazīra, a Saudi daily newspaper that the king read every day. The newspaper printed the poem on its front page, even though it effectively accused Fahd of being corrupt. One passage reads (in translation): Between you and me there are 1,000 Informers who are lying. You were cheated and you were pleased With the cheating. But in the past you were not like this Admiring false things.62

Naturally, Al-Gosaibi was promptly fired and sent into exile as Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to Bahrain. Two decades later, he lost his position as ambassador to Great Britain and Ireland when he wrote a poem celebrating the life of a Palestinian suicide bomber. These experiences confirm Gharem’s observation that it is easy to “accuse” the author of a poem, especially in a country where the written word is central to cultural and religious identity. A graphic image can have multiple meanings, but poetry and other forms of textual art offer fewer ways for artists to obfuscate their meaning. Music

For Saudi poets like Khafaji, music offered another form of artistic expression to reach a mass audience—one that lacks some of the perils of the written word. In particular, music provides a model for how to synthesize

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traditional forms of art with new communication technologies to appeal to mass society and overcome ingrained cultural and religious prohibitions. As Lisa Urkevich has demonstrated in Music Traditions of the Arabian Peninsula, Saudis have a rich musical tradition, but many of them, especially in the central Najd region, associate music “with poor moral values.”63 Indeed, Al-Wayel argues that Saudis inhabit a social milieu that systematically stigmatizes music, treating it as if it “lacks seriousness”—a perspective, as we will see, that they also apply to visual art.64 That has not happened by chance. For decades, Saudi religious scholars have issued countless fatāwin (religious opinions) calling music a sin. For example, Shaikh Ibn Baz, a leading religious scholar, labeled all music “Siḥr Šaiṭān” (the enchantment of Satan).65 Moreover, during the first third of the twentieth century, the Ikhwan (militant Bedouin warriors allied with the royal family) took punitive action against anyone whom they saw as “enchanted” by the devil. They shot at Hajj pilgrims who played instruments in Mecca, entered homes in Jeddah to smash records, and threatened to remove their support from King Abdulaziz if he failed to allow them to destroy his personal gramophone, which he regarded as his “pride and joy.”66 The king prudently agreed to their demands, a decision that sent political ripples throughout the country. But the power of the Ikhwan and their allies began to dissipate by the 1930s, and music made a resurgence by the mid-twentieth century, thanks to the radio and the rise of the modern Saudi army. First introduced into the Gulf around 1930, by the 1960s radio had profoundly influenced the daily lives of Saudis: they could buy personal radios for the first time, and the radio station in Mecca began to broadcast both men and women singing on air.67 Also, the rise of radio in Saudi Arabia coincided with the formation of a modern Saudi army. As H. St. J. B. Philby noted in the early 1950s, this process was facilitated by using “the charms of music”: Slowly and surely public and official opinion began to favor the recruitment and organization of a “regular army,” drilled and dressed after the manner in Europe, to take the place of “Wahhab’s rebel horde” [the Ikhwan]. . . . In the larger towns and settled areas the now considerable garrisons devote most of their time to training and ceremonial duties, while the charms of music, played by reasonably competent bands, have for some time been admitted, in a once musicless land, to revive the tedium of drills and parades, and to attract recruits, and to entertain the public.68

The central figure in those bands was Tariq Abdul-Hakim (1922–2012). Born in Ta’if, a city with a rich musical tradition, Abdul-Hakim was sent by the Saudi army to Egypt to study at the Egyptian Institute of Military Music, where he collaborated with some of the most famous Arab singers of the era.69 After returning home to Saudi Arabia, he rose through the

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ranks of the Saudi army and, with the assistance of the Saudi government, overcame the objections of religious scholars to found the Saudi military band70 and a military music academy.71 Abdul-Hakim used the latter, which was built in Ta’if, as a base to pursue both a successful career as a musician and to mentor multiple generations of musicians, which earned him the nickname “father of Saudi music.”72 Ultimately, Abdul-Hakim’s ability to leverage his position in the army and his connections to the Saudi elite to pursue his artistic dream and to help others to realize theirs provided a potent example for Abdulnasser Gharem.73 Among the first musicians that Abdul-Hakim mentored was Talal Maddah (1940–2000), who was born and reared in Mecca but later moved to Ta’if, where he began his career as a singer of Hij music and was discovered by Abdul-Hakim. After Maddah heard new musical arrangements at a wedding, he began to experiment with pieces that used large ensembles modeled on those in Egypt, Lebanon, and Syria. One of the first songs to emerge from his experimentation, “Wardak ya Zāri’al-Ward” (The grower of roses), became a national hit and was frequently played on Saudi radio.74 Maddah went on to record music in Cairo and to appear in a movie alongside the Lebanese star actress, Sabah. He, too, earned nicknames—the Earth’s Voice and the Golden Throat.75 He also mentored other famous Saudi singers, including Itab (d. 2007), a woman of African heritage.76 Itab was a very gifted singer and musician, recording duets with Maddah in Kuwait, where women were allowed to record music in the 1980s.77 Still, the most important modern Saudi singer, and Abdul-Hakim’s greatest protégé, was Muhammad Abdu, who synthesized classical Saudi art forms with modern musical patterns in the wider Arab world—a synthesis that Saudi visual artists later replicated in the twenty-first century. Born in 1949 in the southern province of Asir, Abdu migrated to Jeddah with his family so that his father, who had been a fisherman, could find betterpaying work as a bricklayer. When his father died in 1954, Abdu’s mother was forced to entrust Abdu’s upbringing to an orphanage. However, thanks to a grant from the future King Feisal, Abdu entered a special school for orphans, and then, in 1963, graduated from a vocational school in Jeddah. He then embarked on a career as a professional singer, beginning with religious chants (našīd), and reciting the Quran after prayer time.78 But Abdu truly established his credentials as a popular Arab singer with the oud at jalsāt (“sittings”). He was said to speak almost spiritually with the oud and subsequently earned great respect with extended pieces and maurūṯ (“inherited songs”). Abdu was especially fond of the work of the Egyptian oud composer Baligh Hamdi and, in 1967, sang one of his compositions for the sixty-ninth birthday of the Egyptian superstar singer Umm Kulthum. A decade later, Abdu and his music were widely known throughout the Middle East, earning him the title “the voice of the Arabs.”

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His 1978 song, “Mālī wa Māl An-Nās” (My fortune and the fortune of others), written by Saudi poet Ibrahim Khafaji, was a hit in Saudi Arabia and throughout the Arab world.79 We can see the strength of Abdu’s popularity from the fact that he became a cultural icon—even after the rise, in 1979, of what many Saudis call the Ṣaḥwa and the imposition of conservative social norms throughout the country. Although the proponents of these social norms convinced the kingdom’s government to bar Abdu and other singers from giving live concerts in the 1980s,80 the Saudi singer remained very popular. His sartorial choices and accessories defined fashion for multiple generations of Saudis, many of whom played his music at their weddings. Indeed, Abdu has joked that he has married half of the country.81 Today, Abdu is a model for the type of cultural figures that visual artists are becoming. His songs and musical retinue, composed of musicians who play both Arab and Western instruments, are a staple on Saudi television.82 In 2017, he performed to large audiences in Riyadh and Jeddah that included many young Saudis who had been born after he gave his last concert in Riyadh in 1988.83 His record label, Rotana, owned for many years by Prince Walid bin Talal, a prominent member of the Saudi royal family,84 is one of the most valuable in the Arab world. Rotana’s satellite music channel has popularized Abdu’s work and that of other Saudi artists, such as superstar singer Rabeh Saqer (b. 1965), in Saudi Arabia and many other Arab countires.85 Visual Art Comes to Saudi Arabia

The success of Abdu and other singers in the 1960s and 1970s had a broad impact on the rest of Saudi culture, which was still wary of any form of art other than poetry. Although music was not taught in the kingdom’s universities, the Saudi Arabia Arts Society funded cultural centers that promoted the public’s awareness of the arts through musical performances. Equally important, the society promoted the visual and plastic arts, which had gradually gained social acceptance in Saudi life since the 1950s—despite firm cultural and religious objections to the portrayal of animal and human images.86 In the late 1950s, the Saudi Ministry of Education incorporated the subject of art into the curriculum of every level of education in the kingdom. The first solo art show was held in Riyadh in 1964, featuring the work of Abdul Halim al-Rawi (1939–2006). Over the next decade, the Arts Institute opened in Riyadh, and the Fine Arts Center (a studio and exhibition space) opened in Jeddah. In addition, most Saudi colleges and universities founded departments of art.87 These changes paved the way for a new generation of Saudi artists to study art at home, as well as in Egypt, France, Italy, and the United States.

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Al-Rawi, Muhammad Salim, and others produced artwork that reflected the leading global schools of their day, such as cubism, formal abstraction, representative realism, and surrealism.88 These artists produced a very wide range of pieces across a host of media, but still their careers as artists and their influence across society were constricted. Few college-educated artists could find work in occupations related to their studies, outside of teaching, for which standards and classroom time were often limited.89 (Art classes met as infrequently as once a week and played a negligible role in the grading system.) Furthermore, few artists could devote themselves full-time to art, and those who did faced financial hardship. For instance, Muhammad Salim, one of the few Saudi artists who dedicated his life exclusively to art, died penniless in 1997.90 Even more important, the many attempts of Saudi artists to synthesize Western conceptions of visual art with existing culture failed to produce the synthesis that emerged out of similar discussions among poets and singers. Instead, bitter debates erupted, pitting artists seeking to push the forms popular in other Arab states and the West against those committed to a vision of art more consistent with existing cultural traditions in the kingdom. Moreover, Saudi artists lacked the means to easily share their art and ideas with others, both at home and abroad, or to build a base of support in a society that was already inclined to look at them and their work with suspicion. As Abdullah Qandeel observed in 2016, this first generation of modern Saudi artists “didn’t communicate very well” because they lacked the “proper technology” and the “desire” to inspire their fellow citizens with their art.91 The mistakes made by these artists provided a cautionary tale for the men and women who led the artistic movement in the early twenty-first century.92 The position of the first generation of modern Saudi artists grew still worse after the seizure of the Kaaba in 1979 when the country’s society came to reject the types of images that were commonplace in the art produced in many other Arab states and the West. Saudi society’s perspective on art was clarified by a fatwa signed by Ibn Baz and three other leading Saudi scholars of religious law: Making images of beings with a soul is Harām [prohibited], whether it is in the form of a sculpture or a painting on a wall, cloth, or paper, or embroidery. There is also no distinction whether a picture is created with a paintbrush, a pen, or any other drawing instrument. Likewise, it makes no difference whether it is an imitation of an original or imaginary figure, or it is smaller, bigger, more beautiful, or uglier than the original. It is even prohibited to draw the skeleton of a being with a soul.93

Notably, Ibn Baz and the other proponents of these types of cultural norms already had a critical place in the primary and secondary educational systems, which they strengthened by taking control over public spaces.

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Even foreigners—such as Joe Horton, an American whose work was popular with companies and individuals in Jeddah—found that official censors had little tolerance for the most basic paintings. Following a 1983 exhibit in which five of Horton’s pieces were censored for not meeting artistic or political standards, Horton returned to the United States.94 As Horton and Saudi artists faced these restrictions, they found little support in Saudi society, in part because of the way they conceived of art—which was to replicate the Western conception of artists as godlike individuals who create new culture in the studio, then share it with others at public showings. In a book that chronicles this generation of artists— Saudi Artists Today, compiled by Abdulaziz Ashour—all the artists are shown as individuals in their studios, producing art in the Western mode, usually wearing Western clothes.95 For a society that sees culture as taking place in the majlis and among groups of people rather than among individuals, a genre of art that focuses on individuals in a space without a ready equivalent in society is not likely to make much sense to the average Saudi or be of value. Not surprisingly, many Saudis have come to see the visual arts as nothing more serious than childish activities or adult hobbies. Since 1980, many of the serious programs for art education have migrated to women’s colleges, which limits how many young men can study art seriously or make it their life’s work.96 Of course, before the turn of the twenty-first century, artists lacked other means, such as the internet, to distribute their art and receive feedback on it. Not the Usual Script

During the 1980s, Saudis founded new institutions that promoted art or encouraged young men to pursue it seriously as a vocation. Strikingly, these new institutions were not in the traditional urban regions or in communities that had existing artistic institutions. Rather, they occurred in the Najd region and, most important, in Asir, which had far fewer connections to the outside world than did the central urban areas of the country. In the Najd and Asir, local business and cultural elites worked with members of the Saudi royal family to use art as a mechanism to educate their people about views that were different from those of the conservative Ṣaḥwa and that might in the long run bring about social change. In 1987, the Saleh bin Saleh Cultural Center opened in Unaizah, the second largest city in Qassim, a province in the Najd and the emotional home of the Ṣaḥwa. Qassim’s then governor, Prince Abd al-Elah bin Abdualaziz, signaled his support for the massive new center by serving as its founding patron. Built on a hill overlooking the city, the center features libraries for adults and children, a large traditional majlis, a life-size model of a traditional central Arabian village, a swimming pool for children, a theater, and

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various classrooms. One of the largest of these classrooms—taking up an entire floor—is devoted to art classes. There is also space for students of both genders to showcase their art.97 The center was a fitting tribute to Saleh bin Saleh (1904–1980), one of the city’s foremost educators, who personally knew the founder of Saudi Arabia, King Abdulaziz, and trained many of the men and women who would make the city famous for their achievements in business and education. Among the individuals who were linked to the city were Sulaiman Olayan, the founder of the Olayan Group and the kingdom’s most accomplished modern businessman. The city was also one of the first in its region to embrace education for women, earning it a reputation for progressive values in the heart of the Najd, long seen as the nation’s conservative heartland.98

Asir and the Birth of Edge of Arabia We Have Gone Too Far

In Abha, the hilly capital city of Asir, business and government interests in the city and beyond sought, around the turn of the century, to find ways to correct the conservative forces that had been unleashed in the country after the seizure of the Grand Mosque in Mecca in 1979. In repeated meetings with his officials, the American- and British-educated Prince Khaled alFeisal, then the longtime governor of Asir, voiced his belief that Saudis had gone too far and there was an urgent need to educate and broaden the worldview of Saudis, especially those living in the south.99 The events of September 11, 2001, only reinforced that perspective: four of the fifteen Saudis involved in the terrorist attacks were from southern Arabia; and two of those four were from Khamis Mushait in Asir. In the past, most Saudi members of al-Qaeda had been from the kingdom’s cities in central Arabia or the coasts. By contrast, the south had long been seen as among the most loyal regions of the country.100 In the late 1990s and early 2000s, the prince, acting in his private capacity and not as governor, sponsored a series of initiatives to realize his visions—one of the most important of which was Al-Waṭan (the Nation), an Arabic-language daily newspaper focused on the south and published, for safety reasons, in a vast unmarked building near Abha’s airport.101 Feisal’s US-educated son, Bandar bin Khaled, is the chairman of the newspaper. Thanks to the energetic work of Jamal Khashoggi, Mustafa Ali, and other progressive columnists from the south, the newspaper gained prominence both domestically and internationally. Under Khashoggi’s two terms as editor, the newspaper became especially known for its willingness to champion the rights of women and other taboo issues—positions that

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earned it the wrath of many conservative Saudis,102 eventually forcing Khashoggi to go into voluntary exile in the West.103 In 2009, the newspaper became a national daily broadsheet, with stories covering international and local news, analytical pieces, lifestyle reports, and sports news. Three years later, it was the top-ranked daily newspaper in the kingdom by circulation, and the only one to be published daily in multiple cities. It has a vast online presence as well.104 The newspaper was not the only institution that the prince sought to use to transform the society of Asir, southern Arabia, and the kingdom as a whole. While he was governor of Asir between 1971 and 2007, he presided over a series of new institutions in Abha that promoted culture and the city’s role as a Saudi tourist destination. These institutions included the Literary Club of Abha, the Abha Singing Festival, the Abha Prize for Cultural Excellence, and the Al-Meftaha Visual Arts Village. With its parks, cafés, and mild climate at its high elevation (7,447 feet, or 2,270 meters) with frequent rainfall, Abha was and is ideal for these types of institutions—which also built on the region’s tradition of valuing graphic arts and crafts, calligraphy, and poetry. Indeed, the prince himself is an accomplished poet and owns an extensive collection of paintings.105 A Movement Is Born

The most important new arts institution for Prince Khaled’s vision was AlMeftaha, which was under his direct patronage. Until the arts village closed in late 2015 for lack of funds,106 it was located in the heart of Abha, on a hill that is only a short walk from the city’s famous outdoor market, Sūq aṯṮulāṯā’ (Tuesday market). Al-Meftaha was made up of a cluster of twostory buildings that resembled a traditional Asiri village.107 Within its space, there were antique stores; a classical majlis, framed by a redwood tree; a mosque; a museum; offices for arts and community organizations; studios for visual artists; and a theater.108 No classes were held in the village, but anyone in the community was free to use the studios, including people whose professions had nothing to do with art. Among Al-Meftaha’s early supporters was Khashoggi, whose two daughters later became professional illustrators.109 In addition, famous visitors were permitted to use the center. In fact, Britain’s Prince Charles, a friend of Prince Khaled al-Feisal, reportedly painted watercolors there.110 In the late 1990s, five young men from different backgrounds and professions began to gather at Al-Meftaha, where they had been granted studio space and had been introduced to one another by Khashoggi.111 Those young men lacked an arts education, but all of them were intensely interested in learning more about art and the world—a process that began at AlMeftaha. As Gharem later told the Saudi television program Min as-Ṣifr,

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Al-Meftaha became a “source of intellectual and artistic energy” for him and his colleagues.112 The arrival of the internet also greatly facilitated this process, because it offered them access to ideas and to information from around the world. The experience transformed their identities and what they believed was possible in the kingdom and the wider world.113 Even more important, these men took a different approach toward art than previous generations of artists had, an approach that expressly used existing Saudi traditions of creating culture and art. Rather than utilizing the Western framework, in which an artist works in a studio on his or her own, creating art as God created the world,114 they looked at the creation of culture—and of art in particular—as a process that involves many people. One can see their resistance to single, unified models of cultural production in the name they chose for their new group or collective: Šaẓīya, an Arabic word that means broken up, shattered, or disembodied.115 From its inception, the Šaẓīya collective took advantage of the internet, a technology that Gharem later remembered “came at the right time.”116 Critically, the technology freed them to explore and consume culture and ideas from around the planet, which they incorporated into their art. These artists may have been physically in Al-Meftaha Village in Abha, but the internet gave them access to another, much larger village: what the Canadian philosopher and communication theorist Marshall McLuhan once famously called “the Global Village”—a contemporary dynamic in which, paradoxically, people may be separated geographically but nonetheless share a common cultural and social space.117 Despite their international interests, the men were clearly Saudis who were committed to building an artistic movement at home from the bottom up with institutions and themes that were recognizable to their countrymen. To build that movement, they practiced a form of tajdīd and islāḥ, adopting a Saudi institution of culture, the majlis, to incorporate external ideas into the kingdom’s society. They began to meet regularly to discuss everything—art, culture, current events, the influence of the media, and the power of images to shape opinion in the world.118 These young men gathered as many articles and books about art as they could and shared them among themselves. They downloaded much of their material from the internet119—a very different use of the technology than that of al-Qaeda or of organizations dedicated to promoting women’s rights or the democratization of the political system. Among the seminal artists whose work these young men considered and discussed were Joseph Beuys, Marcel Duchamp, Jasper Johns, and Andy Warhol.120 Out of their nightly discussions, there emerged a new worldview and Saudi model for creating art, which synthesized art from home and abroad, explored cultural and social issues, drew from the online world, and created a common social space. Again, this movement came to resem-

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ble what Tarrow called rooted cosmopolitans, or intellectual groups that promote indigenous ideas by blending global ideas with those of their own culture. Because the art that emerged from this model was ambiguous and open-ended, and raised almost as many questions as it answered, it could be read in many different ways. By itself, such ambiguity was not unusual. There were examples of art in the West and elsewhere that simultaneously asserted multiple and even contradictory messages. That art was often esoteric, so that only the artist and a select group of others had the skills or knowledge required to unlock its intended meaning. What set the work of the new generation of Saudi artists apart was its exoteric nature: the artists did not assign meaning or truth to their work; rather, they left that up to the audience—or, more broadly, to Saudi society at large. As Gharem has said, he and his colleagues were not picking sides; instead, they were “trying to be a mirror” to society.121 But that did not mean that artists did not want their mirror to serve a greater good, to inspire reaction and change. “Sometimes when you become a mirror as an artist and you show your society who they are,” Gharem has tweeted, “they get upset.”122 By taking that approach, the artists invited further discussion about the real meaning or meanings of their work. Those discussions effectively extended the process of creating art and culture beyond the majlis, so that all of society could have a say in creating culture and be invested in it. Over time, that process transformed the Šaẓīya artists, and those who followed them, into organic intellectuals who, through the language of culture, expressed the feelings and experiences of their society in ways that could not be replicated by academia, business, or the media. The process also differentiated these Saudi artists from Islamist radicals, many of whose hierarchical structures and singular worldviews left little room for discussion. Ambiguity had an important benefit for these artists, for it permitted them to explore sensitive cultural, political, and social topics while still claiming that they and their work were “apolitical.” With the exception of the monarchy, no topic was taboo in their model—because they always had the fallback position that what they were doing was only art.123 This specific model for creating and assigning meaning to culture began in the visual arts in Abha in 2003, spreading over the next decade to other creative genres and “communal” spaces, including comedy shows, live theater, social media, and YouTube. This model of creating art, as we will see, not only appealed to Saudi society’s preference for culture created in communal frameworks but also offered artists a twofold mechanism so they could: secure permission from various people to present their work, and maintain public support for their work after it had been presented to a general audience. Social media proved to be ideally suited to this model.

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“I Am an American Through Ansel Adams”

Two artists, Abdulnasser Gharem and Ahmed Mater, emerged as the driving forces from the Šaẓīya group, helping to define the visual arts in twentyfirst-century Saudi Arabia. Today, they hold a position analogous to that of Tariq Abdul-Hakim for Saudi music. They are the two “fathers” of the movement. Both men are from Asir and have roots in the region’s village culture, with ideas that complement each other and have helped the Saudi Arts Movement to grow rapidly. Both eventually built studios outside of Abha that function as new schools of art, akin to Abdul-Hakim’s school of military music in Tai’f. Abdulnasser Gharem, who was born in 1971 and is the oldest of the five original Šaẓīya artists, is a tall, bright, and charismatic military officer. He grew up watching his grandfather, a shaikh, lead the majlis of a mountainous agricultural community. Gharem was the natural choice to serve as the leader of the artists’ majlis, whose meetings were regularly held at his apartment. He has always been passionate about learning as much as he can about art, teaching his fellow Saudis about it, and bringing it into the social sphere—a passion that was motivated in part by the rejection of his application to attend a local arts school after he graduated from high school. The internet later transformed him, in his own words, into a “citizen of the world,” which forced him to master English. His art has always embodied a vision of culture as dialogue in motion, open to interpretation and reinterpretation. Even his most basic public comments have communicated a similar outlook: for a time in 2013, his personal status on the social media site WhatsApp was “At the movies,” a near impossibility in a kingdom that totally lacked public movie theaters at the time.124 As the Saudi Arts Movement took shape, Gharem emerged as its most visible public figure and began building ties with commercial and political leaders. His status as a military officer lent considerable legitimacy to his art and that of his colleagues—just as Abdul-Hakim’s status once did for Saudi musicians. Gharem has consciously built on his status as an officer in the Saudi army. Not only is there a picture of him in his army uniform on the opening page of his biography, Art of Survival, but he also uses military terms, such as mission, to frame his work as an artist and as a leader of the Saudi Arts Movement. Even the title of the biography suggests a military background, for the word survival is associated more with soldiers in combat than with artists in their studios. He has sought to create opportunities for other military officers to become recognized as artists. Gharem has also worked hard to extend the majlis model to subsequent generations of Saudi artists in various genres, advising and collaborating with them on a host of projects at home and abroad. Indeed, his flexibility toward the world, his willingness to challenge established Saudi myths and norms, and his total

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commitment to the artistic movement’s principles, even at the cost of his own work, have lent him additional legitimacy. An essential moment for Gharem and the Saudi Arts Movement was his decision, in 2008, to listen to others defining the meaning of his photograph Ṣirāṭ. The photograph displays the ruins of a modern bridge that had been devastated by a flash flood in 1980 at a considerable loss of life. Such collapses were all too common in Saudi Arabia at the time and later were a major issue of public debate after the catastrophic Jeddah floods in 2009. Gharem further added to the power of the piece by showing the bridge heading into a dark abyss and by spray-painting ṣirāṭ, an Arabic word with multiple meanings, all over the bridge. Not only does ṣirāṭ mean a roadlike “path,” but it also denotes the “path” to the “other side.” The word has a deeply religious significance for Saudis, for it is part of the Sūra al-Fātiḥa, the opening words of the Quran: “Guide us to the straight path” (1:6).125 Only weeks before the start of the first major exhibit of modern Saudi artists in London, a group of conservative Islamic scholars in Saudi Arabia protested that Gharem’s piece gave viewers a license to walk on the words of Islam. This, of course, was not a meaning that Gharem ever intended. But asserting his role as a modern artist who could define the meaning of his own work was perilous, for it risked launching a debate in which modern Saudi art might be labeled un-Islamic for promoting the notion of the artist as God. Consequently, Gharem agreed to provide the show with an entirely new piece, a giant rubber stamp modeled on the official ones he frequently used to mark his paperwork in the army. The stamp was emblazoned with a phrase, in both Arabic and English, that could be interpreted in multiple ways: “Have a bit of commitment, Amen.” Thanks to Gharem’s decision to remove Ṣirāṭ, the 2008 show was a success, helping to lay the foundation for the future of the Saudi Arts Movement, and removing all doubt about whether the movement was organically linked to Saudi society. Nevertheless, in 2011, Gharem put Ṣirāṭ on the cover of his memoir, Art of Survival.126 By contrast, Mater, a highly cerebral emergency-room physician, lacks the extroverted personality of Gharem. But he demonstrates creativity, energy, a sense of humor, and an implicit trust in his audience and his colleagues. A dilemma in early adulthood forced him to develop a new vision of art and of social change. At the time, Mater was considering abandoning medical school to pursue art, a decision that would have compelled him to travel overseas, as there were no art schools in Saudi Arabia at that time and no way to earn an income from art. Mater’s dilemma was the type of modern choice that many creative people face in conservative settings. Either they stay at home and abandon their artistic dreams, or they pursue their dreams in a more liberal setting far from home. Rather than choosing between a modern profession and art, Mater found a third option, one analogous to Martin Luther King Jr.’s view of how

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African Americans should approach the question of which issue they should pursue first—integration or desegregation. As King said, it was not a matter of either/or, but of and/as well. Mater remained in the conservative setting of Abha, pursuing medicine. But he also promised himself to start a new artistic movement at home, in which he could be both a doctor and an artist.127 Today, Mater draws on the ideas and terms that he learned in medical school to describe his art and his place in Saudi society. He often says that he adopts a “holistic approach” to art, for as a “doctor” he must “treat everybody”—words that suggest that he is not a modern artist in the mode of Jackson Pollock, but more of a civil servant accountable to all of Saudi society, whose art promotes the common good.128 The way that Mater resolved his dilemma between pursuing careers in art and medicine points to his ability to synthesize and reclaim many cultures, intellectual genres, and professions into art. These trends are evidenced by his works that incorporate X-rays, photographic studies of Mecca, Islam, songs, and other references to popular culture. For example, in Yellow Cow, Mater links two aspects of contemporary Saudi life that many Saudis and non-Saudis view as at odds—namely, consumerism and Islam, specifically the Sura al-Baqara, the chapter of the Quran that tells the story of the golden calf. In particular, he modernizes the ancient story, widely known as the “Yellow Cow Sura,” by creating a colorful poster (142 x 114 centimeters; 56 x 45 inches) for Yellow Cow Cheese, an ersatz brand of cheese whose yellow cartoon cow looks similar to the one in the logo for the famous French cheese La Vache Qui Rit (The Laughing Cow). In perhaps an ironic comment on the politics of the Arab-Israeli conflict or the role of Jews in one of the Quran’s defining passages, Yellow Cow Cheese is marked as both “Halal” and “Kosher.” When referring to Yellow Cow, Mater once noted that “in Biblical and Quranic times,” people spread important stories “by word of mouth and recitation.”129 “In the contemporary world,” he continued, a similar process only takes place if a story becomes “a brand recognizable in the marketplace.”130 Hence Mater’s decision to brand the ancient story for the modern world. Notably, Mater believes that Yellow Cow is a work of art without a defining resolution—an entity that can be retold and redefined, including as a film and a later shop installation.131 Throughout all of these versions of the artwork, Mater employs serious commentary and humor simultaneously in a way that reminds the viewer of an observation that the American humorist Robert Benchley made in his review of The Tavern, George M. Cohan’s 1920 play: “Every line and situation in it can be either serious or burlesque, according to the individual powers of discernment of the listener.”132 Equally important, Mater views himself in global rather than narrow nationalist terms. The influence brought to bear on him by Ansel Adams (1902–1984), the famous American photographer and environmentalist, is

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so important to Mater that he jokes that he became “an American” through Adams. In fact, Mater has a biography of the photographer in his studio in Jeddah. He also draws on the work of two other leading American photographers: the famous Works Progress Administration artist Walker Evans (1903–1975); and Diane Arbus, an artist known for her photography of marginalized groups in society.133 Mater combines these American influences with Saudi ones. His artistic vision has been inspired, for example, by ‘Abd al-Ghaffar Baghdadi, a Jeddah-based physician and photographer who aided Christiaan Snouck Hurgronje (1857–1936) in producing his famous pictures of Mecca in the nineteenth century. Mater also draws inspiration from the work of ‘Abd Malouf bin al-Zar, an urban planner who designed the modern structures of many Saudi cities.134 Born in Tabuk to a military family, Mater was then raised in a mountain village dominated by the Tihama tribe, whose men fiercely defend its customs and traditions, including wearing garlands of dried flowers and herbs, a practice that has earned them the nickname the Flower Men.135 Mater’s wife, Arwa al-Neami, is a noted photographer,136 and his mother is a calligrapher and a housepainter in the traditional Asiri style. She taught her son from an early age that the arts are a vehicle for preserving culture, heritage, and religion.137 Those values continue to guide Mater’s artwork and his firm conviction that the creation and experience of art should fill a social role. Indeed, abstract images, a key part of the traditional Asiri style pursued by his mother, are also central to the work of the artistic movement that Mater helped to found. “If You Ever Plan on Going to Saudi Arabia . . .”

As Gharem, Mater, and the other artists in Abha synthesized their new vision at the turn of the twenty-first century, new social trends and technologies meant that their dream of building a new artistic movement was more attainable than ever. In the years after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, there was an intersection of three forces that propelled the Saudi Arts Movement onto the national and global stages: an unprecedented surge of interest in the West in anything related to Saudi Arabia and the wider Middle East; a rapid expansion of charitable giving in Saudi Arabia to social causes, including those dealing with the arts; 138 and the appearance of new internet technologies that were well suited to promoting cutting-edge art at little cost. There was now a potentially lucrative market for art, combined with mechanisms and resources to reach that market—if only the Abha artists could find ways to connect themselves to the global artistic community via curators, private foundations, wealthy philanthropists, journalists, and other

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artists. To help meet this challenge, they formed a partnership with Stephen Stapleton, a young British artist who befriended both Gharem and Mater when he traveled to Abha in March 2003 (see Photo 2).139 In subsequent years, the three men cooperated closely in developing, encouraging, and promoting Saudi Arabia’s new visual artists. Stapleton’s arrival in Saudi Arabia reflected a mixture of his interest in the Middle East, an earlier era’s travel literature, and sheer luck. While still a student in art school, he had become drawn to the traveling artists who regularly crossed borders in the nineteenth century, reshaping both modern global maps and Western conceptions of cultures around the world. He had even taken the one class on critical art theory and practice that he had been able to find in the entire United Kingdom. That class left him convinced that there was a gap between theories of art and the actual roles of art in the contemporary world. Stapleton’s views were further shaped by his bicycle trip from the American Midwest to the Pacific Ocean, a trip that paralleled the path of the famous Lewis and Clark expedition in 1804–1806. He observed how different America looked when seen from the ground up and began to understand the power of traveling artists to see things that others cannot.140

Photo 2. Stephen Stapleton and Ahmed Mater at the Al-Meftaha Visual Arts Village, Asir, Saudi Arabia, 2003. Copyright © 2017 Edge of Arabia. Courtesy Edge of Arabia.

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Even before the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, Stapleton was planning a trip to the Middle East. He wanted to discern what it really looked like and to deconstruct the images of Arabs and others that were now so ubiquitous in the West. His journey to the region was aided by a chance encounter with a man in London whom he had met on a tour of an exhibit on Islamic art. Stapleton’s frequent questions to the tour guide caught the attention of this fellow member of the touring party, who was impressed by his deep interest in the art of the Middle East. When Stapleton revealed that he was planning on going to the region soon, the man handed him his business card and said, “If you ever plan on going to Saudi Arabia, call this number.”141 Stapleton later learned that the gentleman on the museum tour was Prince Bandar bin Khaled, the son of Asir’s governor. When Stapleton traveled to Abha not long afterward, in 2003, Bandar served as his official sponsor, facilitating all his contacts in the kingdom, and arranging for him to attend a party at which he met Gharem and Mater. By helping Stapleton in this way, Bandar adopted a role similar to the one that his father had assumed when he founded Al-Waṭan and the Al-Meftaha Arts Village—as a prominent person using informal channels and influence rather than official power to deliver change. It would be a role that other members of the Saudi elite would play, as the Saudi Arts Movement emerged on the national stage.142 Stapleton also built a relationship with Khashoggi, the man who had first introduced Gharem and Mater. As the British artist later told an audience in New York City in 2018: “[In 2003,] I had crossed the border from Yemen into Saudi Arabia on a public bus and was dropped off under the light of a neon palm tree. Jamal was the first person I met in Saudi Arabia.”143 Khashoggi then took Stapleton on a tour of Al-Waṭan’s offices and drove him to Al-Meftaha, where the British artist met Gharem and Mater.144 The three men became fast friends, building on their common age and commitment to the arts and to forging linkages across international borders. Strikingly, Khashoggi, the artists he met, and their society, as Stapleton realized, bore no relation to how T. E. Lawrence had portrayed them in The Seven Pillars of Wisdom, which he had read on the bus ride to Abha.145 The Saudi artists he had met were intelligent, open-minded, and clearly creative, but the famous British officer had dismissed the same society as narrowminded and lacking creativity—a people “that had no art.”146 One can see the immense impact that the visit to Abha had on Stapleton in Off Screen—a book published in 2004 in which he and three colleagues documented their experiences in Saudi Arabia and other Middle Eastern countries. Intended by its editors to fill the “visual gap in the West between Orientalism and modern media,”147 Off Screen features a series of photographic collages and travel logs, including Stapleton’s comment that it made “no sense” to continue reading The Seven Pillars of Wisdom while in Abha. Of the photographic collages that Stapleton created in Abha, two

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appear side by side in Off Screen, together mirroring the oppositional forces present in Mater’s Cowboy Code and other works of Saudi art. In the first of Stapleton’s two collages, there is the word “us,” a photo of Mater, one of his artworks, and a brief commentary on how he and other artists are the “clearest spokespeople” for the new generation of Saudis. By contrast, in the second collage, there are the words “& them of Wisdom”—a reference to Lawrence’s book—above a drawing of Lawrence in Bedouin clothing. Below Lawrence is the passage from the Seven Pillars of Wisdom in which he downplays the creativity and the art of Saudis.148 As Stapleton told me in June 2018, he placed the two photographic collages alongside one another to show that Westerners like Lawrence viewed art very differently than Saudis. “Lawrence was extremely insightful,” Stapleton observed, “but at the same time framed many things from a very British/Army/Oxbridge point of view.” “He refused to see things like art,” Stapleton added, “outside of his Western references.”149 Still, the comparison also sent a deeper message about Stapleton and the famous British officer. While Stapleton, like Lawrence, was a British visitor to Arabia who adapted to its society and sartorial customs (note that both men wore the Bedouin headdress), he could see art outside of the Western cultural framework and the value of cooperating with artists like Mater in a way that Lawrence never could. Already alienated from Britain’s arts scene,150 Stapleton turned his attention toward Saudi Arabia. There the friendships that he had made in Abha formed the foundation of a new transnational creative community that integrated him into the original group of artists who had founded the Šaẓīya collective. They all understood that the kingdom’s artists had great energy and could make a significant contribution to the Saudi and the global arts scenes, if they had sufficient encouragement and were able to find their own voices.151 Edge of Arabia

Following his trip to Asir, Stapleton stayed in close contact with Gharem, Mater, and the other artists in Abha, frequently showing their work to colleagues and collectors in London. In 2004, he attended the first public exhibition of their work, The Šaẓīya Show in Jeddah, which displayed the benefits of the exoteric approach. For despite the fact that the paintings and other artworks bore no resemblance to the standard fare at other Saudi galleries, the show won the approval of the necessary Saudi officials, sparking discussion rather than outrage. Although the event was covered by the BBC, there was little international interest in the show, and none of the pieces were sold, including the X-ray paintings and the browned-out chewing gum laid out like ancient relics. Thus, a new framework was needed to connect Saudi artists with an international audience and to persuade that

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audience that it should care about narratives the Saudis themselves were producing about the kingdom.152 The solution to this challenge emerged from an article and photo essay on Saudi Arabia by Frank Viviano in National Geographic. Entitled “Kingdom on Edge,” the piece forwarded a standard trope about Saudi Arabia— namely, that it was teetering on the edge of disaster, hovering between the seventh and twenty-first centuries.153 This thesis was illustrated by contrasting photos that portrayed a royal sword dance, modern malls, camel markets, women in ʿabāʾāt (abayas), large palaces, and impoverished homes of expatriate workers. This was a vision that neither Stapleton nor his Saudi colleagues could accept—“a distorted reality,” Mater called it.154 In response, the Saudi artists claimed the notion of “the edge” for themselves: their movement would henceforth be called Edge of Arabia, a title that had both geographic and social significance.155 Hundreds of miles from the kingdom’s population centers, Abha is on the geographic edge of Saudi Arabia.156 Before the discovery of oil in the 1930s brought tens of thousands of people to the center of the peninsula, Abha was part of the edge of settlement in Arabia that stretched from Tabuk to Mecca, Medina, Jeddah, and Jizan.157 Furthermore, avant-garde modern art in the early twenty-first century was definitely on the edge of what anyone would associate with Saudi Arabia. Equally important, a frontier by definition is a multiple that incorporates more than one territory and perspective, just as a shattered object (šaẓīya) is a multiple. To make Edge of Arabia a reality, Stapleton, Mater, and Gharem traveled throughout all of Saudi Arabia over the next four years, looking for like-minded individuals, both artists and patrons, who would be willing and eager to join their enterprise to build a movement from the bottom up. The “grassroots journey,” Stapleton later recalled, had been among friends through the “backroads of Saudi society” and that more than half of the people they met were women.158 In 2014, Stapleton would remark that the greatest strength of Edge of Arabia in its early days was its members’ naïveté.159 Among the artists who joined the organization during this time were Manal al-Dowayan, an Aramco employee who later emerged as one of the organization’s most vocal female voices;160 Hamza Serafi, a Jeddah artist and patron of the arts; and Ayman Yossir Daydban, a Jordanian Palestinian artist living in Jeddah.161 Two additional artists are also worthy of note, for they brought new ideas and technology into Edge of Arabia and Saudi arts generally—technology that would allow Saudi artists to communicate directly with mass society for the first time. Sarah Mohanna al-Abdali, the first Saudi street artist, gained wide fame by using social media to post a series of graffiti pictures that featured a road sign to Mecca, with the Kaaba replaced by a group of high-rise buildings.162 Another early street artist, Shaweesh, is based in Riyadh but has

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roots in the south, much like the Šaẓīya artists. However, he went one step further than Al-Abdali, turning to social media as a tool to publicize and get feedback on his work—just as one might do in a majlis, but that would be impossible on the streets. Shaweesh has created striking photos by adding figures from popular culture to historic photographs.163 In one of his most powerful pieces, Vader and the Delegation, he added Darth Vader to a photograph of Emir Feisal (the leader of the Arab Revolt in World War I) and his delegation at the Versailles Peace Conference in 1919. The conference, which determined the boundaries of the modern Middle East, symbolizes for many Arabs the nefarious role of Western imperialism in their region.164 Many of the artists who joined the movement were similar in experience to those in Abha: they were self-taught and had full-time jobs in professions that had nothing to do with art. The new organization’s artists showed their work abroad, with Mater becoming the first Saudi artist to sell his work to a foreign museum. That achievement won the Abha artists recognition from King Abdullah when he visited Abha in 2007, as well as an invitation for Mater to take part in an international leadership program in the United States. That program introduced Mater to a series of new sources of inspiration. It was then that he received a copy of Gene Autry’s “Cowboy Code,” which he later used in his work of that name.165 Fady Jameel

As the art movement grew in the 2000s, it caught the attention of Fady Jameel, who was the same age as Stapleton and the son of Abdu Latif Jameel, one of Saudi Arabia’s wealthiest men.166 The younger Jameel and his family were part of a groundswell in charitable giving in Saudi Arabia in the early 2000s. Indeed, collection boxes marked with the names of charities are ubiquitous throughout the country, with several organizations fundraising at modern malls on any given night or weekend. As Karim Shalaby notes, “The culture of giving in Saudi Arabia is public and pervasive . . . not reserved for the private space.”167 Ties between individuals and institutions are, Shalaby says, perhaps “stronger than those between individuals and the state.”168 In 2008, Shalaby observed that close to two-thirds of registered charitable associations and foundations were less than ten years old.169 The surge in giving coincided with the adoption of principles of “giving management,” which had been developed in the West.170 Indeed, there is relatively stringent state supervision of charities’ boards of directors, budgets, and sources of funding. Saudi charities cannot accept funds from foreign entities.171 Although most Saudi foundations focus on providing resources to the poor and disadvantaged, a select group focuses on social change and the arts. This latter group includes members of the Saudi royal family, Saudi Aramco

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as a corporate sponsor,172 and three Saudi-linked foundations based in the United Kingdom.173 The most important foundation linked to the royal family and the arts is that of Princess Jawaher Bint Majed Bin Abdulaziz al-Saud, whose father has served as governor of Ha’il. In 1998, she founded the Mansouria Foundation for Culture and Creativity in Paris to encourage the arts and culture in Saudi Arabia. The foundation has funded the work of young Saudi artists and provided gallery space for them in Jeddah. As Princess Jawaher writes in the foreword to Contemporary Kingdom: The Saudi Art Scene Now, “We believe that no artist reaches full potential in isolation.”174 In contrast, Jameel and his family see the arts as only one important element in a holistic approach to resolving larger socioeconomic issues in Saudi society. The development of the arts, he believes, is integral to his family’s larger social goals, for the arts can spark the emergence of a Saudi creative industry modeled on those in the West and focused on the generation or exploitation of knowledge and information. At the same time, it helps to diversify the kingdom’s economy and move it away from dependence on oil, while providing employment opportunities for the burgeoning youthful population. For years, Jameel has looked for Saudi artists who can engage international audiences by inspiring what he calls “an alternative, more positive vision of our country.”175 In 2007, he was especially impressed by a proposal he saw for a show of Edge of Arabia artists to be held in London. In his eyes, the artists’ work represented a radical break from tradition, deserving applause for “addressing local [Saudi] issues rather than pandering to the expectations of the Western art world.”176 Clearly, Jameel was pleased to discover a group of artists who were capable of intelligently depicting Saudi society as it is, instead of how it is imagined by Westerners.177 Jameel has forged a strong bond with Stapleton and the other artists of Edge of Arabia, not only becoming a key financial patron but also serving as a key business and political adviser. Since 2008, he has contributed to the building of a long-term strategy for the organization. Stapleton credits Jameel with being empathetic and thinking in strategic terms, constantly pushing the organization to operate in entrepreneurial modes. While giving his advice, he also makes it clear that he trusts Stapleton and his colleagues.178 The Globalization of Edge of Arabia

That trust has been well placed. Thanks to Jameel’s guidance and financial resources, Edge of Arabia has been positioned to realize its artistic and commercial agendas. Between 2008 and 2013, the organization put on shows in London, Venice, Riyadh, Istanbul, Berlin, Dubai, and Jeddah.179 Edge of Arabia has also published a series of books that highlight its artists, including Gharem’s Art of Survival, which became the best-selling book on

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Middle Eastern art after it was published in 2011.180 The movement inspired Aarnout Helb, a Dutch artist, to establish in Amsterdam the Greenbox Museum of Contemporary Art from Saudi Arabia.181 Although the museum covers only a meager 70 square meters (750 square feet), it had more “likes” on Facebook in May 2013 than either the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City or the Louvre in Paris.182 Edge of Arabia has also effectively utilized social media, beginning with Facebook but extending as well to Instagram and Twitter. Instagram is an online platform that is especially well suited for promoting visual art. Twitter has helped to spark dialogue with a global audience. For example, the name of Edge of Arabia’s 2012 show in London was a Twitter hashtag: #Cometogether.183 One of the premier exhibits of the show was Gharem’s collage sculpture The Capitol Dome, a replica of the US capitol dome, 4 meters (13 feet) high, complete with a miniature version of Thomas Crawford’s bronze Statue of Freedom in front. Of course, Gharem’s piece differed in two critical ways from the actual Capitol dome in Washington, DC. First, Gharem’s Statue of Freedom is on the ground instead of on top of the dome and has a rope running around its neck like a noose. Second, his dome opens to reveal a golden mosque inside. Although Gharem told me that he hoped the piece would remind viewers of Egypt’s transition to democratic government in 2011 and 2012,184 he may also have meant to remind viewers of the 2008 controversy over Ṣirāṭ. It is worth noting that he inscribed the opening sura (chapter) of the Quran along the bottom edge of the mosque inside the Capitol dome—the same phrase that his critics alleged he was referring to in Ṣirāṭ. In March 2011, the commercial viability of Edge of Arabia was validated when an auction at the Dubai office of Christie’s sold six pieces for a total of more than $1 million. One piece alone, Gharem’s Message/Messenger, sold for over $800,000—a record for a work of art from the Middle East.185 Rather than keeping that vast sum, Gharem chose to donate the money to Edge of Arabia in order to advance arts education in the kingdom.186 Other major pieces by Edge of Arabia artists are now part of the permanent collections of the British Museum and the Los Angeles County Museum in southern California, as well as other major museums in Europe and North America.187 Since 2011, there has been little question that Edge of Arabia has established itself as both a domestic and a global force. However, the global success of Edge of Arabia has led to a fundamental question: What is the best way to reach the next stage of developing Saudi artists and transforming Saudi society? Stapleton and Jameel have responded to this question in five ways, by: opening a gallery in London that is specifically intended to promote the development of young Saudi artists; forming an association between the gallery and the British Royal Institute of Art; funding fellowships for Saudi artists to travel to North America; starting Cultu-

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runners, a program to partner Saudi artists with their counterparts in the United States; and creating a new art center in Jeddah under Jameel’s family foundation.188 The creation of the gallery in London in particular offers Saudi artists freedom from the restrictions in their kingdom and access to the thirdmost-important art market in the world after the United States and China.189

Beyond the Edge The Next Generation

Not all members of Edge of Arabia approve of establishing a gallery in London that is specifically for Saudi artists. Mater, in particular, believes that the gallery makes no sense. In his eyes, it only promotes a culture of artists as “superstars” on the world stage, thereby overlooking a key principle of the organization—that the social interaction of people in an art gallery is every bit as important as the art that is displayed. Mater has largely withdrawn from Edge of Arabia and is now concentrating on developing alternative spaces in Jeddah and elsewhere that are meant to spark dialogue and the creation of new art and culture.190 The timing of his decision was good, for it coincided with the political emergence of Prince Muhammad bin Salman, who has identified the arts as a pillar of Vision 2030, his plan to reform Saudi Arabia’s economy and society.191 Among the artists who have taken advantage of Mater’s and the prince’s new initiatives is Arwa al-Neami, Mater’s wife. Like her husband, Al-Neami was raised in Asir, identified art as her lifelong passion at a young age, and had to study a subject other than art in college.192 She had little interest in either of the subjects she studied, computing and management, but she found a ready home at the Al-Meftaha Arts Village, where, in 2004, she won the Southern Region Arts Award, a prestigious prize under the patronage of Prince Khaled al-Feisal, then the governor of Asir.193 Although Al-Neami struggled to have her work accepted in Asir, the artistic community in Jeddah loved her work, including Piece of Paradise, her photographic series on the Prophet’s Mosque in Medina. She has also done a popular photographic series on exquisitely decorated camels, and a wellregarded series on lipstick and women’s clothing, which stresses the sexuality of Saudi women, even when they are covered.194 But Al-Neami’s most successful series has been Never Never Land, which portrays Saudi women on various rides at Never Never Land, an amusement park in southern Saudi Arabia.195 The most provocative parts of the series are videos and photographs that show Saudi women driving bumper cars.196 As Al-Neami has noted, these images of bumper cars have drawn a fierce reaction, as they raise the subject of women driving197—for

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years one of the most sensitive issues in contemporary Saudi society before it was legalized in 2018.198 For his part, Gharem founded his own studio in Riyadh, in which he seeks to continue providing professional guidance, or his “mission,” to the next generation of visual artists.199 One of them, Gharem’s brother Ajlan, has created a number of works, including Paradise Has Many Gates, a metal cage (32 x 98 feet, or 10 x 30 meters) in the shape of a mosque, complete with rugs, which viewers are allowed to enter and explore. There is also a video of the cage—when it was temporarily erected in Riyadh— which shows Saudi men entering the mosque and praying. Some of the men are wearing the type of orange jumpsuits that are worn by the prisoners at the Guantanamo Bay Prison—but also (by deliberate ambiguity) by the men who clean the Grand Mosques in Mecca.201 That is left up to viewers to decide—a process that he hopes will bridge the gaps between the generations.200 Even more provocative are the works of Nugamshi, who implicitly blends tradition and modernity in large murals that consist of highly stylized Arabic calligraphy created with petroleum brushstrokes.202 He creates some of these pieces as performance art, making the creation and viewing of art a collective experience.203 By contrast, many of the women associated with Gharem’s studio— such as Sarah Abu Abdullah, Ahaad Alamoudi, Basmah Felemban, and Njoud Alanbari—focus on gender and the role of women in Saudi society.204 Among the most promising works to emerge from this group of women is Alanbari’s Elementary 240, which highlights, through a large pink mural and a seven-minute video, the gaps between what Saudi society preaches as truth and the highest ideals for women, on the one hand, and what young Saudi girls actually want, on the other.205 Not all artists, however, have been as successful as Alanbari at raising critical questions about the kingdom’s society without running afoul of their fellow Saudis and the government. Ashraf Fayadh, one of the original members of Šaẓīya, was arrested in 2013 for apostasy.206 Although he has produced some conceptual art, Fayadh is closely identified with poetry, in which he explores many of the same themes that appear in the conceptual art of Mater, Gharem, and others. In one poem, he wrote: This was what a leader of the people said: Whoever has oil can meet his needs from its by-products, which is far better than he who torches his eyes— and turns his own heart into a god.207

But society’s reaction to his poetry was very different from the public response to the work of his colleagues in Abha. In August 2013, Fayadh was arrested after Saudi authorities received a complaint “that he was cursing against Allah and the Prophet Muhammad, insulting Saudi Arabia, and distributing a book of his poems that promoted atheism.” 208 All of

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these charges carry severe penalties under Saudi law, and Fayadh’s situation was made still worse when images of women in public places were found on his personal cell phone.209 Fayadh argued that the accusations were the result of a professional disagreement with another artist, and the photographs were harmless, but Saudi authorities charged him with apostasy and sought the death penalty. Although an appeals court spared his life in March 2016, it upheld the conviction of apostasy and sentenced him to eight years in prison with 800 lashes.210 The response of Saudi society to the language in Fayadh’s poem confirmed Gharem’s observation that it is easy to “accuse” the author of a poem, especially in a country where the written word is central to cultural and religious identity. Whereas a graphic image can express multiple meanings, poetry and other forms of textual art offer few ways for artists to obfuscate their meanings and, in Gharem’s words, avoid taking sides. Al-Athr and the New Galleries

By the 2010s, Saudis who were not associated with Edge of Arabia began to build new institutions to promote the visual arts in the kingdom, especially in Jeddah and Riyadh. In Jeddah, a group of wealthy art patrons—the Athr family, Mohammed Hafiz, Hamza Serafi, Neama al-Sudairi, and others—opened galleries, developed new artistic talent, and pushed the boundaries of the kind of social change that only art can achieve. The earliest of this generation’s projects was the Al-Athr Gallery, which was founded in 2009 in Jeddah. The gallery’s owners and staff pioneered what became an industry model whereby a gallery finds new Saudi artists, pushes them to develop their work, and markets them to collectors. This is not an easy process, because opportunities for studying art are still limited in the kingdom, and the government programs do not pay for Saudis to study art abroad. Indeed, young artists are often forced to work with multiple private donors to raise the funds they need to study abroad.211 A talented new generation of Saudi artists has thrived in this environment. For example, Sami al-Turki, who is half Irish and half Saudi, has produced pieces on houses and construction crews that explore two of the most controversial issues facing the kingdom: imported workers and the soaring cost of housing in Saudi cities.212 In addition, the Al-Athr and the Al-Ayyam213 galleries signed and exhibited established Saudi artists such as Mater and Gharem.214 These galleries also achieved an unspoken social goal: breaking down the intellectual and physical barriers between men and women that had been imposed after 1979. That goal was largely in line with Mater’s ideas about the power of galleries as social spaces—even those that are hard to find. The Al-Athr Gallery is situated on the fifth floor of a nondescript,

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aging office tower. Although the building is adjacent to one of the largest malls in Jeddah’s wealthy shopping district on Taḥliya Street, the gallery is very difficult to find unless one has been there before. In fact, it took my experienced Jeddah cab driver nearly an hour and multiple phone calls to the gallery before he could find it.215 After it opened in 2011, the Al-Ayyam Gallery was also located in a similarly central but “hidden” location of a mall—and for good reason. Not only had religious216 and other authorities raided galleries and sought to control what was shown in them,217 but many of the new galleries also have a single entrance, which allows men and women to interact freely in the same physical space.218 Any other arrangement would have effectively created two galleries, but the choice challenged a social norm that has been in place since the early 1980s—the insistence that most private businesses and public facilities have separate entrances and separate physical spaces for single men and for families. Notably, the first art gallery in Riyadh, Al-Aāan, which opened in 2012 and was owned by two prominent Saudis, Neama al-Sudairi and Mohammed al-Sudairi, took this modernizing process a step further. It had one entrance at the front, an art gallery on its ground floor, and a restaurant upstairs—none of which were divided by gender. Even after Al-Aāan effectively withdrew from the gallery business,219 other galleries have opened nearby. They have one entrance for both genders, and their walls facing the street are even more transparent than those of Al-Aāan were. Whereas Al-Aāan had a long foyer between the street and its gallery and restaurant, the newer galleries have wide-open windows on their ground floor and nothing disguising the fact that women and men interact freely inside. In September 2013, at the Naila Art Gallery in Riyadh, men and women sat next to each other at the opening of the exhibit Unstitched.220 As the new art galleries emerged in Jeddah and Riyadh, a group of young professional Saudi women pioneered two initiatives that aimed to bring art to the masses and to the Eastern Province in particular. At the center of these initiatives was Raneen Bukhari, whose family’s art store in Khobar, Desert Designs, became the first art gallery in the Eastern Province and a major force in the country’s art scene. Like the other new art galleries in the kingdom, Desert Designs allowed men and women to enjoy art shows in the same gallery space simultaneously (see Photo 3).221 It was also situated in a space that was hard to find unless you had already visited it. Indeed, my driver, who had considerable experience in Khobar, had great difficulty finding it—and then succeeded only by accident. The first of Bukhari’s art initiatives, LOUD Art, emerged out of her partnership with Najla al-Suhaimi, who was also a young female professional from the Eastern Province.222 The two women aimed to revive the province’s art scene by encouraging the region’s diverse artists to experi-

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Photo 3. Desert Designs Gallery, Khobar, Saudi Arabia, May 5, 2017. Copyright © 2017 by Desert Designs. Courtesy Raneen Bukhari.

ment, engage in dialogues, and move beyond their chief medium of expression, abstract expression. LOUD Art immediately struck a chord in the Eastern Province, drawing 300 people to its first meeting in 2012.223 From the start, LOUD Art sought to democratize art galleries, long seen as elite spaces, through works that sold for $20 or $30, far below the prices found in other Saudi galleries. Over time, it created a new culture where, in Bukhari’s words, “anybody can attend . . . and everybody can buy.”224 This vision of broadening access to the arts, as we will see, would also be adopted by others in the kingdom, beginning with stand-up comedians. Still, the initial chief beneficiaries of this new egalitarian culture were artists from the Eastern Province. As Al-Suhaimi told Al-Waṭan newspaper in 2014, she and Bukhari were especially proud of the fact that LOUD Art had led to the sale of more than thirty works of art during its first year in existence.225 The second of Bukhari’s initiatives, Hunā Art (Art is here), aimed to broaden discussions of art and creativity through regular meetings that included both men and women—building on a successful series of public talks about art that had taken place in Jeddah. The initiative emerged out of a discussion between Bukhari and Najla Abdulla, a young female Saudi pop artist based in the Eastern Province. First held every other week in the Eastern Province, Hunā Art has subsequently been held in locations throughout

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the Gulf. The organization has also partnered with artists interested in publicizing their shows and creating virtual conversations about art through social media. Often Hunā Art provides artists with access to its Snapchat account, which has 10,000 followers, and allows them to give tours of their shows to Hunā Art’s followers online.226 This type of success, however, drew the interest of the Hai’a (or the socalled religious police), whose members visited the opening of a LOUD Art show in early 2016 as guests of Desert Designs. After Bukhari gave them a private tour of the show, they alleged that the show’s paintings contained subliminal messages, compelling the Ministry of the Interior to open an official investigation. However, the ministry’s investigators, after visiting the show, found no subliminal messages. In a clear sign of the diminished status of the Hai’a, whose members would lose the right to arrest Saudi citizens later in the year,227 the ministry’s investigators cleared Desert Designs of all suspicion, allowing the show and the LOUD Art initiative to continue. In recalling the incident, Bukhari told Khaleejesque, an online Gulf culture and lifestyle magazine: “It happens. People complain, there are repercussions, and checks. Then it’s all over and done with.”228 Arrested for Art

The second decade of the twenty-first century has seen the emergence of a series of Saudi artists in the kingdom and beyond who do not fit neatly into the model of either Edge of Arabia or the artists emerging from Al-Athr and other galleries. These artists have largely been educated abroad, and some come from wealthy Saudi families. Three of these artists are worthy of note: Ms. Saffa, Abdullah Qandeel, and Lina Gazzaz. In 2012, the Saudi artist known as Ms. Saffa was living in Australia, where she was finishing her degree in arts at the University of Sydney. Born and raised in Saudi Arabia, she had moved abroad when she was eighteen and had become a printmaker and a street artist. Then, in her early thirties, she was, in her own words, “humiliated” when Saudi authorities repeatedly demanded that she live with a male guardian—a husband, father, brother, or son—and that he supervise her life in Australia.229 In response, Ms. Saffa created a Twitter hashtag, “Anā_Walīya_Amrī# (#IAmMyOwnGuardian),” thereby linking herself with the burgeoning Saudi women’s rights movement, especially to Manal al-Sharif and other female activists who were advocating for women to have the right to drive. Ms. Saffa then created images of Saudi women wearing a male headdress, which she publicized through Instagram, Twitter, and other social media sites to great effect. Her posters have been plastered on Saudi streets, earning her fierce pushback and vicious harassment on social media.230 She has reinforced her message with social media posts and re-posts, including ones

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by Western scholars who have criticized the Saudi government’s decision to arrest female activists in May 2018.231 On the one hand, Ms. Saffa sees art as a vehicle of self-expression, which allows her to assert that she and other Saudi women have a voice of their own and do not need Western feminists to save them. On the other hand, she shares a key goal with other Saudi artists—namely, to get people talking. As she told Newshour, the PBS nightly news show, “I think that my work has instigated a lot of conversation about what is feminine and what is power.”232 Another Saudi artist whose actions abroad have sparked conversation online in Saudi Arabia is Abdullah Qandeel, whose large, colorful neoexpressionist works look very different from the work of other Saudi artists. The muralist made headlines in 2016 both for winning the kingdom’s highest arts honor and for defaming luxury hotels in London and New York City, which prompted him to tell journalists, “I feel happy that people got to see a Muslim arrested for art, and not terrorism.”233 Qandeel’s path to professional success is certainly unique among Saudi artists. The scion of a wealthy Jeddah family with economic and familial links from the United States to Japan, he spent much of his life abroad, first in Great Britain. There, starting at age ten, he attended boarding school, excelling in his studies and in sports—despite facing harassment for being a Muslim Arab. After studying at Sandhurst, he moved to Lawrence, Kansas, where his aunt lived with her husband, Jeffrey Lang, a prominent American convert to Islam, who teaches in the University of Kansas Mathematics Department.234 But Qandeel never fit in there, failing his art class at the University of Kansas and eventually relocating to New York City in 2011 with just $200 to his name.235 In the Big Apple, Qandeel, who had already begun to post his paintings on social media, was discovered at a party by Safia El Malequi, a EuroSaudi socialite. El Malequi was impressed with Divorce, Qandeel’s first painting, which he created after his parents had separated. After seeing an image of the painting on the home screen of Qandeel’s cell phone, El Malequi invited him to do a show at her gallery in Monte Carlo, which jumpstarted his career. Soon thereafter, he met a wealthy backer, Karim Karaman.236 By 2014, his paintings were being sold by Sotheby’s.237 He was also influenced by New York’s art scene and the works of men such as Julian Schnabel, a Jewish American neo-expressionist painter.238 During this time, Qandeel also worked with Jewish Americans, including those at the Burning Man Arts Festival, which led to two works in 2012 and 2014, both entitled Burning Man.239 He also worked with young members of the Saudi royal family, many of whom have taken on key positions in government after King Salman ascended to the throne in 2015.240 A good example is Prince Bader bin Abdullah bin Mohammed bin Farhan al-Saud, who, in June 2018, became the Saudi minister of culture. 241 Six months

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earlier, Prince Bader gained worldwide fame when the New York Times named him as the mystery buyer of Leonardo da Vinci’s Salvator Mundi, a painting then valued at over $450 million.242 Qandeel, who is still in his twenties, frames his art career and his work as combating extremism and promoting the goals of Vision 2030. He envisions creating a Bedouin-style center in the desert backed by a $2-billion endowment where Saudis can secure investments and assistance in creating artistic and other creative projects to help the country. Although he sees himself as part of the Saudi artistic movement started by Gharem and Mater and others, he has refused to join a collective of artists or be represented by an art gallery. As he told Vice magazine: “It’s my work. I write the rules here; that’s why I’m an artist.”243 Not surprisingly, his career goal is similarly individually based—namely, to become the top artist in the world by the age of thirty-five or forty. In the long run, he hopes his success will inspire young Saudis to see that they too can create world-class art and become international celebrities.244 Finally, Lina Gazzaz is a Jeddah native whose family traces its roots throughout the Middle East and the Mediterranean. Thanks to her family’s independent wealth, Gazzaz was able to study art in the United States. (Her brothers run the Ferrari dealership in Jeddah, and her father was one of the earliest Saudi geologists.) She has used that education to blend Western abstract art with her commitment to social activism for Saudi women, while conveying her total faith in Islam. For her, art is a tool that—much like religion—allows an individual to see a wider picture of their world and place in it: “Art is my tool,” she explains “to allow the viewer to see beyond our objective conceptualization of reality, revealing the complexity imperceptible by our senses.”245 Whereas many Saudi artists have juggled the two roles of artist and educated professional, Gazzaz balances three: as an activist for women, an artist, and a religious scholar. Notably, her view of the role of art could also be applied to religion.246 Conclusion By the second decade of the twenty-first century, Saudi officials had come to see the Saudi Arts Movement as a tool both to transform the kingdom’s society and to transform how the rest of the world views Saudis. To begin with, the movement could be used to facilitate meetings with world leaders—as was done with Muhammad bin Salman’s visit to Beijing in September 2016, during which Mater gave Chinese president Xi a painting that celebrates Sino-Saudi ties.247 Nine months later, Mater and other artists hosted a show for Donald Trump. His work was also part of an exhibit celebrating King Salman’s official visit to Moscow in October 2017.248

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In the long run, however, Saudi artists may be most useful for promoting cultural ties between Saudi Arabia and other societies around the world. In December 2017, MiSK announced that it was founding an institute to promote “grassroots cultural production, diplomacy and exchange” in both Riyadh and at a reopened Al-Meftaha Arts Village in Abha.249 In both 2016 and 2017, the Saudi government, in partnership with Culturunners and other private Saudi arts organizations, promoted a series of single-artist and group exhibits throughout the United States. One of the most important of those events, which was held at the Smithsonian Museum’s Sackler Gallery in Washington, DC, featured Mater’s work. Entitled Cities of Pharon, the exhibit showcased recent videos, paintings, photographs, and interviews. Drawing on his training as a physician, Mater assesses the civic health of Mecca and, by extension, all of Saudi society. With the influx of oil revenues and, more important, the movement of tens of thousands of Saudis from the country’s frontiers to Mecca and the other booming central cities, the kingdom as a whole has undergone enormous change since the 1970s.250 Mater went to great pains in his work to examine “every aspect of life in Mecca” by objectively abandoning his “own preoccupations and beliefs.”251 As he noted to the pan-Arabic daily As-Šarq Al-Ausaṭ in March 2016, approaching Mecca objectively is not an easy task, for the city is symbolic and paradoxical—simultaneously, in Mater’s words, “the most visited city in the world and the most private.”252 Throughout the series, one sees visual images of every part of Mecca’s life, from hotel rooms that cost $3,000 a night to the crowded accommodations for foreign workers and street cleaners. The viewer constantly encounters serious matters presented with humor. For instance, Mater highlights the municipal symbol of Mecca, which features a bulldozer and columns from an Ottoman-era fortress253—allowing the viewer to see the irony in the fact that the city regularly makes headlines by demolishing historic buildings, including the very fort pictured on the city seal.254 By exploring such issues, Mater seeks to view society from the level of the grass roots—or, as he has written, “to tap into the questions that preoccupy contemporary Saudis.”255 In his eyes, the most important of these questions concern “authenticity, identity, a sense of time, place, [and] belonging.”256 As Mater asks, “What is it that we belong to . . . and are the people reflected in the way our society is run?”257 Indeed, these are the type of apolitical and political matters that we expect an organic intellectual like this Saudi artist to explore through the language of culture. Perhaps no work of Mater’s exhibit better embodies these questions for the kingdom than Television—a painting that features multiple mirages, or surrealistic images, in a desert setting. In the foreground, there is a TV set, five or six Bedouin coffee cups, and a woman reclining on a couch. Behind her there is a man leading a donkey, flanked by a modern highway and a

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single white car that is driving away from the viewer. In the background, we see telephone poles, a cube-like structure, mountains, and the moon. Together they illustrate the forces that shaped Saudi Arabia’s transition from a poor, traditional, rural society in the 1960s to the urban and technologically advanced society of today. Whereas Saudis once only entertained themselves in a majlis while drinking coffee and traveled with donkeys, today they watch television, drive cars, and use electricity. Yet memories of the past persist in Saudi society. What do these various contexts have to do with one another? It is up to the observer, the individual Saudi with all his or her history, to create the links that connect these various elements to one another. Mater challenges his viewers to become artists themselves—to create the deep connections at which he only hints. We are dealing here with collage, certainly, but collage that becomes collision, and finally an unexpected harmony. In a sense, the work is chordal—functioning as a chord does in music. Various elements, harmonious and dissonant, are all present and in touch with one another. They exist as fundamental, culturedefining questions: What does it mean to be Saudi? And what does it mean to have all these elements in simultaneous, conscious insistence? Mater’s ability to produce such a powerful juxtaposition with great confidence and without any embarrassment says much about him personally as an artist, but it also provides insight into what we might learn from his exhibit and his country. During this era of the “political outsider,” vexing existential questions have come to define electoral processes in many countries, forcing people to choose between seemingly incompatible conceptions of national identity and worldview. By contrast, and perhaps surprisingly, Mater and other Saudi visual artists are used to negotiating simultaneously in wildly disparate contexts, which many in the West and some in the Middle East may find contradictory, but which the Saudi visual artists experience as part of the multiple faces of reality. In an interview conducted in 2014 with the Huffington Post, Mater stated, “It is more interesting to be an artist surrounded by challenges like ours than to be an artist surrounded by too much choice and unrestricted opportunity. . . . Now the contemporary artists are re-imagining this place.”258 Notes 1. “Šāhad al-Malik Salmān wa Ar-Ra’īs Trāmb yazrūrān Ma‘riḍ al-Fann alMu‘āṣir,” Al-Arabiya, May 20, 2017, http://bit.ly/2y8Kjig. 2. Anas al-Yousef, “‘Al-Fann al-Mu‘āṣir . . . ’ Litaqwīm al-mufāhīm wa Taṣḥīḥ al-Inṭibā‘āt,” Okāẓ, May 21, 2017, www.okaz.com.sa/article/1548301. 3. “Šāhad al-Malik Salmān wa Ar-Ra’īs Trāmb yazrūrān Ma‘riḍ al-Fann al-Mu‘ṣir.” 4. Superstorm Wave (@Superstorm Wave), “Jaula lilā‘hil as-Sa‘ūdīyī al-Malik Salmān bin ‘Abd al-‘Azīz wa aR-Ra’īs al-Amrīkī Dūnāld Trāmb dāḵil ma‘riḍ al-

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fann al-Mu‘āṣir” (from Al Jazeera TV), YouTube video, May 20, 2017, www .youtube.com/watch?v=s6JaDb84kp8; and Mohammed Jarrah, “What Did Trump Tell This Saudi Artist When They Met in Riyadh?” Al-Arabiya, May 25, 2017, http://english.alarabiya.net. 5. This is the Ritz-Carlton made famous in November 2017 when thirty elite Saudis were arrested on charges of corruption and confined in the hotel. Martin Chulov, “How Saudi Elite Became Prisoners at the Riyadh Ritz-Carlton,” Guardian, November 6, 2017. 6. Gareth Harris, “The Art Donald Trump Saw During His State Visit to Saudi Arabia,” Art Newspaper, May 22, 2017, and MiSK (@MiskKSA), “Ḍuyūf #MiskTweeps yatajūlūnu fī Ma‘riḍ al-Fannī al-Muṣāhab lmultaqa wa al-Muqaddam bida‘man min @GE_A.,” Twitter, May 21, 2016, https://twitter.com/MiskKSA/status /866281444972400641. 7. For example, see this tweet from @beshdon, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, May 20, 2017: #Riyadh_Summit “Trump visited the exhibit of contemporary Saudi art and interacted with each artist and commented on their work. It was something beautiful and wonderful and points to the next stage in culture and art.” ! Abd Rahman (@beshdon), “Jaula Trāmb fī Ma‘riḍ al-Fann as-Sa‘ūdīyī al-Mu‘ṣir, wa saraḥa kull fannān Sa‘ūdī li‘am‘ālahi, šai’ jamīl wa rā’iḥ wa yadullu ‘alā tawajuhu ad-Duwalhu al-Qādim fī aṯ-Ṯaqāfa wa al-Fann,” Twitter, May 20, 1997, https://twitter.com/beshdon/status/865914006099439616. 8. Hanna al-Kahlout, “Trāmb fī ma‘riḍ al-Fann as-Sa‘ūdīyī . . . māḍā arādt arRiyāḍ an tuwṣil lahu?” Alkhaleejonline, May 21, 2017, http://alkhaleejonline.net. 9. Elizabeth Dickinson, “Q & A: Saudi Nonprofit MiSK Paves the Way for Youth,” Devex, May 8, 2017, www.devex.com. 10. Game Changers 2030, episode 2, “Ahmed Mater,” Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, on CNBC, www.cnbc.com. 11. Ibid. 12. Ahmed Mater, “CEO MiSK Art Institute,” LinkedIn, June 2018, www.linkedin .com/in/dr-ahmed-mater-ab594193/. 13. Katie Paul and William MacLean, “Saudi Entertainment Chief Sees Cinemas Returning, Eventually,” Reuters, April 28, 2017, http://reuters.com. 14. Author in conversation with Rajaa A. al-Sanea, Saudi novelist, December 2013. 15. Al-Rasheed, A Most Masculine State, 227–230; and Abdulaziz al-Fahad, “Raiders and Traders: A Poet’s Lament on the End of the Bedouin Heroic Age,” in Saudi Arabia in Transition, ed. Bernard Haykel, Stéphane Lacroix, and Thomas Hegghammer (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015), 231–262. 16. Henry Hemming, Abdulnasser Gharem: Art of Survival (London: BoothClibborn Editions, 2011), 129. 17. Chris Dercon, “Ahmed Mater, Doctor and Artist: A Manifesto for Saudi Art,” April 2013, www.ahmedmater.com/copy-of-linda-komaroff. 18. Ibid. 19. Ahmed Mater, Desert of Pharan (Baden, Switzerland: Lars Müller, 2016), 577. 20. Deborah Amos, “A New Generation of Saudi Artists Pushes the Boundaries,” NPR All Things Considered, February 6, 2016, www.npr.org. 21. Dercon, “Ahmed Mater, Doctor and Artist.” 22 Author in conversation with Adnan Manjal, January 2014. 23. Al-Jundabi, “Ahmed Māṭar: Al-Fann tajāwaz ‘al-Ḵāma’.” 24. Specifically, Mater says: “Mā Baina ḏātīya wa al-Mauḍū‘īya yaḵaraj al-Fann.” Here Mater is alluding to the ideas of Stephen David Ross, who has written that “art

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involves both subjectivity and objectivity and the interplay between them.” Mater, “Ahmed Māṭar: Al-Fann tajāwaz ‘al-Ḵāma’” and Stephen David Ross, A Theory of Art: Inexhaustibility by Contrast (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1982), 46. 25. For more on this concept of art and how it is changing, see the ideas of David Joselit. In his book After Art, Joselit examines the shift away from the “modern” conception of art, which defines the meaning and the power of images by looking at how and where individual artists produce them. In place of that conception, a new global definition of art has emerged in the twenty-first century in which the meaning and the power of an image are no longer defined by creator or place of origin. Instead, the meaning is determined collectively by people who view it after it has entered global social networks. David Joselit, After Art (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2012), 87–89. 26. Abdulnasser Gharem, Twitter handle, January 12, 2017, https://twitter.com /abdulnasserghar?lang=en. 27. Hemming, Abdulnasser Gharem: Art of Survival, 129. 28. Specifically, he said: “Al-Fannān al-al’an nāšiṭ siyāsī wa ijtimā‘ī.” Mater, “Ahmed Māṭar: Al-Fann tajāwaz ‘al-Ḵāma’.” 29. Karen Elliot House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines—and Future (New York: Knopf, 2012), vvii, 37, and 57. 30. Ibid., 57. 31. See Rory Miller, Desert Kingdoms to Global Powers: The Rise of the Arab Gulf (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2016), 217–218; and Danforth, Crossing the Kingdom, 91–97. 32. Game Changers 2030, episode 2, “Ahmed Mater.” 33. T. E. Lawrence, The Seven Pillars of Wisdom (New York: Anchor Books/ Doubleday, 1926), 38. 34. Abdulsalam al-Wayel, “‘An iḥtiqārna al-Fann . . . fauz Muhammad ‘Asaf baina al-Ḥaḍif wa al-Ḡabaran,” As-Šarq, June 29, 2013, www.alsharq.net. 35. Michael Cook, Commanding Right and Forbidding Wrong, 2nd ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 166. 36. Even Saudis who buy art are looked on with disdain, as Lucie Ryzova has observed in her research on Egyptian art dealers. “For Egyptian art dealers,” Ryzova noted, “the Gulf clients are the villains—the ‘bad’ guys who have no history.’” Lucie Ryzova, “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: Collector, Dealer, and Academic in the Old-Paper Markets in Cairo,” in Archives, Museums and Collecting Practices in the Modern Arab World, ed. Sonja Mejcher-Atassi and John Pedro Schwartz (Surrey, England: Ashgate, 2012), 103. 37. Author in conversation with Egyptian in Asir, November 2013. 38. Saad Albazei, “Tension in the House: The Contemporary Poetry of Arabia,” World Literature Today 75, no. 2 (Spring 2001): 274. 39. Sultan al-Qassemi, “Correcting Misconceptions of the Gulf’s Modern Art Movement,” Al-Monitor, November 22, 2013, http://sultanalqassemi.com. 40. Author in conversation with Sultan al-Qassemi, November 2013. 41. Feldman, “Taking It to the Street.” 42. Tariq Ali, “A Farewell to Munif: Patriarch of Arab Literature,” www.library .cornell.edu. 43. Abdelrahman Munif, Cities of Salt, trans. Peter Theroux (New York: Vintage Books, 1989). 44. “Abdul Rahman Munif, 71, political novelist,” New York Times, February 2, 2004.

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45. Notably, one of the most famous criticisms of the book—Amitav Ghosh’s 1992 review essay in the New Republic—asserts that Munif’s ending for the first part of the trilogy, in which “traditional” forces expel the “modern” forces in the oil region, was unbelievable—even in a literary context. In Ghorash’s eyes, it is impossible to imagine a context in which Arab “traditional” forces could defeat a modern Gulf monarchy funded by oil. Amitav Ghosh, “Petrofiction: The Oil Encounter and the Novel,” New Republic 206, no. 2, March 2, 1992: 29–34. 46. Paul Aarts and Carolien Roelants, Saudi Arabia: A Kingdom in Peril (London: Hurst, 2014), 92. 47. Rufus Burrow, Extremist for Love: Martin Luther King, Man of Ideas and Nonviolent Social Action (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2014), 42. 48. Specifically, the shaikh says: “Qāla al-Nabīy . . . ‘fī ši’r, hunāka ḥikma.’” Ibn Baz, “What About the Degree of Authenticity of the Hadith: ‘Singing Is the Traveler’s Supply’?” in Fatwas of Ibn Baz, vol. 26, Book on Hadith, Second Section, Book on Hadith Mawdu`, Degree of Authenticity of Hadith: Singing Is the Traveler’s Supply, http://bit.ly/2rIFjzb. 49. For instance, as noted above, in Ibn Baz’s fatwa on “Authenticity of the Hadith,” he notes, “The Prophet Muhammad . . . said, ‘In poetry, there is wisdom.’” Ibn Baz, “What About the Degree of Authenticity of the Hadith: ‘Singing Is the Traveler’s Supply?” 50. Saad Albazei, “Introduction,” in Saad Albazei, ed., New Voices of Arabia: The Poetry. An Anthology from Saudi Arabia (London: I. B. Tauris, 2012), xii. 51. Albazei, “Tension in the House,” 267–268. 52. Albazei, “Introduction,” xii–xiii. 53. Albazei, “Tension in the House,” 271. 54. Ibid. 55. Ibid. 56. Ibid., 272–273. 57. Thuraya al-Arrayed, Aina ittijāh as-Šajar (Riyadh: Muhafiza as-Shura, 1995). 58. Author in conversation with Thuraya al-Arrayed, November 2013 and December 2013. 59. The title is also a tongue-in-cheek reference to Yes Minister, the famous British television sitcom about the life of senior bureaucrats and politicians in Whitehall. 60. “Ibrāhim Ḵafājī . . . wāḍi‘ an-našīd al-Waṭanī Sa‘ūdīyī,” Mausū‘a al-Jazīra, March 6, 2016, http://bit.ly/1R4wPt0. 61. Ibid. 62. Trevor Mostyn, “Ghazi al-Gosaibi Obituary: Saudi Politician and Poet Known for His Modernizing Spirit,” Guardian, August 24, 2010. 63. Lisa Urkevich, Music and Traditions of the Arabian Peninsula: Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, and Qatar (London: Palgrave, 2015), ix and 7. 64. Al-Wayel, “‘An iḥtiqārna al-Fann.” 65. Ibn Baz, “What About the Degree of Authenticity of the Hadith.” 66. Urkevich, Music and Traditions of the Arabian Peninsula, 6–7. 67. Dana Adams Schmidt, “Saudis Expunge a Popular Image,” New York Times, May 13, 1962. 68. H. St. J. B. Philby, Saʻudi Arabia (New York: Arno Press, 1972), 347. 69. Urkevich, Music and Traditions of the Arabian Peninsula, 248–249. 70. Hussein Shobokshi, “Farewell Tariq Abdul-Hakim,” Asharq al-Awsat, February 27, 2012.

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71. The school was later moved to Riyadh, where it still exists today. Following the first visit of the U.S. Army Band to Riyadh, in 2016, Colonel Sultan al-Moneeh, the director of the Saudi Land Forces Music Department, said, “Music has no borders. I believe that it brings people together and encourages them to bond and work collectively through cultural differences.” Sergeant Aaron Ellerman, “A ‘Note’ Worthy Engagement,” U.S. Army, September 30, 2016, www.army.mil. 72. Urkevich, Music and Traditions of the Arabian Peninsula, 248–249. 73. Ibid. 74. John A. Shoup, “Music: Traditional and Contemporary,” in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States Today, 2 vols., ed. Sebastian Maisel and John A. Shoup (Westport: Greenwood, 2009), 315–317. 75. Ibid. 76. Urkevich, Music and Traditions of the Arabian Peninsula, 257. 77. Ibid. 78. ‘Alī Maṭīr, “Muhammad Abdu . . . Riḥla min ibḥār baina damū‘ ‘salma’ wa ibtisāmāt dalāl,” As-Šharq Al-Ausaṭ, April 22, 2005, http://archive.aawsat.com. 79. Ibid. 80. Mohammed Jarrah, “Saudi Stars Rabeh Saqer, Khalid Abdulrahman to Hold Concert in Riyadh,” Al-Arabiya, March 27, 2017, https://english.alarabiya.net. 81. Maṭīr, “Muhammad Abdu . . . Riḥla min ibḥār baina damū‘ ‘salma’ wa ibtisāmāt dalāl.” 82. Shoup, “Music: Traditional and Contemporary,” 315–317. 83. For more on these concerts, see Mohammed al-Sulamil, “‘Artist of the Arabs,’ Mohamed Abdu Enchants Jeddah in Rare Gig,” Arab News, January 31, 2017, and Agence France-Presse, “Long-Awaited Concert Music to Saudi Ears,” Arab News, March 11, 2017. 84. Prince Walid bin Talal was one of the thirty prominent Saudis arrested in November 2017 and confined in the Riyadh Ritz-Carlton. Martin Chulov, “Royal Purges Send Shockwaves Through Saudi Elites,” Guardian, November 5, 2017. 85. Laith Ulaby, “Mass Media and Music in the Arab Persian Gulf,” in Music and Media in the Arab World, ed. Michael Frishkopf (Cairo: The American University in Cairo Press, 2010), 121. 86. Abdulaziz Ashour, “Introduction: The Intellectual Discourse in Saudi Art,” in Saudi Artists Today, comp. Abdulaziz Ashour (Jeddah, Saudi Arabia: Al-Mohtaraf, 2011), 11–19. 87. Ibid. 88. For more on Muhammad Salim’s ideas, including what an Arab art critic referred to as his “personal style,” see Muhammad Salim, “A Word for the Sake of Art (1976),” in Modern Art in the Arab World: Primary Documents, ed. Anneka Lenssen, Sarah Rogers, and Nada Shabout (New York: Museum of Modern Art, 2018), 413–414, and Muhammad Salim, “Exhibition Statement (1976),” in Modern Art in the Arab World: Primary Documents, ed. Lenssen, Rogers, and Shabout, 414. 89. Still, as Saudi art historian Maha Alsenan rightly points out, female Saudi artists faced more challenges than their male counterparts did during this period. For more, see Maha Alsenan, “Considerations on Society Through Saudi Women’s Art,” International Journal of Development Research 5, no. 5 (May 2015): 4537–4538. 90. Ashour, “Introduction,” 13. 91. Abdullah Qandeel, “Why Abdullah Qandeel Is Saudi Arabia’s Unlikely Arts Savior,” interview by Karim Khan, i-DVice, April 23, 2016, https://i-d.vice.com. 92. To see multiple examples of their work, see Maha Alsenan, Mu’aṯṯirāt ArRawīya fī At-Taṣwīr Taškilī As-Sa‘ūdī Al-Mu‘āṣir (Riyadh, Saudi Arabia: Dār As-

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Ṣaḥāfa lidi‘āya wa Al-‘Ālān, 2007). Notably, Alsenan breaks down these artists into four generations, beginning with those born in the 1930s and 1940s. 93. ‘Abdullah ibn Qa`ud, ‘Abdullah ibn Ghudayyan, ‘Abdul-Razzaq ‘Afify, and ‘Abdulaziz ibn ‘Abdullah ibn Baz, “What Is the Islamic Position on Sculpture, Classical Paintings, and Abstract Art?” Fatwas of the Permanent Committee, group 1, vol. 1: ‘Aqidah (part no. 1, p. no. 696), www.alifta.com/Fatawa/Fatwaprint.aspx ?languagename=en&id=389&BookID=7§ionid=. 94. Judith Miller, “Reporter’s Notebook: Saudis See Dangers in Art and Mixed Bathing,” New York Times, October 23, 1983, accessed via ProQuest Historical Newspaper: The New York Times (1851–2009). 95. See the pictures of Abdullah al-Shaikh, Abdulaziz Ashour, Mohammed Farea, Mohammed al-Ghamdi, Fahad al-Hajilan, Zaman Jassim, Abdullah al-Marzook, and Monira Mosly. Saudi Artists Today, comp. Abdulaziz Ashour (Jeddah, Saudi Arabia: Al-Mohtaraf, 2011), 23, 28–29, 41, 59, 72–73, 88–89, 124–125, 149, 155, and 161. 96. Author in conversation with Stephen Stapleton, March 2014. 97. Author in conversation with Saleh Mohammed al-Gothami, January 2014; author in conversation with Abdu Mabrook, January 2014; and author’s field notes from visit to Unaizah, Qassim, January 2014. 98. Al-Gothami, conversation; Mabrook, conversation; and author’s field notes from visit to Unaizah, Qassim, January 2014. 99. Author in conversation with Abdulaziz S. A. al-Mathami, October 2013; author in conversation with Ali Ibrahim Fageeh, October 2013. 100. For more on the importance of Saudis from the southern part of the kingdom in the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, see Thomas Hegghammer, Jihad in Saudi Arabia: Violence and Pan-Islamism Since 1979 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), 131–132. 101. Author’s field notes from visit to Al-Waṭan Newspaper, October 2013. 102. That anger is in part why the newspaper is housed in an unmarked office building and protected by private security guards. 103. For more on his career at Al-Waṭan and use of humor to advance his positions, see “Obituary: Jamal Khashoggi,” The Economist, October 27, 2018, www.economist.org. 104. Al-Mathami, conversation, and author in conversation with Majed Mohammad al-Bassam, October 2013. 105. Author in conversation with Abdulnasser Gharem, August 2013. 106. Hasan Āl ‘Āmir, “Taṭall‘āt l-istiṯmār ṯaqāfī qablu iḡlāq abwāb al-Meftaha,” Al-Waṭan, August 6, 2015 107. Author’s field notes from visit to Al-Meftaha arts village, October 2013. 108. Ibid. 109. Both women studied art in the United States and have partnered with leading Saudi arts organizations. Author in conversation with member of the Saudi art community, October 2018. 110. David Calverley-Morris, “People Weren’t Ready for Us,” Esquire Magazine, September 2013, 125. 111. Jasmine Bager, “I’m a Young Saudi Journalist: Jamal Khashoggi’s Disappearance Will Not Silence Us,” Time, October 19, 2018, www.time.com. 112. Min as-Ṣifr (@MinAlsefer), “Abdalnasser Gharem: Qaryat al-Miftāḥa atTaškīlīa kānt Manba‘ lilṭāqāt al-Fikrīa wa al-Fannīa, #min_as-Ṣifr, #‘Abd Nasser _Gharem_fī_As-Ṣifr, @Mofeed_n,” Tweet, June 17, 2017, https://twitter.com/Min Alsefer/status/876233012689514496. 113. Hemming, Abdulnasser Gharem: Art of Survival, 38–53; and Gharem, conversation.

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114. US poet Jack Spicer expressed this vision of art in his poem Imaginary Elegies: “Poet /Be like God.” For more on this poem, see Lewis Ellingham and Kevin Killian, Poet Be Like God: Jack Spicer and the San Francisco Renaissance (Hanover, NH: Wesleyan University Press, 1998), ix. 115. Hemming, Abdulnasser Gharem: Art of Survival, 38–53, and Gharem, conversation. 116. Ibid. 117. For more on this concept, see Marshall McLuhan’s groundbreaking 1962 text, Guttenberg Galaxy: The Making of Typographic Man (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1962). 118. Author in conversation with Ahmed Mater, January 2014. 119. Calverley-Morris, “People Weren’t Ready for Us,” 126. 120. Ibid. 121. Aimee Dawson, “Saudi Artist Abdulnasser Gharem to Have First Solo US Show at Lacma,” Art Newspaper, March 8, 2017. 122. Abdulnasser Gharem (@abdulnasserghar), “Sometimes when you become a mirror as an artist and you show your society who they are, they get upset,” Tweet, June 29, 2017, https://twitter.com/abdulnasserghar/status/880382635 570233346. 123. As multiple Saudi artists noted to me, red lines were far from clear, but there was universal agreement that the authorities and society would react negatively if a work of art directly insulted the state. In 2016, Ahmed Omran and Margherita Stancati explained in a Wall Street Journal article on Saudi artists that “taboos include nudity, anything that insults the state or Islam, and sculptures of living beings.” Ahmed Omran and Margherita Stancati, “Bold Contemporary-Arts Scene Emerges in Saudi Arabia,” Wall Street Journal, March 15, 2016. 124. Gharem, conversation, and Hemming, Abdulnasser Gharem: Art of Survival, 32–37 and 187–188. 125. Gharem, conversation. 126. Gharem, conversation. 127. Game Changers 2030, episode 2, “Ahmed Mater.” 128. Dercon, “Ahmed Mater, Doctor and Artist.” 129. Athr Gallery, Yellow Cow Poster 2010 (Jeddah, Saudi Arabia: Athr Gallery, 2010), www.athrart.com. 130. Ibid. 131. Aarnoult Helb, “Yellow Cow: Performance,” in Ahmed Mater, ed. Edward Booth-Clibborn (London: Booth-Clibborn Editions, 2010), 124–143. 132. Robert C. Benchley, “For President: George M. Cohan,” Life 76, no. 2 (1920): 680. 133. Mater, conversation. 134. Ibid. 135. Stephen Stapleton, “Ibn Aseer,” in Ahmed Mater, ed. Edward BoothClibborn (London: Booth-Clibborn Editions, 2010), 19. 136. For more on her photography, see Adnan Manjal, “Keep Your Abaya Inside the Ride at All Times,” Hyperallergic, December 22, 2014, http://hyperallergic.com. 137. Stapleton, “Ibn Aseer,” 19. 138. Karim Shalaby, “Kingdom of Saudi Arabia,” in From Charity to Social Change: Trends in Arab Philanthropy, ed. Barbara Lethem Ibrahim and Dina H. Sherif (Cairo: American University in Cairo Press, 2008), 72. 139. Stephen Stapleton, “Border Crossing,” in Edge of Arabia, ed. Stephen Stapleton and Edward Booth-Clibborn (London: Booth-Clibborn Editions, 2012), 23. 140. Stapleton, conversation.

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141. Stapleton, conversation, and Al Braithwaite, Henry Hemming, Stephen Stapleton, and Georgie Weedon, Off Screen: Four Young Artists in the Middle East (London: Booth-Clibborn Editions, 2004), 31–38. 142. Stapleton, conversation. 143. Bager, “I’m a Young Saudi Journalist.” 144. Anna Sommers Cocks, “Do Not Penalize Saudi Arabian Artists for the Murder of Jamal Khashoggi,” The Art Newspaper, October 30, 2018, https://www .theartnewspaper.com/comment/do-not-penalise-saudi-arabian-artists-for-the-murder -of-jamal-khashoggi. 145. Stapleton, conversation. 146. Lawrence, The Seven Pillars of Wisdom, 38. 147. “A Long Way from Slough,” Telegraph, June 8, 2004, www.telegraph.co.uk. 148. Braithwaite, Hemming, Stapleton, and Weedon, Off Screen, 31–38. 149. Stephen Stapleton, Facebook Instant Message to the author, June 9, 2018. 150. In September 2014, Stapleton told Art Media Agency, “Before starting Edge of Arabia I felt rejected by the existing art institution—as the generation after the YBA [Young British Artists], I didn’t feel the art scene in the UK was a centre of energy that I wanted to focus on.” Stephen Stapleton, “The Edge of Middle East Art: An Interview with Stephen Stapleton,” interview by Art Media Agency, September 10, 2014, http://en.artmediaagency.com. 151. Stapleton, conversation; and Maryam Bilal and Stephen Stapleton, “Maryam Bilal and Stephen Stapleton—Edge of Arabia,” filmed January 2012 in Jeddah, Saudi Arabiaf TEDx Arabia video, 13:38 min., www.youtube.com. 152. Stapleton, conversation; Mater, conversation; Hemming, Abdulnasser Gharem: Art of Survival, 42–43. 153. Viviano, “Kingdom on Edge: Saudi Arabia.” 154. Stapleton, “Border Crossing,” 23. 155. Stapleton, conversation. 156. Mater, conversation. 157. Ibid. 158. Bilal and Stapleton, “Maryam Bilal and Stephen Stapleton—Edge of Arabia.” 159. Stapleton, conversation. 160. Author in conversation with Manal al-Dowayan, November 2013. 161. Stapleton, conversation. 162. Catriona Davies, Rima Maktabi, and Aroub Abdelhaq, “How to Rebel Saudi Style,” CNN, March 23, 2012, www.cnn.com. 163. For examples of his artwork, including Vader and the Delegation, see “Shaweesh,” http://edgeofarabia.com. 164. Darth Vader’s presence in the photograph could also be tied to Saudi nationalism. There is a long-standing historical rivalry between Feisal’s family, the Hashemites, and the Al-Saud, the Saudi royal family. I thank Elizabeth Bishop for pointing out this possible interpretation of Vader and the Delegation in March 2018. 165. Mater, conversation, and Stapleton, conversation. 166. Stapleton, conversation. 167. Shalaby, “Kingdom of Saudi Arabia,” 70. 168. Ibid., 69. 169. Ibid., 72. 170. Ibid., 69. 171. Author in conversation with Sheikha al-Sudairy, January 2014. 172. Maryam Beydoun, “Saudi Aramco,” in Contemporary Kingdom: The Saudi Art Scene Now, ed. Myrna Ayad (Dubai: Canvas Central, 2014), 265–267.

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173. Those foundations are the Barakat Trust, Basmoca, and the Kinda Foundation. One can visit Basmoca on Second Life. Maryam Beydoun, “The Barakat Trust,” in Contemporary Kingdom, ed. Ayad, 288–291; Maryam Beydoun, “Basmoca,” in Contemporary Kingdom, ed. Ayad, 284–287; and Maryam Beydoun, “The Kinda Foundation,” in Contemporary Kingdom, ed. Ayad, 276–279. 174. Princess Jawaher bint Majed bin Abdulaziz al-Saud, “Foreword,” in Contemporary Kingdom, ed. Ayad, 7; Maryam Beydoun, “Al-Mansouria Foundation,” in Contemporary Kingdom, ed. Ayad, 253–55; and Shalaby, “Kingdom of Saudi Arabia,” 81. 175. Fady Jameel, “Foreword,” in Edge of Arabia, ed. Stephen Stapleton and Edward Booth-Clibborn (London: Booth-Clibborn Editions, 2012), 11; and Maryam Beydoun, “Abdul Latif Jameel Community Initiatives,” in Contemporary Kingdom, ed. Ayad, 261–263. 176. Jameel, “Foreword,” 11. 177. Stapleton, conversation. 178. Ibid. 179. Stephen Stapleton, “Exhibitions,” in Edge of Arabia, ed. Stapleton and Booth-Clibborn, 254–281. 180. Gharem, conversation. 181. Maryam Beydoun, “The Greenbox Museum of Contemporary Art from Saudi Arabia,” in Contemporary Kingdom, ed. Ayad, 292–295. For more on Aarnout Helb, see Chin-Chin Yap, “Aarnout Helb: How the Yellow Cow Found Its Green Box,” Artasiapacific 96 (November/December 2015). 182. Daisy Carrington, “More ‘Likes’ than the Louvre: Tiny Museum Shows the Power of Saudi Art,” CNN World, May 8, 2013, www.cnn.com. 183. David Batty, “Contemporary Saudi Artists Break Down Old ‘Safety’ Barriers,” Guardian, October 4, 2012. 184. Gharem, conversation. 185. Stephen Stapleton, “Abdulnasser Gharem,” in Contemporary Kingdom, ed. Ayad, 95. 186. Gharem, conversation. 187. Jessica Holland, “Next Generation Dialogue for Regional Art,” National, October 7, 2012. 188. Stapleton, conversation. 189. Ibid. 190. Mater, conversation. 191. Specifically, see section “1.2.1 Promoting Culture and Entertainment.” “Full Text of Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030,” Al-Arabiya, April 26, 2016, https://english .alarabiya.net. 192. Tahira Yaqoob, “This Side of Paradise: The First Woman to Photograph One of Islam’s Holiest Places,” National, October 9, 2014. 193. Ibid. 194. Author in conversation with Arwa al-Neami, April 2016. 195. Manjal, “Keep Your Abaya Inside the Ride at All Times.” 196. Ibid. 197. Arwa al-Neami and Ahmed Mater, “Contemporary Art, Interview: Arwa and Ahmed: An Interview with Two Saudi Art Stars,” interview by Joelle Seligson, FS BLOG, March 31, 2016, www.freersackler.si.edu/arwa-and-ahmed-an-interview-with -two-saudi-art-stars-2/. 198. Kinninmont, “Scrapping the Ban on Women Driving Shows bin Salman Is Something New.”

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199. Leila Hussain, Brooke Bowman, and Eoghan Macguire, “Abdulnasser Gharem: The Saudi Artist ‘Swimming Against the Currents,’” CNN: Style: Inside the Middle East, August 10, 2017, www.cnn.com; and Ben Hubbard, “Saturday Profile: Artist Nurtures a Creative Oasis Inside the Saudi Capital,” New York Times, April 15, 2016. 200. Denize Marray, “Art and Culture: Saudi Artists Bring Fresh Perspective to London Exhibition,” Arab News, February 3, 2016. 201. Author in conversation with Ajlan Gharem, June 2016. 202. Rawan Radwan, “Clash of Two Worlds: Calligraffiti by Abdulrahman AlNugamshi,” Arab News, June 2014. 203. Author in conversation with Abdulrahman al-Nugamshi, June 2016. 204. Amos, “A New Generation of Saudi Artists Pushes the Boundaries,” and Molly Glentzer, “Provocative ‘Parallel Kingdom’ Shows Saudis Have Something to Say,” Houston Chronicle, July 8, 2016. 205. Carmen Stolfi, “A Feminine Look at Saudi Arabia’s ‘GENERA#ION’ at Minnesota Street Project, San Francisco,” Artradarjournal, August 21, 2016, http://artradarjournal.com. 206. David Batty and Mona Mahmood, “Palestinian Poet Ashraf Fayadh’s Death Sentence Quashed by Saudi court,” Guardian, February 2, 2016;and “As-Sa‘ūdīyīa taḵaffa Hukm al-‘Idām ‘alā as-Šā‘ir Ashraf Fayadh ilā as-Sijn 8 a‘wām,” BBC Arabic, February 2, 2016, www.bbc.com/arabic/middleeast/2016/02/160202_saudi_fayadh_sentence. 207. Ashraf Fayadh, “On the Virtues of Oil over Blood,” trans. Mona Zaki, Arabic Literature in English, January 14, 2016. 208. Batty and Mahmood, “Palestinian Poet Ashraf Fayadh’s Death Sentence Quashed by Saudi Court.” 209. Ibid. 210. Human Rights Watch, “Saudi Arabia: Poet Sentenced to Death for Apostasy,” Human Rights Watch, November 23, 2015, www.hrw.org. 211. Manjal, conversation (2013), and author in conversation with Adnan Manjal, Athr Gallery, January 2014. 212. Adnan Manjal, “Beyond Here Lies Nothing: Sami al-Turki,” Canvas 9, no. 5 (September/October 2013): 116–123. 213. Al-Ayyam is a Syrian-owned gallery that opened in Jeddah after the start of the Syrian civil war in 2011. 214. Manjal, conversation (2013); author’s field notes from visit to Al-Ayyam Gallery, September 2013. 215. Author’s field notes from visit to Al-Athr Gallery, June 2013. Because I was paying the driver by the day, he had no incentive to delay. 216. One of the most famous (and controversial) examples of the religious authorities’ raiding was Feisal Samra’s exhibit in the year 2000. He did not do another show in Jeddah until 2013. Author in conversation with Feisal Samra, September 2013. 217. In November 2013, the Saudi Society for Arts and Culture in Jeddah publicly demanded that Al-Ayyam close one of its exhibits, arguing that the works on display there violated religious and social norms. The controversy eventually forced the gallery’s Syrian owners to sell Al-Ayyam to their Saudi partner, Qaswara Hafez, who renamed it Hafez Gallery. For more on this controversy, see Maha Alsenan, “An Insider’s View of Saudi and UAE Arts,” Asian Academic Research Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities 35, no. 1 (May 2015): 46. 218. Author’s field notes from visit to Al-Athr Gallery, June 2013, and author’s field notes from visit to Al-Ayyam Gallery, September 2013. 219. By 2016, Al-Aāan Gallery had largely withdrawn from displaying art, instead focusing on its restaurant.

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220. Author’s field notes from visit to Al-Aāan Gallery, August 2013; author’s field notes from visit to Naila Gallery, September 2013; author in conversation with Yiding Cao, gallery manager, Al-Aāan, September, 2013. 221. Desert Designs also now has a store in the Galleria Mall in Zinj, Bahrain— a suburb of Manama. 222. For more on Al-Suhaimi, see Hannah Stewart, “A Family Affair,” Forbes Arabia, April 28, 2014. 223. Yusuf al-Ḥarbī, “Qiṣṣa al-‘Adad: Šabāb yuḥaduṯūn ‘šawīya ḍajja” fī alḴubr’,” Al-Waṭan, May 30, 2014. 224. Samyah Alfoory, “Transforming Art in Saudi Arabia’s Eastern Province: Loud Art and Huna Art,” Arab Gulf States Institute Washington Scholarly Paper, September 12, 2016, www.agsiw.org. 225. Al-Ḥarbī, “Qiṣṣa al-‘Adad.” 226. Alfoory, “Transforming Art in Saudi Arabia’s Eastern Province.” 227. In May 2016, the Saudi government stripped the Hai’a members of their ability to arrest citizens and instructed them to act kindly and gently in enforcing Islamic rules. Harvey Day, “Be Nice! Saudi Arabia Strips Its Super Strict Religious Police of Powers of Arrest and Orders It to Be ‘Kinder and Gentler’ in Enforcing Islamic Rules,” Daily Mail, April 13, 2016. 228. Raneen Bukhari, “Exploring the Art Scene of Saudi Arabia with Raneen Bukhari,” interview by Lucy Moore, Khaleejesque, January 28, 2016, https:// khaleejesque.com. 229. Ms. Saffa, “‘We Have a Voice’—Artist Confronts Saudi Arabia’s Male Guardianship Laws,” interview by Rebecca Oh, PBS Newshour, PBS, October 16, 2016, www.pbs.org. 230. Sarah Malik, “Ms Saffa, Protest Art and the Fledgling Saudi Arabia Women’s Rights Movement,” Guardian, November 30, 2016. 231. For instance, in May 2018, she re-tweeted this tweet from Madawi alRasheed (@MadawiDr), “My article on recent detentions @LSEMiddleEast Saudi House of Cards: Paranoid Mohammed bin Salman sees enemies everywhere, http:// www.middleeasteye.net/columns/saudi-arabia-house-cards-mohammed-bin-salman -determined-spread-fear-and-eliminate-dissent-1841123352 . . . via @MiddleEastEye,” Twitter, May 25, 2018, https://twitter.com/MadawiDr/status/999973542870515712. 232. Oh, “Ms. Saffa.” 233. Khan, “Why Abdullah Qandeel Is Saudi Arabia’s Unlikely Arts Savior.” 234. Lang is married to a sister of Qandeel’s father. The couple met in San Francisco. For more on his life, see Jeffrey Lang, “My Journey to Islam” (lecture, Didsbury Mosque, Manchester, UK, March 20, 2014), @Disbury Mosque, YouTube video, 36:55, www.youtube.com. 235. Author in conversation with Abdullah Qandeel, May 2018. 236. Khan, “Why Abdullah Qandeel Is Saudi Arabia’s Unlikely Arts Savior.” 237. Qandeel, conversation. 238. Ibid. 239. Carlos Lacayo, “See It: The Best Art Experiences in NYC,” Haute Living, March 15, 2015 240. Qandeel, conversation. 241. Stephen Kalin and Marwan Rashad, “Saudi Arabia Names Businessman as Labor Minister, Boosts Culture and Environment,” Reuters, June 1, 2018, https:// reuters.com. 242. David D. Kirkpatrick, “Mystery Buyer of $450 Million ‘Salvator Mundi’ Was a Saudi Prince,” New York Times, December 6, 2017.

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243. Khan, “Why Abdullah Qandeel Is Saudi Arabia’s Unlikely Arts Savior.” 244. Qandeel, conversation. 245. “Lina Gazzaz,” Edge of Arabia, http://edgeofarabia.com/artists/lina-gazzaz. 246. Author in conversation with Lina Gazzaz, September 2013 and January 2014. 247. ‘Abīr Mušaḵḵis, “Hadīya al-Mamlaka al-‘Arabīya As-Sa‘ūdiya li-Daula AsṢīn‘Unwānihā Aṯ-Ṯaqāfa wa Al-Fann,” As-Šarq Al-Ausaṭ, September 2, 2016, http://bit.ly/2cjvn4A. 248. Ministry of Culture and Information Saudi Arabia (@moci_ksa), “#Ṣuwar, fa‘āliāt al-Usbū‘ at-Taqāfṯ as-Sa‘ūdī fī Rūsiyā, #Az-Ziyara_Al-Malikiya_liRūsiyā,” Twitter, October 7, 2017, https://twitter.com/moci_ksa/status/916588655057268742. 249. Anna Somers Cocks, “Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Launches Institute to Promote Art in the Middle East,” Art Newspaper, December 8, 2017. 250. Mater, Desert of Pharan, 576. 251. Ibid. 252. ‘Abīr Mušaḵḵis, “Ahmed Māṭr yuqdumu ‘Al-Mudun Ar-ramziya’ fī Awwal Ma‘āriḍhi as-Šaḵṣīya fī Wāšinṭōn,” As-Šarq Al-Ausaṭ, March 12, 2016, http://bit.ly /2tuCFek. 253. Mater, Desert of Pharan, 289–291. 254. The fort has been replaced by the Mecca Royal Clock Tower and Hotel, which overlooks the Ka’aba. For more on the issue, see “Saudis Hit Back over Mecca Castle,” BBC News, January 9, 2002, http://news.bbc.co.uk, and Basharat Peer, “Modern Mecca: The Transformation of a Holy City,” New Yorker, April 16, 2012. 255. Mater, Desert of Pharan, 579–580. 256. Ibid. 257. Ibid., 580. 258. Mater, “Symbolic Cities: The Work of Ahmed Mater,” and Scarborough, “A Conversation with Ahmed Mater.”

3 The Emerging Comedy Scene

Stand-up comedy is really convenient for Saudi society because it is one person on stage; there is no acting, no women on stage. . . . Socially it is accepted. —Ahmad Fathaldin

The Saudi youth already knew about stand-up comedy before it arrived here, so it was easy for us to accept it—especially since there was nothing like it in Saudi culture. —Ali Kalthami

In the spring of 2012, Khaled Mos was a bit nervous before taking the stage to do a stand-up comedy routine at an audition for Luxury Productions, a Riyadh-based company that specializes in stand-up comedy and entertainment shows. After all, he had no formal training in stand-up comedy and had never before done anything like his audition at Luxury.1 But Mos had been fascinated by comedy since his late teens and early twenties. That interest further intensified in the year after he returned from graduate school in Canada. At that time, he had difficulty finding any work despite his graduate degrees from the West, so he spent most of his time watching YouTube videos, especially those of leading stand-up comedians in the United States. Those videos were invaluable to him, as there were few stand-up comedians or comedy clubs in the kingdom then. With the encouragement of his family, he searched for materials to master stand-up comedy and then signed on for a Luxury audition in Riyadh.2 Further complicating matters that day for Mos, who is a dark-skinned Saudi, was that he had followed the act of a Saudi woman with a beautiful voice, whose skin was so fair she could be seen as racially white by Saudis. Race and racism are sensitive issues in Saudi society, with government 73

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officials and prominent intellectuals proclaiming that there is no racism in the country3—even though many darker-skinned Saudis and foreigners report that they experience discrimination in their everyday lives.4 In fact, some black Saudis use special whitening creams, a process often called “skin bleaching,” to improve their employment and social prospects.5 When Mos finally began his comedy routine, he opened by saying, “I don’t know if you are just bad or did something sufficiently bad that God is cursing you! How else could you be unlucky enough to have a black man follow a white woman with a beautiful voice?”6 He then delivered a set of jokes, some of which touched on race in Saudi society. He closed by noting that if he failed, he would hang out with Luxury’s security guard, who was also black, until the whitening cream had its intended effect. The response was hearty laughter among the Luxury judges, one of whom, Ali Kalthami, a pioneer in Saudi stand-up comedy, marveled at Mos’s jokes and presence on stage.7 It was clear that Mos had passed the audition with flying colors, and today he is one of Saudi Arabia’s large class of formidable stand-up comedians. * * * Mos’s decision to seek a career with Luxury and to use comedy as a tool for social commentary helps us to understand the emergence of the second stage of the Saudi Arts Movement that had begun in Abha at the turn of the twenty-first century. The artists in this next stage of the movement were interested in exploring many of the same questions that visual artists had explored, but through stand-up comedy. The Saudis who adopted stand-up comedy as a mode of artistic expression during the 2000s emerged from an intersection of social and technological factors. The most important factor for them was the growing desire among young Saudis for opportunities to use humor as a new tool to promote the discussion of critical social challenges. Many of those Saudis believed that the existing modes of comedic self-expression failed to reflect both their own worldview and the worldview of other important social groups. Notably, many of those Saudis came from regions outside of Riyadh, including Asir— the same southern province that had given birth to the Saudi Arts Movement. Many of the pioneers of Saudi stand-up comedians spoke English well and had studied in North America, thanks to the King Abdullah Scholarship Program, which began in 2005. That program, later renamed the “Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques’ Overseas Scholarship Program,” 8 sent thousands of Saudis to the United States and other Englishspeaking countries, where they earned both undergraduate and graduate degrees. Many discovered stand-up comedy during their time abroad and then brought it back to the kingdom.

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The scholarship program coincided with an explosion of interest in and access to global culture and media in Saudi Arabia. As Saudi stand-up comedian Hisham Fageeh detailed in his master’s thesis at Columbia University in 2016, peer-to-peer (P2P) computer file-sharing programs in the early 2000s permitted computer pirates from Saudi Arabia to bootleg premium video games, music, and films from around the world.9 Although these types of materials had existed for years in elite Saudi households and libraries, internet piracy allowed everyone in the kingdom to have access to such content for the first time. Further aiding the distribution of this content was the emergence of YouTube in 2005. The global video file-sharing system’s translators allowed pirates to download global content, put Arabic subtitles on the content, and upload it again to their channels. In Fageeh’s words, these videos garnered “millions of views from audiences who could have never enjoyed the content otherwise.”10 Saudi audiences, however, soon hungered for cultural content that better reflected the values of their society and could go beyond the limitations of existing Saudi tools to voice social critique.11 Among the first to recognize and respond to this new market demand were stand-up comedians. Their first shows were staged in English in the first decade of the twenty-first century in exclusive areas, such as Riyadh’s Diplomatic Quarter and the Aramco compound in Dhahran in the Eastern Province. Over the next decade, Fahad Albutairi, Hisham Fageeh, Ali Kalthami, Omar Hussein, Mississippi Ibrahim, and others transformed stand-up comedy into an artistic vehicle to treat subjects that could never have been handled previously as openly in the media or in other public settings. Just as many of the pioneers of the Saudi Arts Movement lacked formal artistic training and pursued professional careers outside of the arts, so too did most Saudi stand-up comedians. Playing these dual roles was not always easy. Indeed, in 2009, Kalthami, then a technology specialist at a pan-Arab satellite television network, Al-Arabiya, remarked to McClatchyDC,12 “I’m living a double life with my imagination and with the way I perceive life. . . . I almost dream when I’m awake.”13 From the start, Saudi comedians expressed a vision of Saudi art and society as capable of embracing many oppositional forces—a vision that corresponded closely to the one voiced by Gharem, Mater, and other visual artists. As Fageeh explained in an interview with the German magazine Exberliner in 2016, “People have to understand that there’s a multiplicity and duality to any society,”14 including Saudi Arabia’s. In his eyes, it is possible for multiple or contradictory truths to exist simultaneously in a country that is in a state of permanent unresolved tension. To prove his point, Fageeh provided an example from the United States, where he earned his BA and MA degrees in the 2000s. “If I see an American film, that’s Hollywood, and then I go to South Dakota or North Carolina, they’re not going

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to be the same people that I saw in a Hollywood film.”15 Despite their vast geographic and socioeconomic differences, Fageeh suggests, the people in Hollywood, South Dakota, and North Carolina are all Americans—just as people from Asir, Jeddah, and Riyadh are all Saudis.16 The comedy that emerged from this consciousness was often as exoteric as the work of the artists in the Saudi Arts Movement, functioning in the same way that an abstract painting does. The comedy blended contemporary Saudi cultural norms with artistic norms from other cultures, especially those of American stand-up comedians of color.17 For their humor, Saudi comedians also drew on classical Arabic poetry and tales told by traditional Arab storytellers. Echoing Mater’s insight about the inherent advantages of producing art in a conservative social setting rather than one of unrestricted opportunity, many Saudi stand-up comedians have embraced the clear boundaries of Saudi society, seeing these as an aid rather than a hindrance. As Fageeh explained to the Exberliner, he and many other comedians have chosen to remain in Saudi Arabia because its unique social milieu spurs their creativity.18 For artists like Fageeh to succeed, society must correctly balance oppositional forces. “The system,” says Fageeh, “has to have the right amount of restriction and the right amount of freedom for it to work, to be like that golden spot.”19 Thanks to this balance of forces, he notes, in Saudi Arabia “there is a symbiotic relationship between who the artist is and where [he or she comes] from.”20 This interconnected relationship allowed Fageeh and other Saudi stand-up comedians to assume a social role that was analogous to the one that modern Saudi visual artists had already adopted—as organic intellectuals. Again, organic intellectuals are men and women who are not part of the Saudi intellectual elite but whose work gives voice to the experiences that the masses accept but cannot easily articulate. In addition, many Saudi stand-up comedians, like their colleagues in the Saudi Arts Movement, draw on global cultural norms while pursuing an indigenous social movement grounded in Saudi culture. This should come as no surprise, for there were strong linkages between Gharem and the Saudi stand-up comedians, who frequently sought his advice, promoted his art, and even retweeted his theories on art and society.21 As live comedic shows in Saudi Arabia blossomed in popularity, standup comedians gravitated to a new class of media companies that blended stand-up comedy with advertising. Among the most important of these companies was Luxury Productions, the Saudi equivalent of San Francisco’s Bill Graham Productions. Building on its close ties to the royal family, Luxury Productions provided advertising services and financed sophisticated comedy shows and other forms of live entertainment. These shows provided a venue for comedians such as Mississippi Ibrahim, a Saudi comedian of Sudanese background who focuses on issues

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of race. Thanks to comedians like him, stand-up comedy in Saudi Arabia has been transformed from an elite form of English-language art performed by amateurs into one dominated by Arabic-speaking professional comedians whose work can be enjoyed by all Saudis, regardless of class. The success of Mississippi Ibrahim and other comedians associated with Luxury Productions and other new companies reflects the fact that stand-up comedy in Saudi Arabia shares many of the characteristics that made visual artists a success over the previous decade. Stand-up comedy is most often performed in an interactive group setting, akin to that of a majlis, where everyone is expected to participate. Jokes often contrast multiple ways of viewing a subject or assigning meaning to it, blending humor that is both lowbrow and highbrow. The comedians, each of whom is only onstage for a few minutes, often lack time for explanation and thus have to present their material in an ironic or exoteric way, providing enough information for the audience to use its imagination to fill in the blanks. This type of ambiguity reinforces another key strength of Saudi comedy—namely, that the listeners are not supposed to take the comedians’ work seriously. This gives the comedians the opportunity to pretend that what they are saying is “only a joke,” absolving them of any adverse consequences. This technique essentially keeps Saudi humor “all in the family”—to use the title of a famous American TV show that took a similar stance.

You Guys Didn’t Find That Funny? When the King Is Not Enough

The young Saudis who brought stand-up comedy to the kingdom were shaped by the experiences surrounding Ṭāš mā Ṭāš (No big deal), the satirical TV program that aired on state television during Ramadan, the Muslim month of fasting, starting in the early 1990s. Although the show’s title suggests that its content was not serious, Ṭāš mā Ṭāš explored the most sensitive issues in Saudi society: religious puritans, lazy bureaucrats, corrupt businessmen, traditional tribal peoples, hypocritical husbands, and provincial yokels. Through satirical skits that featured men and women, and even men dressed as women, Ṭāš mā Ṭāš won high ratings.22 Not only did Saudi women appear on screen without veils, but they were also shown driving in one episode. During every Ramadan, the Saudi media devoted enormous coverage to each episode of the show.23 Ṭāš mā Ṭāš made its two creators, Abdallah al-Sudhan and Nasser alQasabi, household names and won them many fans. Crown Prince Abdullah (to become king later on) provided his full support to the show, with many Saudis hailing him as “Ṭāš mā Ṭāš’s greatest fan.”24 That support seemingly

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gave Ṭāš mā Ṭāš the freedom to satirize anyone and anything except the royal family and the kingdom’s foreign policy. In explaining their show and approach to comedy and satire, Ṭāš mā Ṭāš’s creators were clear that their alliance with the government was enormously beneficial, with Al-Sudhan noting that Saudi Arabia’s state television “guarded us against donkeys and cretins.”25 For his part, Al-Qasabi went a step further, explaining to the British writer Robert Lacey, “Our leaders make mistakes. . . . And we enjoy laughing at the results of those mistakes. But we don’t make fun of the leaders personally. That is not the Saudi way.”26 However, the “Saudi way” and the overwhelming state power that stood behind it could not shield Ṭāš mā Ṭāš or its producers from public opinion on a massive scale—illustrating Pascal Ménoret’s insight that the show demonstrates that Saudi Arabia, “a country long believed to be monolithic and mute,”27 can have energetic public debates. The most vigorous response came from the people whom Al-Sudhan had dismissed as “donkeys and cretins”—that is, Saudi clerics and their supporters.28 Remarkably, both Al-Sudhan and Al-Qasabi welcomed the anger of these people “as a sign of the show’s success.”29 Because these groups saw Ṭāš mā Ṭāš as attacking their core values, they mobilized vigorously against it, with lawyers suing the show in court for insulting Saudi society. Islamic jurists also issued numerous religious opinions (fātawā) against the show. One fatwa, issued in the year 2000, banned Muslims from watching the show or even buying ads to sponsor it.30 That fatwa also criticized Ṭāš mā Ṭāš for a number of wrongdoings—such as ridiculing “righteous people” and God-fearing people, adopting an arrogant tone toward others, and promoting men’s lust by having unveiled women appear on screen without their guardians.31 In December 2003, forty Saudis staged a rare public demonstration in central Riyadh during Ramadan, demanding that the Saudi state television channel cancel Ṭāš mā Ṭāš.32 Although Ṭāš mā Ṭāš remained on the air, tensions grew worse. As AlQasabi’s wife, Badryah al-Bishr, detailed in her book on the controversy, computer hackers destroyed the show’s website, while internet forums openly called for the assassination of Al-Qasabi and published his home address and that of Al-Sudhan.33 Other members of Al-Qasabi’s and Al-Sudhan’s immediate families were also directly threatened. For their personal safety, the two men relocated with their families to Dubai, where the show continued until 2011 on the Middle East Broadcasting Channel (MBC), a Saudi-owned panArab satellite station.34 A year after the show went off the air, the online journal Muftah noted that Ṭāš mā Ṭāš had failed to connect with young Saudis in large part because it did “not sufficiently reflect the modern realities of a country torn between competing and often contradictory values.”35 For the young men who pioneered stand-up comedy in Saudi Arabia, Ṭāš mā Ṭāš’s battle with the kingdom’s religious elites provided a lesson

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about politics and the arts in their country. Although the government’s support was critical to the success of artists engaging in any form of social commentary, it was not enough by itself to secure their position in the country if important segments of the public opposed them. Even in absolute monarchies like Saudi Arabia, the king does not always get his way. Although King Abdullah may have been the biggest fan of Ṭāš mā Ṭāš in Saudi Arabia, that support alone was not enough to allow Al-Qasabi, AlSudhan, and their families to continue to live safely in the kingdom. In response, Saudi stand-up comedians, as we will see, sought a vision of comedy that would include all of society, following the path of the Saudi Arts Movement. While cooperating with the state whenever possible, Saudi stand-up comedians asserted that stand-up comedy is “socially acceptable”—a phrase clearly designed to reassure everyone that their comedy would not reignite the fierce battles sparked by Ṭāš mā Ṭāš.36 Their choice of language reflects a refined vision of politics and society that looks at both as multiples rather than simple binaries. Again, as Fageeh noted, societies must be thought of as multiples. This vision resembles that of Martin Luther King, Jr., and of Mater—meaning that social and political matters should not be thought of as either-or choices, but as expansive ones with multiple options. For the comedians, it was not the stateversus-society dynamic that was the most important factor. Like the Saudi visual artists, the comedians had to consider their relationships with both the state and their diverse and conservative society. Fahad Albutairi, one of the first Saudi stand-up comedians, explained this viewpoint in an interview with Foreign Policy. “Most of the pressure that we’re afraid of,” he said, “is driven by public opinion, not the government.”37 As he would later tell the Financial Times, “a lot of people have been able to practice activism to a certain degree” in Saudi Arabia.38 Yes, some Saudis are jailed, he admitted, including his wife, the women’s rights activist Loujain al-Hathloul, who has been imprisoned multiple times on serious charges.39 “But if it’s just political,” Albutairi added, “there’s more room to get [away] with it.” On the other hand, “if it’s religious,” the Saudi comedian cautions, “that’s when it gets really, really tricky.” “There’s still a little bit of a struggle on a governmental level to a certain degree,” he continues “but not as much as [with] society.”40 For Albutairi, conventional Western social science overlooks these complex dynamics in the kingdom because Americans are prejudiced against monarchies, which they assume to be totalitarian by definition.41 A Failure to Connect

Of course, Saudi society includes other groups that have reasons to reject the “Saudi way” of comedy. As Pascal Ménoret has written, many Saudis

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from both the east and the south of the country did not recognize the regional caricatures, accents, and costumes featured in some of the episodes of Ṭāš mā Ṭāš—many of which bore little resemblance to their own lives. 42 Instead, in their eyes, these episodes actually reflected the stereotypes held by Saudis from Riyadh and the central Najd region about rural folk. 43 This was a criticism also voiced by religious elites, whose fatwa in 2000 faulted Ṭāš mā Ṭāš for demeaning the dialects and traditions of provincial Saudis.44 Equally important, provincial Saudis may not have recognized the show’s Najdi-based humor. As the director of a Saudi theatrical comedy told me, citizens of Saudi Arabia’s different regions view comedy very differently. “The people of the Najd, Tabuk, and the south,” he explained to me, “value jokes that are quick and lack repetition.” By contrast, “the people of the Eastern Province like repetition and extended jokes. Hejazis value long jokes but not repetition.”45 Among the Saudis who pioneered stand-up comedy were individuals from regions that were not part of the show’s Riyadh cultural framework. For instance, Ali Kalthami was born in Asir, the same southern region that had produced the Saudi Arts Movement. 46 When As-Šharq Al-Ausaṭ, a pan-Arab daily newspaper, asked Kalthami in 2013 to explain the recent success of stand-up comedians, he strikingly overlooked Ṭāš mā Ṭāš, arguing that there had been “no comedy at all in Saudi Arabia” before the rise of stand-up comedians.47 During the first two decades of the twentyfirst century, he and other stand-up comedians sought to add fresh comedic voices from throughout Saudi society as they built new businesses and institutions related to stand-up comedy. In addition, there were Saudis in Riyadh and the Najd who were uncomfortable with the show and therefore shaped how Saudi stand-up comedians approached their art. These Saudis dismissed Ṭāš mā Ṭāš as nothing more than palliative, or a way to let off steam by voicing critical views of society. Ṭāš mā Ṭāš may have been art as social mirror, but it was nothing like the Saudi Arts Movement, which always intended to elicit positive social action. As Mohammed Abbas, a literary critic for Ar-Riyāḍ, a Saudi daily newspaper, wrote, Ṭāš mā Ṭāš taught Saudis that “reality is a big joke that we have all helped to tell, but that we have neither the right nor the power to change.”48 Instead, Abbas explained, “we have only the right to watch the actors playing out our mistakes, and to hear our own voices through theirs.”49 By contrast, Saudi stand-up comedians aimed to present a vision of humor that transcended the limitations of Ṭāš mā Ṭāš, following the model of the Saudi Arts Movement. The comedians wanted their audiences to hear their own voices, but also to act. Again, there were strong links between Saudi comedians and Gharem, Mater, and other Saudi visual artists.

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Fortunately, the Saudis who pioneered the stand-up comedy movement came of age in a very different era than Gharem, Mater, and the other artists who had started Edge of Arabia. Whereas Edge of Arabia artists reached adulthood during an era of low oil prices and limited government resources and in the socially conservative era after 1979, Saudi stand-up comedians became adults during a period of more social openness and greater material abundance, thanks to a period of sustained high oil prices between the late 1990s and 2014. Under King Abdullah, Saudi Arabia invested the proceeds from higher oil prices in education,50 allowing tens of thousands of young Saudis to study abroad, where they learned about Western culture, including stand-up comedy. After ascending to the throne in 2005, King Abdullah reached an agreement with President George W. Bush to open the doors of US universities to Saudis, of whom, at the time, there were only 5,000 studying in this country.51 Those numbers had once been higher, before Washington imposed steep restrictions on Arab visitors to the United States after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.52 By 2005, most Saudis studying abroad were not enrolled in US universities, preferring instead to earn their degrees in Australia, Canada, or Great Britain. The King Abdullah Scholarship Program aimed to change that dynamic, helping to strengthen Saudi-US ties and addressing a key deficit in the Saudi labor market—namely, the dearth of qualified Saudi professionals. The mission statement of the program made the goal clear: “To prepare and qualify Saudi human resources in an effective manner so that they will be able to compete on an international level in the labor market.”53 In particular, the program sought to provide a stream of new “highly qualified individuals . . . [for] Saudi universities as well as the government and private sectors”54 in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). Over time, the program aimed to have these Saudis replace the thousands of foreign professionals who had worked in the kingdom for decades, thereby sparking the creation of new non-oil industries that would help to lessen Saudi Arabia’s dependence on petroleum.55 Thanks to a sustained period of higher oil prices, the Saudi government had sufficient financial resources to sponsor tens of thousands of Saudi students who wished to earn degrees at top universities in the English-speaking West.56 Within a decade of the program’s launch, there were 100,000 Saudis studying in the United States, where they gained new technical skills, developed creative ambitions, and learned English.57 Upon their return to Saudi Arabia, these young students provided what Wafaa Fallatah, one of the few Saudis to write on Saudi stand-up comedy, called a “dynamic injection” of English into the academic and social life

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of the kingdom, making English far more “than a foreign language.”58 The acceptance of English as a culturally acceptable language even extended to conservative Saudis, who had rejected Ṭāš mā Ṭāš. In the past, many of them had treated English as a clearly foreign, “non-Islamic language”—an unwelcome competitor to Arabic, the language of the Quran.59 By the twenty-first century, however, many Saudis of all backgrounds had embraced English, which, as Fallatah observed, had become a “popular language” in the kingdom.60 The new central place of English in Saudi Arabia was critical because it created a readymade cultural space for Saudis to import artistic genres, including stand-up comedy, from America and other English-speaking nations. Fahad Albutairi is a good example of how Saudis living abroad adopted the new artistic genre. Albutairi had grown up in Khobar, a large city in the Eastern Province, a region that is culturally and socially different from Riyadh but closely tied to Aramco. During his childhood, Albutairi had avidly watched Egyptian slapstick comedy, Jim Carrey movies, and Ṭāš mā Ṭāš.61 As he explained in his TED talk in 2011, Albutairi discovered stand-up comedy in 2003, while he was studying geology at the University of Texas at Austin. After a disastrous attempt to do stand-up comedy at the university, he took a friend’s suggestion to attend the Capitol City Comedy Club and other comedy clubs in Austin to learn how professional comedians actually perform.62 When he finally went onstage again, this time at Capitol City, he had “found himself” as a comedian by abandoning blond jokes, which “worked for everyone else,” in favor of jokes about himself and his culture.63 After all, as he later recalled, he was “brown” and not “white,” and therefore his jokes should reflect both his identity and his fellow people’s experiences.64 That insight clearly guided his very first joke at Capitol City. Building on the widespread American belief that all Arabs are terrorists who don’t drink alcohol—a perception that every Saudi knows well—Albutairi began his set by telling the audience a joke whose punchline was a mixed drink: “I can guarantee you this, the only bomb I can make is a Jägerbomb.”65 Noting that his audience was laughing, albeit nervously, Albutairi decided to push the envelope to get the response he really wanted. “You guys didn’t find that funny?” he asked. “The immigration officer didn’t think it was funny, either. He told me, with three fingers up my ass, ‘That’s not funny.’” 66 That got genuine laughs, giving Albutairi confidence to continue to perform stand-up comedy by drawing on the common experiences of Saudis. Eventually, he brought stand-up comedy back to Saudi Arabia, helping to give birth to a new genre of comedy very different from that of Ṭāš mā Ṭāš.67 Although Albutairi states that he uses very little of his US training except “discipline and punctuality,” his geology degree and his social expe-

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riences abroad have been crucial to his comic vision. Not only did they expose him to American culture, but they also gave him computer and technical literacy. It is notable how many of the other early stand-up comedians have also earned degrees in STEM fields, a key focus of the King Abdullah Scholarship Program. These comedians, along with Albutairi, are open to utilizing social media and other new internet technologies to promote their careers and the place of stand-up comedy in Saudi society. By blending these cultural and technical trends, Saudi comedians have also emerged as rooted cosmopolitans, following in the footsteps of Gharem and other members of the Saudi Arts Movement Finally, although most Saudis who went abroad did not become standup comedians, many of them were exposed to stand-up comedy during their studies and were essential to its blossoming in the kingdom. As Fageeh has noted, the King Abdullah Scholarship Program’s first batch of graduates formed a natural audience for Saudi stand-up comedians.68 Saudi Pirates

New technology also expanded stand-up comedy’s fan base far beyond those Saudis who spoke English well after studying abroad. Advances in internet technology have given millions of Saudis unfettered access to quality global media for the first time. American movies, music, TV shows, and even videos of stand-up comedians like Fluffy became popular among many young Saudis of all income classes. The wide access to foreign media has marked a significant departure from the recent Saudi past. Because of the censorship laws in the kingdom after the emergence of conservative norms after 1979, there were no movie theaters in the country for many years and few retail outlets to purchase foreign books or other media products. Before 2000, when ordinary Saudis wanted access to foreign media, they had to access elite libraries inside the country or utilize the black market for pirated movies and music. Under that system, US music cassettes and Hollywood movies took time to get, often months after they had been officially released. As Rhym Ghazal, a Saudi journalist, recalls in a 2009 article published in the National, a United Arab Emirates daily newspaper, buyers and sellers of pirated goods in Saudi Arabia during the 1980s and 1990s used code words, such as “the item I asked for,” to describe illicit products. Sellers also cautiously “looked around before handing over the carefully wrapped-up goods.” 69 The phone numbers of the sellers with the best pirated goods, Ghazal added, were a closely guarded secret, “only to be exchanged among trusted friends.”70 Such networks extended to the large expatriate communities living in Saudi Arabia, many of whose members were hungry to buy the latest TV shows, movies, and music from their homelands.71

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However, this clandestine market for pirated goods was upended after 2001 with the rise of high-speed DSL in Saudi Arabia.72 Thousands of digital lines replaced the dial-up internet services that had facilitated the emergence of the Saudi Arts Movement in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Thanks to the higher speeds offered by DSL, Saudis for the first time could connect, via P2P file-sharing programs, to Pirate Bay and other vast online databases of digital content. Recognizing a golden opportunity, entrepreneurial Saudis created their own online services, providing pirated content to ordinary Saudis. The kingdom quickly emerged as one of the worst offenders for pirated music and videos in the Gulf, and the world. Some pirates in the kingdom amassed as many as 100,000 counterfeit products.73 In 2008, Kevin Ridgely, the managing director of Sony Music Entertainment Middle East, estimated that at least 50 percent of Saudi Arabia’s legal music trade had been lost to piracy.74 By that time, YouTube had opened new business opportunities for Saudi pirates. By utilizing the program’s automatic translators, the pirates could download Hollywood movies and other popular content, insert Arabic subtitles, and then upload the products to their online channels—which, as Fageeh explained, got “millions of views from audiences that could have never enjoyed the content otherwise.”75 There was little that the old information controllers, such as official censors or the Hai’a, could do to stop this business. Riyadh eventually enacted legislation to combat piracy and prosecute some of the worst offenders,76 but these actions did little to counter the social forces that had been unleashed by Saudi piracy. Those forces fundamentally transformed the tastes and expectations of Saudi youth, helping to lay the groundwork for the rise of the Saudi stand-up comedy movement. Over time, that new movement created a recognizably Saudi art form, which drew from the same Saudi and Western cultural influences that its audience did—again, following the path laid out by Gharem and others in the Saudi Arts Movement.

Comedy in Saudi Arabia Has Come of Age Smile Productions

British and Irish nationals played a key role in Saudi stand-up comedy from the start by cooperating closely with Saudis and others in building the institutions that launched it—just as Stephen Stapleton had done with the artists from Abha. That process began with Irishman Peter Howarth-Lees, who arrived in 1997 to work as an executive in Riyadh, where he joined the city’s amateur theater scene, which included stand-up comedy. HowarthLees, who had acted in high school, was eager to contribute to that scene,

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which dated back to the 1970s. Not only did he take a class (in Abu Dhabi) with Tom Todoroff, a prominent American acting coach, but he also arranged for Todoroff to visit Riyadh to teach there in 2007. Howarth-Lees went on to work with Lubna Hussein on Jasr, a Saudi TV news program, for which he was asked to cover the Israeli military operation in Gaza in January 2008. He also earned a cameo role in Ṭāš mā Ṭāš. In 2005, Howarth-Lees was working for the Prince Sultan Foundation and had converted to Islam, a necessary step for him to marry his third wife, a Saudi national and coworker at the foundation. Marriage and religious conversion are momentous choices for many people, but they had special importance for Howarth-Lees. Because his Irish mother had wanted him to be a missionary, he had studied to be a Catholic priest as a young man. By the time he lived in Saudi Arabia, he had already been married twice and was an agnostic who had witnessed events that had colored his perspective of Islam to the point of hatred.77 In 2002, he had been the first to find the body of a friend and neighbor in Riyadh whose car had been destroyed by a bomb, probably planted by alQaeda-inspired terrorists. Saudi authorities, however, accused HowarthLees and a group of British nationals of the crime, supposedly a part of a dispute over the control of illicit alcohol sales. Although he was finally cleared of the charges, subsequent events did little to improve his view of Islam, for two more friends were killed in bombings of compounds in Riyadh, with another shot by al-Qaeda-inspired terrorists. Not surprisingly, it was only after hours of conversation with his future wife and one of her friends that he decided to convert. The process of conversion was so lengthy and arduous that it earned Howarth-Lees a nickname in his new family: the “Greatest British Hejazi since Lawrence of Arabia.”78 As his views toward Islam evolved over the course of his married life, Howarth-Lees began to see the interaction of theater, comedy, and Saudi society differently. To begin with, he recognized that there were few places for expatriates like him and Saudis like his wife to meet, laugh, and spend time together forming common bonds. Such places did not exist in Riyadh, and many people told him that he would be crazy to try to create one. Nor were there spaces for people of the opposite gender from different families to laugh together and to date. Nevertheless, Howarth-Lees sought to organize stand-up comedy shows in settings where no divisions in the audience existed between men and women. This followed formats similar to those in the Anglo-American world, with comedians speaking English—a language common both to expatriates and Saudis.79 Fortunately for Howarth-Lees there was already a community of people in Riyadh who shared his vision for stand-up comedy in Saudi Arabia and were willing to cooperate with him to make it a reality. A good example is Todd Nims, an American whom Howarth-Lees met when they both

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appeared on a Saudi television program that discussed expatriate life in the country and examined Home: The Aramco Brats’ Story—a feature-length documentary film that Nims, his brother, Zachary, and their close friend Matthew Miller had produced about their experiences growing up as expatriates in Saudi Arabia on the Aramco compound in Dhahran.80 Nims, who had studied film and had lived in Hollywood, connected Howarth-Lees to a community of expatriates and Saudis interested in standup comedy, such as Ali Kalthami, whom Nims had met when he was interviewed by Al-Arabiya about his film. Because the anchor could not speak English, Kalthami, who worked in the IT department, was asked to translate. “It was clear when we first met in the elevator,” Nims recalled, “that Kalthami had a terrific sense of humor.”81 After the interview, Kalthami and Nims met daily for weeks to talk about the arts and comedy and how they could play a role in transforming Saudi society. These discussions proved fruitful, as Kalthami, as Nims has observed “always has his finger on the pulse of Saudi society.”82 Over time, Howarth-Lees, in consultation with Nims and others, developed a new vision in which comedy would be part of a process that could help to bring people in Riyadh closer together, while addressing clear social needs. As Howarth-Lees later remembered, he believed at the time that laughter could be a powerful tool of liberation if people could share it in appropriate spaces under appropriate conditions. Although neither Howarth-Lees nor his friends knew the new class of arts patrons, curators, and visual artists in Saudi Arabia, this vision of art and the public space it might be viewed in was strikingly similar to the one championed by visual artists and their elite allies—in which the interaction of people in an audience and the physical space in which they view art are as important as the artistic product itself.83 So in May 2008, Howarth-Lees founded a new company, Smile Productions, to make this new vision a reality. The title was intended to bring to mind the common emoticon in email and text messaging for smiling: !!! .84 “I Haven’t Laughed This Hard in Ages”

In 2009, when Howarth-Lees posted a notice on Facebook asking comedians in Saudi Arabia to attend tryouts in Riyadh and Jeddah for a stand-up comedy show,85 he received replies from many aspiring comedians.86 As Kalthami had observed, Saudis and foreigners in Saudi Arabia were already familiar with Western stand-up comedy, thanks to the many videos that had become easily accessible online and translated into Arabic by the Saudi pirates. Saudis were especially interested in the work of the Axis of Evil, a group of stand-up comedians who performed in various countries in the Middle East, except for Saudi Arabia itself. In 2008, that group of

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comedians performed in Bahrain with a number of expatriate and local comedians opening for them.87 Saudi stand-up comedians in Riyadh could also draw on indigenous sources of spoken humor. For example, many jokes had been circulated by Arabs since the rise of the BlackBerry messenger service in 2002 and 2003.88 Furthermore, there was humor in classical forms of poetry and the tales told by traditional Arab storytellers, or ḥakāwatī, a term that combines ḥikāya, “story,” with ḥakī, “to talk.”89 As Hezab al-Rayyes, a professor of media studies at King Saud University in Riyadh, has observed, ancient storytellers often “entertained the public with stories and jokes,” catering to the traditional “Arab love of puns and wordplay.”90 Following the publication in 2008 of Rabih Alameddine’s novel The Hakawati, there was a revival of the art form in the Middle East, including the Gulf.91 Howarth-Lees selected sixteen stand-up comedians to participate in a show in Riyadh headlined by Ahmed Ahmed, a leading Egyptian American comedian. To avoid negative reactions from Saudis who might object to the show on religious grounds, Howarth-Lees and his comedians limited publicity about the show, only telling ticket buyers a day before the performance where it was to be held.92 With the exception of local politics, religion, and sex, the comedians were allowed to touch on any issue they wished. No distinction by gender was made between the thousand men and women in the audience, which included several of King Abdullah’s sons. The show was a roaring success.93 Demand proved to be so strong for more shows that Howarth-Lees scheduled another one with Ahmed Ahmed in Riyadh, which drew 450 people. Another show, this one in Jeddah, drew 800 men and women of all ages.94 Throughout the performance hall in Jeddah, the audience responded to jokes in the same way that people do in America and other countries— “with giggles, which occasionally reached a crescendo of booming laughter, whistles, and ringing applause.”95 Many members of the audience expressed a desire to see future shows, having become passionate fans of stand-up comedy—a fact that did not go unnoticed by Ahmed Ahmed. “Out of all the countries that I have performed in,” he told the Arab News, “Saudi audiences were by far, the most explosive, electric audiences.”96 Equally important, the audience enjoyed Ahmed Ahmed, an established foreign stand-up comedian, nearly as much as the Saudi amateur comedians. Mohammed Saed, a twenty-four-year-old college student, said that he had expected “Ahmed Ahmed to be great, but he was truly amazed by the talent of the other local comedians.”97 Khaled Masry, a twenty-three-year-old marketing intern, expressed similar sentiments about the Saudi comedians. “The show,” he said, “was really beyond my expectations. The Saudi comedians were impressive.”98 The local performers were

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also enthralled by the reaction of the audiences in Jeddah and Riyadh. Khalid Khalifa, a Saudi stand-up comedian, stated that he was heartened by the responses of the audiences, noting that people told him that “our show far exceeded their expectations.”99 A decade earlier, that might have been a one-time success. In this case, however, Facebook, Twitter, and other social media quickly spread word about the show, producing a surge of interest in future events. HowarthLees later compared this popular phenomenon to the rapid spreading of raves in Western cities in the 1980s. Two of his other shows in Riyadh’s Diplomatic Quarter drew a total of 12,000 people—a number that would have been higher if the quarter’s guards had not turned away hundreds of women who arrived without their male guardians. On another occasion, however, the Hai’a were denied entry to a comedy show produced by Howarth-Lees (this one attended by the American ambassador, James Smith) when they were told that the show was sold out.100 The presence of the Hai’a at the venue, however, impacted everyone there, including Nemr Abou Nassar (Nemr).101 The Lebanese performer, who was one of the first stand-up comedians in the Arab world, performed in a number of Smile shows and was a mentor to many early Saudi standup comedians.102 Yet he was also moved by the “revolutionary changes” that he saw in Saudi society and in his audiences.103 They reacted far more positively to his jokes, which had references to Jay-Z and to Beyoncé, than he had predicted.104 In October 2010, after his first two shows in the country, Nemr wrote on Twitter: “I never thought two days in Saudi Arabia would have such a profound effect on my life, but they have.”105 Nemr’s insight into the profound changes taking place in his audiences and Saudi society proved accurate. By late 2010, Saudi and foreign standup comedians had become so popular that they had won acceptance from both the public and the government—a remarkable achievement, since Howarth-Lees and his colleagues at Smile lacked extensive connections to members of the kingdom’s elite. But slick marketing that appealed to young Saudis helped to establish the place of Howarth-Lees and his company on the commercial landscape. For instance, Howarth-Lees named one of his first shows LOL- ;-), and developed hashtags, such as “#SmileJeddahNov18,” for fans and comedians to communicate with one another on social media. Note the following exchange between Nemr and Manal Assaad, a twenty-six-year-old marketing executive, after a November 2011, stand-up comedy event that Howarth-Lees had organized in Jeddah: Thank YOU! RT @SafanaSejini: #SmileJeddahNov18 was a great event thanks to @ThaimzZz @StandupAl & @NEMRCOMEDY for their amazing performance. —Tweet, @Nemrcomedy, 4:24 p.m., November 11, 2011106

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Replying to @NEMRCOMEDY We should be thanking you @NEMRCOMEDY & @SmileKSA for such a great evening! I haven’t laughed this hard in ages! #SmileJeddahNov18. —Tweet, @Themanalyst, 4:50 p.m., November 11, 2011107

The publicity around this and the other stand-up comedy shows drew the attention of some of the most powerful figures in the Saudi capital, who offered Howarth-Lees protection from the religious authorities and government censorship. However, he rejected those offers, fearing the restrictions that might be placed on what his comedians could say from his “protectors.” In fact, he had no need for protection, as comedy was now an accepted part of the social landscape in the kingdom, winning the Irish convert to Islam a new nickname among the country’s stand-up comedians: “the Godfather of Saudi comedy.”108 Giving Back to the Community

Howarth-Lees was not the only foreign national in Saudi Arabia who saw comedy as a way to contribute to the community and generate social change. Rehman Akhtar, an Aramco employee who was born in Pakistan but raised in Great Britain, formed a natural partnership with HowarthLees, as well as with Todd Nims.109 Together, these three men brought the first generation of young comedians to the Saudi stage, including Fahad Albutairi, Omar Hussein, Ali Kalthami, Khalid Khalifa, and Omar Ramzi. These young comedians came from various parts of the country. Many of them were similar to Ahmed Mater, Abdulnasser Gharem, and the other artists in Edge of Arabia insofar as they had day jobs when they began and virtually no formal training in their art. Even Fahad Albutairi, who had done stand-up comedy as a student at the University of Texas at Austin, saw himself as a geologist as much as a comedian. In response to a group of adoring young fans who said that he “rocked” before a 2010 comedy show in Dhahran, he jokingly replied, “Isn’t that because I am a geologist?”110 In contrast, Rehman Akhtar is an experienced comedian and performer. When he joined Aramco as a consultant in 2000, he gave up a promising career as a stand-up comedian in Great Britain. In the 1990s, he had frequently performed as a stand-up comedian in clubs and had been on British national television. Akhtar’s personal brand of humor began early in life, for it was a natural coping mechanism to deal with the many challenges he faced as he grew up in public housing in the 1960s and 1970s as the first “brown” kid.111 Four years after his arrival in Saudi Arabia, Rehman Akhtar returned to stand-up comedy as a way to cope with the stresses of work at Aramco. When he participated in the 2008 Axis of Evil Show alongside Fahad Albutairi

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and others, he wondered if comedy could provide a common language for Saudi society, as a vehicle to bring expatriates like himself and Saudis of different backgrounds closer together. He found ready support when he proposed the idea of holding a comedy show at Aramco’s facilities to Charlie Johnson, a board member of Saudi Aramco’s Employee Association (SAEA). Johnson responded that Akhtar needed to do the project for the sake of the Aramco community, and he persuaded SAEA to sponsor the show in Aramco’s compound in Dhahran, the company’s principal facility in Saudi Arabia. The show was to be aimed at Aramco employees (“Aramcons”) and anyone else who was fluent in English and had access to the company’s compound. The publicity for the first show and for later ones at Dhahran made this point clear, including on social media, where the Facebook posting advertised the comedy show with the following warning: PLEASE NOTE: This show is open only to Saudi Aramco employees and their personal guests. ONLY people who have access to the residential camp (or have someone who can sign them in) can attend. Just having a ticket in your hands is NOT enough to get access to the residential camp. You have to be signed in properly and observe all Aramco rules and regulations while on camp.112

Notably, access to Aramco’s residential camp—a sprawling neighborhood resembling a postwar US suburb—has always been severely restricted.113 Most Saudis and expatriates cannot enter it, a point made clear to Akhtar on Twitter by a Saudi man who was living in Dhahran, a large city adjacent to the Aramco residential camp. “The thing is,” he tweeted, “many people would love to come, but they can’t get into Aramco!”114 Although the show was obviously not meant for a general audience in the kingdom and was only advertised on English-language social media, it had a profound impact on stand-up comedy throughout Saudi Arabia.115 The Dhahran Shows

In conjunction with Howarth-Lees, whom he had met at the Axis of Evil Show in Bahrain a year earlier, Akhtar produced stand-up comedy shows in 2009 and 2010. The audience for the shows included men and women of all ages, both expatriates and Saudis. Senior Aramco executives also attended. Just as in many art galleries, there was no division in the audience between the genders. Akhtar wrote the script, coached the comedians, and served as master of ceremonies. In his opening monologue for the first show, in March 2009, Akhtar explained to the audience what a comedy show is, proclaiming that “change

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is coming to Saudi Arabia” and joking that the Hai’a were in the audience. They were disguised, he suggested, as students from nearby King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals (KFUPM), an elite Saudi technical university that shares a wall with Aramco.116 Akhtar went on to note that it would be clear who the spies were from the fact that they would not laugh at the right moments, and he asked audience members to point them out. In an astonishing sign of confidence, he joked that “we will deal” with the infiltrators after the show is over. Of course, no infiltrators were found.117 Throughout his opening monologue, Akhtar told the audience that he spent considerable time on Facebook and email, interacting with fans before the show started.118 One young woman, he said, had posted on his Facebook wall that she would kill herself if she didn’t get a ticket. “I hope she made it to the show,” he concluded.119 The comedians on stage were equally daring in the subjects they explored and how they treated them. Omar Hussein, whose opening act in the first Dhahran show in 2009 was only the second professional appearance of his career, foreshadowed many of the topics that he would later deal with on his popular YouTube video comedy show 3al6ayer.120 Many of those topics had been taboo in Saudi society—namely, bullying, corruption, homosexuality, financial inequality, the unorthodox sexual practices of Westerners, and workplace sexual harassment. He also focused on the challenges faced by students at KFUPM, where he was studying chemical engineering,121 getting the most laughs when he explored the absence of heterosexual dating opportunities at the then all-male university. Thanks to his time there, Hussein confided to the audience, “I have more testosterone built up in my body than Saudi Arabia has oil.”122 In the subsequent shows at Dhahran, Hussein went one step further, using words in English that would be inflammatory in any society, such as faggot. He also wore a pink shirt—the color commonly associated with homosexuals—as he openly mocked young gay men in Saudi Arabia who had participated in a riot on National Day.123 Hussein jokingly hailed the riot as Saudi Arabia’s “first gay march,” implying that the Saudi police, fearful of directly interacting with sexually aggressive young gay men, had preferred to let them go than arrest them all.124 Along with Fahad Albutairi and other comedians, Hussein also touched on Saudi masculinity and on the seemingly “gay” character of the country’s most used cell phone at the time, the BlackBerry. After all, Albutairi observed, the cell phone is named after a fruit and is nicknamed “B-B.” The comedians also made light of the sartorial styles and social attitudes of elite men and women. Receiving special attack was women’s belief that they had a sense of entitlement if they were waiting on line at hotels. One of the other comedians joked about how high the country’s automobile accident rate was, especially given that Saudis are legally prohibited from drinking alcohol.125

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This was an elite forum, which was reflected in the jokes and styles of delivery. There were many jokes about Filipino workers and noticeably no “shout-outs” to them, unlike for Americans, Brits, South Asians, and Saudis. Khalid Khalifa joked about his interactions with friends and family members who did not know how to speak English, making it clear that this was an issue shared by other members of the audience. All the comedians, especially Albutairi, channeled how leading American and British comedians behave on stage. Albutairi’s body language, diction, and facial expressions bore a strong resemblance to those of Jerry Seinfeld, the American comedian whom everyone in the audience would have known from Seinfeld, his TV situation comedy of the 1990s.126 The performers onstage interacted directly with men and women in the audience in much the same way that comedians do in Europe and North America. The show in October 2009 included a red carpet, so that Akhtar and the other comedians could arrive and interact with fans and a reporter (played by Todd Nims), just as they would at the Academy Awards ceremony in Los Angeles.127 In addition, Akhtar and others utilized social media in much the same way that promoters did in the West. Not only were color pictures of the event posted online,128 but Akhtar also wrote about the show in an enthusiastic Facebook post that concluded, “Comedy in Saudi Arabia has come of age!”129 Stand-up comedy in Saudi Arabia had now emerged as a new way to treat subjects that previously could not have been handled as openly in other public forums, including those located in Western schools and compounds. By the end of 2009, Akhtar was asked to do subsequent shows in Jeddah and Riyadh. His and other comedians’ success reflected the fact that the medium of stand-up comedy shares many of the characteristics that made the work of Edge of Arabia a success. The comedy is performed in an interactive group format, akin to that of a majlis, where everyone is expected to participate. Jokes often contrast multiple ways of viewing a subject or assigning meaning to it. The comedians, each of whom is only onstage for a few minutes, lack time for explanation. Therefore, they have to present their material in an exoteric way, providing just enough information for the audience to use its imagination to fill in the blanks. This type of ambiguity reinforces another surprising strength of stand-up comedy: the listeners are not supposed to take the comedians’ work seriously. “It was only a joke, after all, right?”

Why Shouldn’t We Have Stand-Up Comedy? The First Arabic Show

By the spring of 2010, comedy in the kingdom was starting to divide into two separate scenes: one for expatriates and another for Arabs. Many of the

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Saudi comedians who had started with the first scene moved easily into the second. Because the comedians in the second scene focused on local culture, it made sense for them to perform their work in Arabic, even as they retained American styles of stand-up comedy. Albutairi even made jokes in Arabic without translating them during Rehman Akhtar’s comedy shows in Dhahran. This development grew out of a growing impulse on the part of Arabic-speaking comedians to do something to put their “stamp” on standup comedy and the rules of Saudi society. In the process, the management of shows passed from expatriates to Saudis, who had to simultaneously develop business acumen and an eye for artistic talent. Ultimately, the Arabizing of stand-up comedy is another example of Saudis successfully practicing tajdīd and islāḥ. Much like Edge of Arabia, the Saudi stand-up comedy movement had made a genre of foreign culture fit into the kingdom’s existing cultural and social landscapes. In other words, Saudi stand-up comedians had become rooted cosmopolitans. As Ibrahim Khairallah noted, it was only natural that Saudis would adopt stand-up comedy and make it their own. “I perform stand-up comedy in Arabic,” he said, “because the Arabs are the people of jokes, the people of laughter. So why shouldn’t we have stand-up comedy?”130 As Arabic has become the dominant language of the comedy scene in Saudi Arabia, the medium has lost its old social mission of bringing Saudis and expatriates together, which Howarth-Lees and other expatriates originally envisioned for it. Instead, it has taken on a new social mission of providing a forum for young Saudis of both genders to debate issues of importance to them—mirroring Bukhari’s vision of democratizing access to the visual arts in the kingdom. Consequently, Saudi comedians have expanded their repertory to include issues that were rarely discussed earlier: criticism of select members of the royal family, the experiences of Saudis abroad, interfamily relations, health issues, and, most strikingly, racism. Although jokes are made in Arabic and focus on local issues, they retain both a cosmopolitan and a global framework—a reflection of an audience that is largely bilingual (Arabic and English) and consumes culture from around the world. Indeed, Fluffy, a Hispanic American comedian from California, has performed to sold-out audiences in Saudi Arabia, and his comedy shows are among the most watched on YouTube in the kingdom.131 Although Howarth-Lees and Akhtar had produced stand-up comedy shows that included comedians who delivered jokes only in Arabic, the first stand-up comedy show entirely in Arabic was held in 2010 at Al-Feisal University in Riyadh. As Mississippi Ibrahim, one of the comedians who performed that day, later remembered, it was a chaotic learning experience.132 Neither the comedians nor the organizers were absolutely certain that they knew how to produce a comedy show or even how to sell tickets

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to one. Still, more than 1,200 people attended, providing clear evidence there is a viable market in the kingdom for stand-up comedy in Arabic.133 A Mass Saudi Phenomenon

The all-Arabic stand-up comedy show ushered in several changes for stand-up comedy as a genre of art and for the emerging class of Saudi stand-up comedians. To begin with, the Saudi state took a direct interest for the first time in stand-up comedy, with the Riyadh municipality and other government agencies sponsoring stand-up comedy shows.134 Thanks to government aid, stand-up comedy shows were now increasingly held in large public buildings or public spaces in cities, including football stadiums. These spaces were accessible to most ordinary Saudi males, making stand-up comedy far more of a mass phenomenon than it had ever been in the English-language shows. In addition, stand-up comedians were regularly asked to perform at other smaller events—including, remarkably, a workshop on the Quran.135 The new venues hosting stand-up comedy revealed that many Saudis had come to see the art form as “socially acceptable”—one that provides a framework to handle sensitive social matters without running afoul of the government or the groups that had fueled the debates about Ṭāš mā Ṭāš. This point was made by a pioneer of Saudi stand-up comedy, Ahmed Fataldin, who told the New York Times that the one-person format of standup comedy eliminates the need for the type of slapstick and multiperson storytelling that is a staple of traditional Arab humor and Ṭāš mā Ṭāš.136 Furthermore, unlike Ṭāš mā Ṭāš, stand-up comedy in Saudi Arabia is not married to the worldview of the capital. Rather, it allows all Saudis, regardless of region, to feel as if they are included in a distinctly Saudi genre of stand-up comedy. One young Saudi, Hassan Mansouri, who had attended stand-up shows as a student in Colorado, made this clear when he told the New York Times in 2011 that “it was nice to see a Saudi flavor” to stand-up comedy.137 Even socially and religiously conservative Saudis began to attend Arabic stand-up comedy shows. In one instance, a Saudi stand-up comedian did a routine with obscene jokes in front of an audience that included a man who sported a long beard, a symbol of Islamic piety. He was accompanied by a woman who wore an ʿabāʾa and the niqāb, the black piece of cloth that is worn by conservative Saudi women to cover the whole face except for the eyes.138 After the show, the comedian sought out the bearded man and apologized to him for the type of language in his jokes, asking forgiveness if he had been offended. Much to the comedian’s surprise, the man responded enthusiastically, noting that he had enjoyed the show and thought the comedian was awesome.139 This was totally different from the confronta-

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tional approach that Ṭāš mā Ṭāš’s producers had taken with similar Saudis, instead following the conciliatory approach taken by Gharem to resolve the controversy over Ṣirāṭ. Luxury Entertainment: “Together Nothing Is Impossible”

In 2010, a new media company, Luxury Entertainment, was founded by Prince Khaled bin Mansour al-Saud. Housed in the prince’s palace in southern Riyadh, the company aims to be as transformative as Google was a decade earlier. Luxury Entertainment seeks to raise awareness of the arts, develop new talent in stand-up comedy and many other artistic genres, market performers and other clients through different media platforms, and put on visually stimulating stand-up comedy shows. However, the process has been far from easy. Not only has there been resistance to the company’s efforts to promote comedy and other arts that bring people together in public, but Luxury has also had to educate the public about what stand-up comedy is.140 However, under the motto “Together Nothing Is Impossible,” Luxury Entertainment has fashioned a unique social space for itself in the kingdom through innovative programs, investments, and marketing campaigns. Following the stand-up show at Al-Faisal University in Riyadh, Luxury worked in 2012 with Fahad Albutairi and other leading comedians to put on a new stand-up comedy show entitled Revolution—in the middle of the Arab Spring! That show was the first of dozens to benefit from increasingly sophisticated audiovisual technology and online and offline marketing campaigns of a size and sophistication that were unprecedented in Saudi Arabia—and throughout the Middle East, for that matter. In short, an entertainment company in the mold of San Francisco’s legendary Bill Graham Productions had been born in Saudi Arabia.141 When I visited the company’s comfortable modern offices in Riyadh in 2013, a diverse staff of men and women, fluent in both Arabic and English worked on a variety of projects.142 They designed advertising campaigns for multinational corporations, managing a varied roster of Saudi and foreign performers. These have included such comedians as Albutairi; rappers and hip-hop artists such as Qusai; Ahmed al-Bayed and other illusionists; and a freestyle dance troupe that features football players from around the world. Like the managers of Jeddah’s art galleries, Luxury’s agents work closely with performers to develop them professionally and broaden their presence on the web. For example, the number of Twitter followers for each performer is prominently displayed in promotional materials. Several managers are also aspiring comedians. Prince Khaled stands at the center of the company’s operations, participating in virtually every major decision.143 Luxury’s stand-up comedy shows are high-profile public events that promote its various talents. They bear a striking resemblance to football

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matches in the kingdom, a fact that is perhaps a reflection of Prince Khaled’s youthful passion for An-Naṣr, one of Riyadh’s top football clubs. The shows, which are aimed chiefly at Arabic-speaking men, are advertised on Arabic social media and large public signs in Arabic.144 For example, Luxury sent this tweet out for Street Madness 2, a comedy show in Riyadh, which read (in Arabic): “Oh, Šabāb. It only lasts three days. #Street_Madness2 #Riyadh. And free admission! We’re waiting for you.”145 @LuxuryKSA_, January 20, 2014.146 As with Saudi football games, Luxury’s comedy shows can become highly rowdy and are therefore routinely policed by the national guard. Like rock concerts in the West, Luxury’s comedy shows feature state-ofthe-art lighting, sounds, sets, and special effects. Equally important, they draw huge crowds: 11,000 people to one show alone. In a kingdom of 30 million, the only form of public entertainment that comes close to drawing those numbers is the national sport, football.147 Mississippi Ibrahim

Few individuals have taken more advantage of the Arabization of Saudi comedy and benefited more from Luxury Entertainment’s model of standup comedy than Mississippi Ibrahim. The energetic and bright comedian grew up in Kharj, just outside of Riyadh, in a family of educated professionals. His comedic outlook draws on his belief that he and other comedians have a great potential for sparking social change. His material uniquely reflects his life experiences, beginning with the paradoxes of growing up with dark skin in a country where racism is not supposed to exist. In fact, national leaders are often photographed surrounded by guards who, like Ibrahim himself, are of African descent. In reality, Ibrahim has argued, racism in Saudi Arabia is “like a ghost,” for it hangs over social situations, including his own work as a comedian. Unfortunately, Ibrahim has been threatened by anonymous texts and other cowardly methods for his challenges of Saudi attitudes toward race.148 Such explosive issues even extend to seemingly apolitical forums, such as sports. For example, he has been criticized for supporting Al-Hilāl, the Riyadh football team associated with whites (i.e., Arabs), the royal family, and the city’s elite, instead of An-Naṣr, the Riyadh team associated with commoners and people of African descent. Race and football are potent issues in the kingdom, where fans of different clubs treat each other as members of hostile tribes and are therefore compelled to sit in separate sections of stadiums. To counter such intense passions, the managers of Saudi Arabia’s premier football league had five young men appear on the pitch before a game between Al-Hilāl and An-Naṣr in November 2013, holding a sign that read, “We are five different races, but we are all Saudis.”149

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Racism, however, is not the only issue that animates Ibrahim’s humor and agenda for social change—which is a good thing, as the Saudi government in 2017 asked stand-up comedians to avoid racism as a topic altogether.150 Ibrahim also attacks religious extremism and obesity, a condition that killed a friend of his, inspiring him to work with a medical researcher to try to determine why obesity kills more Saudis than auto accidents do. Like many men who grew up in the kingdom during the 1980s and 1990s, he attended neighborhood summer camps that stressed strict adherence to Islamic traditions. Although the camps ignited his interest in theatrical performance, they also prompted him to consider briefly whether he should take up jihad in South Asia—thankfully, a choice he did not make. Fundamentally, however, this experience points to what Ibrahim sees as comedy’s essential role as a vehicle for bridging the gap between a conservative older generation and their worldly children, which plagues Saudi families and the society at large to this day.151 In this respect, Ibrahim shares Ajlan Gharem’s view of art as a tool to reconcile generational differences.152 Nevertheless, Ibrahim does not limit himself to Saudi culture and society. Much like the artists in the Saudi Arts Movement, he is a rooted cosmopolitan, seeing himself as part of the “global village”—a cultural community created by communication technology, in which racism and other social ills have impacted many people, not just Saudis with African features. For Ibrahim, social media have been instrumental in building links between himself, other comedians, and his public. But these links were not created overnight: it took Ibrahim many attempts to figure out the right times and circumstances to connect with fans. In addition, as with Mater, the internet has been a tool to educate Ibrahim about how other people in the world have approached the issues he cares most about. The choice of “Mississippi” as his stage name reflects this global cultural awareness and his desire to link his comedy to the struggle of African Americans for civil rights in the United States. When he took the name, Ibrahim knew that the members of his primary audience would be familiar with that struggle through American popular culture, thanks to the pirates and the experiences of Saudis who had studied in the United States.153 “We Are All Minorities”

Another Saudi comedian who has focused on race and sees himself as part of a larger multiethnic world is Khaled Mos. But his worldview was shaped by Jeddah, a very different city than Riyadh, where racial lines are crystal clear. This difference has been personified by a joke about how people in the two cities react to seeing a black man driving a fancy car. In Riyadh, it is assumed that he is a chauffeur; whereas in Jeddah, it is assumed that he

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is the owner. Such racial distinctions are impossible to maintain in Jeddah, where, as Mos is fond of saying, “We are all minorities.”154 Mos’s large and tightknit family is racially and nationally diverse, with family members from Central Asia, India, Lebanon, Nigeria, Sudan, and Syria. One of his cousins is married to a Mexican. Family photos look like a poster for the United Nations or an ad for the United Colors of Benetton. Mos and three of his siblings have graduate degrees from Western universities. One of his brothers-in-law is an accomplished physician. Like all his relatives, Mos has a strong command of English—a skill that allows him to write the first draft of his jokes in that language (otherwise unheard of in Saudi Arabia) and to immerse himself in the work of stand-up comedians as varied as Dave Chappelle, Richard Pryor, Eddie Griffin, and Louis C.K. At the same time, he has ties to the other end of the ideological spectrum, having studied for nine years in Salafi schools, an experience that left him with a deep knowledge of the Quran and Islamic tradition in general, even if he rejected Salafism’s absolutist worldview.155 With the strong encouragement of his extended family, Mos looked for materials to master stand-up comedy, which he then used in his Luxury audition. His initial and subsequent success reflects his wide cultural and personal experiences, which have given him an intelligent understanding of a wide variety of social groups, from whom he borrows freely, switching from one to another during his act (see Photo 4). He looks at comedy as far more than a form of amusement. Rather, it is an art that allows Saudi society to expand the boundaries of what is “acceptable” to discuss.156 Among the topics that Mos explores is the practice of black Saudis’ using whitening creams to improve their job prospects. He also lampoons how different minorities in Jeddah refuse to allow their children to marry “other” minorities. One of Mos’s favorite topics is interracial dating. For example, he tells a joke about how young black Saudis utilize racism to their own advantage. When a black suitor wishes a relationship to end, he says, the man professes his undying love for his “white” girlfriend by asking to meet her family. Normally, this would be the first step toward marriage, so the suitor knows his request will be denied, and the relationship can soon end. Such humor suggests that Saudi society is beginning to use comedy to move toward creating a context in which issues that need to be aired can be raised in a broad and public way. At its deepest, this trend is an attempt to demonstrate to the world the humanity not only of Arabs but of everyone. In the dazzling light of such a context, Arabs are not a “they” but a “we.” Alcomedy

By the end of 2012, Mos’s hometown, Jeddah, was an emerging center of stand-up comedy with the opening of the Alcomedy Club, the first of its kind

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Photo 4. Khalid Mos performing at the Alcomedy Club, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, January 2018. Copyright © Khalid Mos. Courtesy of Khalid Mos.

in Saudi Arabia. The club arose out of a partnership between the Saudi Arabian Society for Culture and Arts (SASCA), a government organization, and a group of local stand-up comedians who were searching for a space where they could practice.157 Throughout the early stages of creating the club, SASCA was essential in winning the necessary government permits, playing a role analogous to that of Fady Jameel for the artists of Edge of Arabia. One of the principal comedians involved in founding the club was Yaser Baker, a Jeddah-based comedian whose life resembles that of many of the other early voices in Saudi stand-up comedy. Baker had little formal training in the arts, graduating (like Hussein) from KFUPM, where he studied engineering. Just as many Saudi stand-up comedians had professional careers outside the arts, Baker and his colleagues at Alcomedy had “normal” careers in the private sector before founding the club. Like Albutairi’s humor, Baker’s was shaped by Jerry Seinfeld and other leading American comedians of the 1990s. The Jeddah-based performer sees stand-up comedy as a mechanism to move Saudi humor away from storytelling and toward a more observational and socially conscious humor.158 As of 2017, Baker ran Alcomedy full-time with a group of other comedians from Jeddah. The club, which is housed in SASCA’s auditorium, regularly hosts comedy shows on Thursday evenings, the start of the Saudi weekend. For two days a month, the club hosts stand-up comedy shows. In

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addition, it puts on an improv performance one night a month, and a comic play one night a month.159 The comedians are usually allowed to address any theme they want, so long as they don’t touch on politics, religion, sex, and, in recent years, racism.160 Since 2012, the club has hosted over 150 comedians, including some of the leading stand-up performers in Saudi Arabia, such as Rehman Akhtar and Mississippi Ibrahim.161 Although Jeddah has a large English-speaking community and has hosted some of the first English-language stand-up comedy shows in Saudi Arabia, Alcomedy’s management has decided to focus on local content and talent. Omar Khaled, one of the comedians who founded the club with Baker, explained this decision to the Arab News in May 2017. “Not that we are not interested in an English audience,” Khaled said, “but they already have this type of entertainment in their compounds, embassies, and consulates.”162 In fact, the club’s original name, the Jeddah Comedy Club, Khaled added, was changed to Alcomedy to better associate the club’s “brand” with local culture and identity.163 When there is a show at Alcomedy, the club looks and feels pretty much like comedy venues anywhere else in the world. There is a stage, a spotlight, a microphone, and a large sign with the club’s name in Arabic and in English. During the performances, the comedians are routinely allowed only ten minutes on stage, where they are expected to make the audience laugh while talking about daily life in Saudi Arabia.164 There is seating for only 200 people, creating an intimate feel that is different from the large Luxury stand-up comedy venues. Whereas Luxury’s shows are usually aimed exclusively at men, the Alcomedy Club accepts mixed audiences, although they must sit in segregated seating. Popcorn and other refreshments are served, but alcohol, a staple of US comedy clubs, is not. There is also an admission charge, but it is kept reasonable to compete with other entertainment in Jeddah.165 Baker and his colleagues have also organized outdoor comedy festivals in Jeddah, Ta’if, and, most recently, the holy city of Mecca.166 In keeping with other Saudi stand-up comedians of his generation, Baker worked hard to address the concerns of pious Meccans, assuring them and the local authorities that the city’s stand-up comedy shows would draw from local talent and be appropriate for Saudi families.167 Over the last few years, Baker and the Alcomedy staff have also organized tours by Saudi stand-up comedians to Dubai and the United States.168 Moreover, in April 2017, Alcomedy worked with Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman’s foundation, MiSK, to sponsor an episode of CNN’s Inside the Middle East that focused on Baker, Saudi stand-up comedy, and Alcomedy.169 Every two weeks, Baker holds auditions at Alcomedy to identify new Saudi stand-up talent, thereby encouraging the next generation of comedians in much the same way that Mater and Gharem have mentored young

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artists. In fact, Baker has said that he sees the club as “a mini-school to graduate Saudi talent.”170 A key part of that process is Alcomedy’s close partnership with the Time Talent Agency, a company that manages stand-up comedians and other performers in Saudi Arabia. Headed by Princess Ameera al-Taweel, a former wife of Saudi billionaire Prince Walid bin Talal, the agency aims to expand the number of comedians in the kingdom and the Saudi public’s openness to art and creativity.171 Conclusion On February 3, 2011, together with the Saudi government, Luxury sponsored “The Fluffy Tour,” a comedy festival headlined by Fluffy, which also featured a group of American and Saudi comedians. Among the Saudis who were asked to perform that day with Fluffy were two pioneers of Saudi comedy, Albutairi and Khairallah. Luxury marketed the event on Facebook and Twitter, capitalizing on Fluffy’s fan base in the kingdom.172 Ticket prices for the festival were expensive, with front-row VIP seats costing 500 riyals ($133).173 There was intense interest in the festival, with Saudis welcoming Fluffy on social media from the moment he arrived in Jeddah.174 The Saudis’ strong reactions to the festival in part reflected the factors that had transformed the kingdom over the past decade, paving the way for the rise of the Saudi stand-up comedy scene. These factors included: the thousands of Saudis who had studied in the United States, funded by the King Abdullah Scholarship Program; the accessibility of high-quality US and global cultural products, thanks to the internet and pirated online materials; the gradual liberalization of Saudi society under King Abdullah; and the rise of a new class of Saudi stand-up comedians who present a different vision of comedy and satire than previously existed in the kingdom. However, the comedy festival was not held in one of the kingdom’s major cities, where most Saudis reside, but in a remote desert location.175 As National Public Radio’s Deborah Amos noted in a story that she filed for the network about the festival, stand-up comedy fans in Saudi Arabia had to drive 80 miles (129 kilometers) from Riyadh, “past remote villages and Bedouin tents,” to get to the site.176 Once they arrived at the remote location, she added, they had to endure multiple hours outdoors in the midday sun without air conditioning.177 Nonetheless, hundreds of young Saudis made the journey to the festival, arriving on time, a remarkable feat for a people who are infamous for being late. As he surveyed the audience, moments before the show started, Albutairi told Amos, “It’s an act of God. Ninety-five percent full, and it’s ten minutes before the show.”178 The presence of so many fans was a strong

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sign that an important part of the kingdom’s society had accepted stand-up comedy, even if most of the jokes that day were delivered in English. The festival, where men and women mixed freely, was a world away from the strict gender segregation of Riyadh. The “real Saudi Arabia,” Albutairi explained to Amos, “is somewhere in between.”179 That comment shows a key insight that distinguishes stand-up comedians in Saudi Arabia— namely, their awareness that there are multiple and perhaps even contradictory social realities possible in the kingdom at any one time. Albutairi and others had learned that they are most successful when they retain the support of the government while appealing to many different groups in the kingdom. As we have seen with Ṭāš mā Ṭāš, it is not sufficient to have government support without the approval of a significant portion of Saudi society. Fluffy, Albutairi, and the other Saudi comedians earned a far more vigorous response from the Saudi audience than did their US colleagues, even though the latter were seasoned professionals. The local comedians, all of whom were amateurs at the time, were especially effective at providing intellectual frameworks through comedy to help their fellow Saudis contemplate two controversial issues at the forefront of Saudi society: the Arab Spring uprisings, especially the one in Egypt; and the Saudi government’s ineffective response to the massive floods in Jeddah in January 2011, with the subsequent collapse of the city’s infrastructure.180 Of the two issues, the political crisis in Egypt was the more significant. That issue, Albutairi told Amos, was “all about the people; there are millions who agree on one thing. You got to listen to them.”181 Through listening to those voices and crafting jokes to express their outrage, Albutairi and many other Saudi stand-up comedians effectively became organic intellectuals, filling a role analogous to that of the Saudi Arts Movement. One Saudi comedian whose work that day followed in the footsteps of Gharem and Mater was Khairallah. Mixing Arabic and English, he began by saying, “Egypt—it’s a big problem.”182 He went on to tell the audience that Egypt’s embattled president, Hosni Mubarak, might soon visit Jeddah in much the same way that former Tunisian president Ben Ali had come to the Red Sea city after his government was toppled by massive street protests in January 2011. Of course, once the Egyptian leader came to the flooded Red Sea port, Khairallah added, Mubarak would travel around the city “on jet skis.”183 That joke won a hearty laugh from the audience, who understood that it was not really about Egypt and the Arab Spring, but about the Saudi government’s response to the devastating floods in Jeddah.184 At the end of the show, Albutairi focused on the festival’s audience, telling them to “give yourself a round of applause.”185 By making this comment, he signaled that he saw the comedy festival as a collective experience, akin to the art gallery for the Saudi Arts Movement or the majlis for Saudi society in general. Moreover, Albutairi expected the audience mem-

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bers—all of whom, like him, were young—to take the jokes and the dialogue back home with them and spread the word. After all, the audience members represented the majority of the country and held the future in their hands. As Albutairi told Amos, “We’re changing things little by little, but we are changing, and it’s happening. The youth is the future.”186 * * * Albutairi’s comments and the 2011 stand-up show in the Saudi desert bring us back to a central question of this chapter: Why did stand-up comedy flourish in the kingdom in the first decade of the twenty-first century? After all, stand-up comedy is an act by a performer who is standing alone on a stage, seeming to be speaking his (or her) own mind. One practitioner, Will Ferrell, has called the process “hard, lonely, and vicious.”187 Although the term stand-up did not enter the American lexicon until the 1960s,188 its roots in the United States extend back to the nineteenth-century comic lectures of Mark Twain and then to vaudeville.189 The latter often featured comic pairs, such as Burns and Allen or Gallagher and Shean, but also presented individual comedians such as Bert Williams or Frank Fay.190 However, the comedian who made stand-up comedy a staple of American entertainment in the modern era was Bob Hope.191 Stand-up comedy features rapid-fire jokes, one atop another, and an intense, immediate relationship between the comedian and the audience. The members of comedy teams speak to each other, whereas stand-up comedians speak directly to the people in front of them. If the audience members are not laughing, the monologists will sometimes urge them to do so. How does this figure, alone onstage, flourish in the context of Saudi cultural pluralism? Isn’t that comedian, by definition, an emblem of individualism—a solitary figure on an otherwise empty stage? In fact, many stand-up comedians in the West play the role of eccentric figures, even madmen. One need only think of Jonathan Winters or Robin Williams.192 In the final analysis, stand-up humor has offered Saudis a mechanism to present social criticism and satire without any of the cultural baggage associated with older forms of Saudi comedy. A stand-up comedian can raise almost any topic, including very sensitive subjects involving mixed groups, without the need to have male and female actors onstage. This is a significant advantage in a society that has strictly regulated groups by gender and has had very different regional definitions of comedy. Although it would be hard to imagine Al-Qasabi performing at either a Quran workshop or in Mecca, Saudi stand-up comedians have performed in both venues, along with more modern ones, such as Western residential compounds. The success of stand-up comedians in these different settings is a great testament to their insights into Saudi politics, and their recognition

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that satire in the kingdom requires them to retain the support of the government and most of society. Indeed, stand-up comedians in Saudi Arabia have worked to build bridges across society. Saudi comedians have been able to build those bridges in part because they never present themselves as either individuals or as defenders of a given side in society—as Ṭāš mā Ṭāš did for years. Rather, they function as the conscience of the crowd, expressing truths that are apparent to but unspoken by the audience. As Omar Hussein has observed, stand-up comedians in Saudi Arabia “reflect something that is happening in our community in a comical manner, and it’s up to you to decide what’s right and wrong.”193 Consequently, everyone who attends a stand-up comedy performance in the kingdom is “in on the joke” and therefore is invited to become a comedian, too, just as everyone who attends an art gallery is invited to become an artist. Within this collective milieu, stand-up comedians are truth-tellers—the articulate voices of the audience, of which they often implicitly ask, “Isn’t that right? Isn’t that true?” Although they are lone figures onstage, they are also Everymen, the representatives of our secret selves suddenly appearing in public spaces. This role liberates stand-up comedians—much as exoteric art liberates visual artists—from “owning” the meaning of their art. They are really social mirrors, whose job, to paraphrase the late American comedian Joan Rivers, is to “say the things that everyone else has thought but has not really verbalized.”194 Notes

1. Author in conversation with Khaled Mos, January 2014. 2. Ibid. 3. Habib Toumi, “Saudi Prince Banned from Media over Racist Slur,” Gulf News, April 27, 2015. 4. For more on this controversy, see Sana Uqba, “Dark-Skinned and Beautiful: Challenging Saudi Arabia’s Perception of Beauty,” New Arab, March 8, 2017, www.alaraby.co.uk; Mat Nashed, “The Arab World Needs to Admit It’s Racist,” Middle East Eye, April 6, 2017, www.middleeasteye.net; Ali al-Ghamdi, “Saudis Are Not Racists and Must Speak Out Against It,” Al-Arabiya English, January 19, 2017, https://english.alarabiya.net; Ali al-Ghamdi, “Saudis Are Not All Racists,” Saudi Gazette, January 24, 2017; and “The ‘Rosa Parks of Saudi Arabia’ Wants to End Racism and Sexism in the Best Way,” Makers, June 15, 2016, www.makers.com/blog. 5. For more on skin bleaching in Saudi Arabia, see Sofia Guellaty, “Let’s Be Fair,” Vogue, July 16, 2013. 6. Mos, conversation. 7. Ibid. 8. Annalisa Pavan, “The Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques’ Overseas Scholarship Program: Targeting Quality and Employment,” World Journal of Education 7, no. 4 (2017): 34. 9. Hisham Fageeh, “YouTube, Humor, and Politics in Saudi Arabia,” master’s thesis, Columbia University (2016), 7.

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10. Ibid., 8. 11. Author in conversation with Mississippi Ibrahim, October 2013. 12. Dion Nissenbaum, “Saudi Casting Call: One Kiss and It’s Over for Women,” McClatchyDC, June 10, 2009. 13. His statement brings to mind the Egyptian expression “al-Aṭraš fil Zaffa” (“the deaf in the wedding party/procession”)—which describes people whose thoughts are in a very different place from where they are physically. For more on this expression, see L. L. Wynn, Pyramids and Nightclubs: A Travel Ethnography of Western and Arab Imaginations of Egypt, from King Tut and the Colony of Atlantis to Rumors of Sex Orgies, Urban Legends About a Marauding Prince, and Blonde Belly Dancers (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2007), 231, n.15. 14. Hisham Fageeh, “Dating Saudi-Style,” interview by Mars Yupilami, Exberliner, February 16, 2016. 15. Yupilami, “Hisham Fageeh.” 16. Ibid. 17. This included comedians on the Axis of Evil Comedy Tour, Fluffy (i.e., Gabriel Iglesias), Dave Chappelle, and other US stand-up comedians. 18. Yupilami, “Hisham Fageeh.” 19. Ibid. 20. Ibid. 21. For instance, see Fahad Albutairi retweeted and translated into Arabic, Abdulnasser Gharem’s English-language tweet about what happens when an artist becomes a mirror and angers society. Fahad Albutairi (@fahad), “Aḥyānan ‘indamā taṣbaḥu mara’a—kafannān—t’aiksu limujtamii’ki ḥaqīqathum, yanfa‘lūn.” Tweet, June 29, 2017, https://twitter.com/Fahad/status/880423433699557377, and Fageh, Kalthami, et al., conversation (2013). 22. Pascal Ménoret, “Saudi TV’s Dangerous Hit,” Le Monde diplomatique, trans. Pascale Ghazaleh, September 2004, http://kit.mondediplo.com/spip.php ?article3990. 23. Ibid. 24. Robert Lacey, Inside the Kingdom (New York: Penguin, 2009), 324. 25. Ménoret, “Saudi TV’s Dangerous Hit.” 26. Lacey, Inside the Kingdom, 324. 27. Ménoret, “Saudi TV’s Dangerous Hit.” 28. “Satire and Political Protest in Saudi Arabia,” Muftah, July 12, 2012, https:// muftah.org. 29. Ménoret, “Saudi TV’s Dangerous Hit.” 30. ‘Abdulaziz bin Abdullah Āl as-Šaiḵ, ‘Abdullah bin ‘Abd Ar-Raḥmān alḠadiān, Bakr bin ‘Abd Aḷḷāh Abū Zīd, and Ṣāliḥ bin Fauzān af-Fauzān, “Bayān min alLajna Dā’ima liBuḥūṭ al-‘Ilmīya al-Iftā‘ biša’n Taḥrīr al-Musalsalāt al-Muḵālifa lilaššar‘ al-Muṭahhar wa minhā Musalasal (Ṭāš mā Ṭāš),” Said.net, December 3, 2000, www.saaid.net. 31. As-Šaiḵ, Al-Ḡadiān, Abū Zīd, and Af-Fauzān, “Bayān min al-Lajna Dā’ima liBuḥūṭ al-‘Ilmīya al-Iftā.” 32. Ménoret, “Saudi TV’s Dangerous Hit.” 33. Saad al-Muḥārib, “Badryah al-Bishr lial-Arabiya: al-Fatwā ḍidd Ṭāš mā Ṭāš lam tujid ṣadiya bi-as-Sa‘ūdīya,” Al-Arabiya, September 10, 2007, https://www. .alarabiya.net/articles/2007/09/10/38960.html#007. 34. Mahmoud Ahmad, “Tash Ma Tash Actors Receive Death Threats,” Arab News, October 27, 2004. 35. “Satire and Political Protest in Saudi Arabia.” 36. Neil MacFarquhar, “In Saudi Arabia, Comedy Cautiously Pushes Limits,” New York Times, June 11, 2011.

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37. Siobhán O’Grady, “Meet the Comedian Making Saudis Laugh About Driving Laws,” Foreign Policy, November 24, 2015. 38. Erika Solomon, “Saudi’s First Stand-Up Comic Fahad Albutairi on Humour and His Homeland,” Financial Times, February 16, 2017. 39. Saul, “Saudi Women Jailed for Driving ‘Released from Prison’ After Two Months”; Caroline Mortimer, “Saudi Arabia Jails Human Rights Activist Who Defied Women’s Driving Ban,” Independent, June 7, 2017, www.independent.co.uk; and Vaidyanathan, “Women’s Rights Activists Arrested in Saudi Ahead of Lifting of Driving Ban.” 40. Solomon, “Saudi’s First Stand-Up Comic.” 41. Ibid. 42. Ménoret, “Saudi TV’s Dangerous Hit.” 43. Ibid. 44. As-Šaiḵ, Al-Ḡadiān, Abū Zīd, and Af-Fauzān, “Bayān min al-Lajna Dā’ima liBuḥūṭ al-‘Ilmīya al-Iftā.” 45. Author in conversation with Basil al-Hilal, August 2013. Al-Hilal is a veterinarian, government official, and theater director. He studied acting and the theater at King Feisal University in Hofuf and regularly puts on plays in Riyadh and other cities. 46. Kalthami’s heritage shaped how some Saudis looked at his work, with some dismissing his jokes as funny but nonetheless “janūbī” (or southern)—an unsubtle jab at his Asiri roots. 47. Abīr Mušaḵḵis, “‘Alī al-Kalṯamī wa Kōmīdiyā al-Yūtiyūb fī as-Sa‘ūdīya,” As-Šarq Al-Ausaṭ, June 17, 2003, http://archive.aawsat.com. 48. Ménoret, “Saudi TV’s Dangerous Hit.” 49. Ibid. 50. “Saudi Arabia Approves $21 Bln Five-Year Education Plan—SPA,” Reuters, May 9, 2014, http://reuters.com, and Irfan Mohammed, “Kingdom Tops World in Education Spending,” Arab News, January 2, 2013. 51. Ibrahim Naffee, “Number of Saudi Students in America Up 6 Percent,” Arab News, January 26, 2013. 52. Suzanne Kurtz, “Thanks to Scholarship, Saudi Students Return to the U.S. in Droves,” Washington Diplomat, August 31, 2012. 53. Richard LeBaron and Stefanie Hausheer, “Americans Must Do More to Welcome Saudi Scholarship Students,” U.S. News and World Report, March 1, 2013. 54. Charles Taylor and Wasmiah Albasri, “The Impact of Saudi Arabia King Abdullah’s Scholarship Program in the U.S.,” Open Journal of Social Sciences 2 (2014): 110. 55. Ibid., 111. 56. LeBaron and Hausheer, “Americans Must Do More to Welcome Saudi Scholarship Students.” 57. Afshin Molavi, “King Abdullah: A Saudi Education Revolutionary,” AlArabiya, January 23, 2015, https://english.alarabiya.net. 58. Wafaa Fallatah, “Bilingual Creativity in Saudi Stand-up Comedy,” World Englishes 44 (2017): 3–4. 59. Ibid. 60. Ibid. 61. Solomon, “Saudi’s First Stand-Up Comic.” 62. Ibid. 63. Fahad Albutairi, “Haha, Wait, What?” Filmed December 20, 2011, Ajman, United Arab Emirates, TEDx video, 14:02, www.youtube.com.

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64. Solomon, “Saudi’s First Stand-Up Comic.” 65. Ibid. 66. Ibid. 67. Ibid. 68. Fageeh, “YouTube, Humor, and Politics,” 4. 69. Rym Ghazal, “In Saudi, We Always Found Ways to Watch New Films,” National, October 29, 2014. 70. Ibid. 71. When I lived in Riyadh in 2013 and 2014, this market still existed, but in a reduced form. Sellers of pirated goods often set up stands at meetings of foreign spouses. 72. The first DSL in Saudi Arabia was established in the early 2000s, only a few years after the first dial-up services were started in February 1999. Anthony Shoult, “Telecommunications and Information Technology,” in Doing Business with Saudi Arabia, 3rd ed., ed. Anthony Shoult (London: GMB Publishing, 2006), 430. 73. “Saudi Arabia Jails Piracy Trader in Landmark Case,” Abu-Ghazaleh Intellectual Property, February 29, 2012, www.agip.com. 74. Joanne Bladd, “Saudi Arabia Worst for Music Piracy in Gulf,” Arabian Business, June 5, 2009. 75. Hisham Fageeh, “YouTube, Humor, and Politics,” 8. 76. “Saudi Arabia Jails Piracy Trader in Landmark Case”; and Rodolfo Estimo, “New Law Enacted to Stamp Out Piracy in Saudi Arabia,” Arab News, June 6, 2012. 77. Author in conversation with Peter Howarth-Lees, January 2014. 78. Ibid. 79. Ibid. 80. Author in conversation with Todd Nims, May 2018. For more on the movie, see www.bratstory.com/about.html. 81. Ibid. 82. Ibid. 83. Howarth-Lees, conversation. 84. Ibid. 85. Hassna’a Mokhtar, “Stand-Up in Saudi? You Must Be Joking,” Arab News, March 1, 2009. 86. Howarth-Lees, conversation. 87. Ibid. 88. Ibrahim, conversation. 89. Ibid. 90. “Saudi Comedians Stand Up,” As-Asharq al-Awsat, January 30, 2014. 91. Suchitra Bajpai Chaudhary, “Hakawati: The Ancient Arab Art of Storytelling,” Gulf News, April 5, 2014. 92. Micheline Tobia, “Noufie: The First Stand-Up Saudi Comedienne,” Mashallahnews, December 10, 2010, www.mashallahnews.com. 93. Howarth-Lees, conversation; and Mokhtar, “Stand-Up in Saudi? You Must Be Joking.” 94. Ibid. 95. Ibid. 96. Ibid. 97. Ibid. 98. Ibid. 99. Ibid. 100. Howarth-Lees, conversation.

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101. Nemr remembers the night differently. He told a US audience in 2017 that he drove off the Ha’ia by pretending that he was a Secret Service agent working for the US ambassador to Saudi Arabia. For more on the Lebanese comedian’s memories from that night, see Nemr Abou Nassar, “Arabs—America’s Imaginary Enemy” (lecture, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, April 12, 2017), @NEMRCOMEDY, “NEMR: Arabs—America’s Imaginary Enemy,” YouTube Video, 1:38:33, April 12, 2017, www.youtube.com. 102. Nemr Abou Nassar in conversation with the author, May 2018. 103. Rod Leddone, “Superstar Comedian Set for San Diego Homecoming,” Del Mar Times, August 26, 2016. 104. To see an example of Nemr performing in Saudi Arabia at the time, see Smile Productions KSA, “Nemr Abou Nassar in Jeddah,” YouTube Video, 2:09, September 29, 2010, www.youtube.com. 105. Nemr Abou Nassar (@Nemrcomedy), “I never thought two days in Saudi Arabia would have such a profound effect on my life but they have,” Twitter, October 1, 2010, https://twitter.com/NEMRCOMEDY/status/26058855411. 106. Nemr Abou Nasser, @Nemrcomedy, “Thank YOU! RT @SafanaSejini: #SmileJeddahNov18 was a great event thanks to @ThaimzZz @StandupAl & @NEMRCOMEDY for their amazing performance,” Twitter, November 11, 2011, https://twitter.com/NEMRCOMEDY/status/137687780846354432. 107. Manal Assad, @manalyst, Replying to @NEMRCOMEDY We should be thanking you @NEMRCOMEDY & @SmileKSA for such a great evening! I haven’t laughed this hard in ages! #SmileJeddahNov18,” Twitter, November 11, 2011, https://twitter.com/TheManalyst/status/137694190971781122. 108. Author in conversation with Rehman Akhtar, January 2014. 109. Akhtar, conversation; author in conversation with Todd Nims, January 2014; Howarth-Lees, conversation. 110. Rehman Akhtar, Rehman and Friends: Live in Dhahran Stand-Up Comedy Show, Saudi Arabia, Show2 (Dhahran, Saudi Arabia: Rehman Akhtar, 2010). I thank Rehman Akhtar for providing me with a copy of this show. 111. Akhtar, conversation. 112. Rehman Akhtar, “Rehman and Friends Are back in Town for 2 Laugh-OutLoud Shows on: Wed 3rd April and Thurs 4th April 2013,” Facebook, April 3, 2013, www.facebook.com/events/294588830669060/. 113. For more on Aramco and its history, see Robert Vitalis, The American Kingdom (Palo Alto: Stanford University Press, 2007). 114. Mohammad (@Mohammad___ ),“@ComedymanDotCom The thing is many people would love to come but they can’t get into Aramco!” Twitter, March 10, 2013, https://twitter.com/ComedymanDotCom/status/309308332966035457. 115. Akhtar, conversation. 116. In late May 2018, KFUPM announced that it would allow women to attend the university’s MA and PhD programs in mathematics, statistics, computer engineering and sciences, public administration, and engineering management. By contrast, the university’s undergraduate programs, which accounted for over 80 percent of student enrollment, remained all male. “KFUPM Opens Doors for Women Students,” Saudi Gazette, May 24, 2018. 117. Akhtar, Rehman and Friends Stand-Up Comedy Show. 118. Akhtar was not kidding. His Facebook wall for that period is filled with comments about the show, both him advertising the show and fielding comments on it. 119. Akhtar, Rehman and Friends Stand-Up Comedy Show. 120. The name is how Saudis would text the Arabic phrase “On the side.”

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121. Gilbert Ramsey and Sumayah Fatani, “The New Saudi Nationalism of the New Social Media,” in Political Islam and Global Media: The Boundaries of Religious Identity, ed. Noha Mellor and Khalil Rinnawi (New York: Routledge, 2016), 191. 122. Akhtar, Rehman and Friends Stand-Up Comedy Show. 123. To see pictures from the show, including of Hussein’s pink shirt, go to: Rehman Akhtar, “Rehman and Friends—Show 2,” Facebook, November 8, 2009, www.facebook.com/rehman.akhtar/media_set?set=a.178570675828.132045.619500828 &type=3. 124. Akhtar, Rehman and Friends Stand-Up Comedy Show; and Akhtar, Rehman and Friends: Live in Dhahran Stand-Up Comedy Show, Saudi Arabia, Show2. 125. Ibid. 126. For his part, Albutairi has said that the only reason that people have made the connection between him and Seinfeld is because of his hair and demeanor: “It’s because of the Jewfro and the eyes and the glasses, and just the whole thing—the schnozzle. And it’s because I work safe and I work clean on stage.” Solomon, “Saudi’s First Stand-Up Comic.” 127. Ali Kalthami served as the cameraman. Akhtar, Rehman and Friends StandUp Comedy Show; and Akhtar, Rehman and Friends: Live in Dhahran Stand-Up Comedy Show, Saudi Arabia, Show2. 128. Abdullah Nidal Mohiuddin, Facebook Instant Message to the author, June 1, 2018. 129. Rehman Akhtar, “Rehman and Friends—Show 2.” 130. “Saudi Comedians Stand Up.” 131. To see Fluffy’s stand-up comedy routine on his trip to Saudi Arabia in 2013, go to Gabriel Iglesias (@Gabriel Iglesias), “Fluffy Visits Saudi Arabia—Gabriel Iglesias (from Aloha Fluffy: Gabriel Iglesias Live from Hawaii),” YouTube video, April 27, 2013, www.youtube.com. The trip was his second to the kingdom. His first was in February 2011. To see pictures of that visit, go to Luxury KSA (@LuxuryKSA), “The Fluffy Tour—Riyadh—with Gabriel Iglesias,” Facebook photographs post, March 13, 2011, www.facebook.com/LuxuryEventsKSA/photos/a .199675906722693.52325.108515492505402/199676723389278/?type=3&theater. 132. Ibrahim, conversation. 133. Ibid. 134. “Fannānūn Ašādū bijuhūd Amānat ar-Riyāḍ litanẓīm fa‘‘ālīyiāt aš-Šabāb biaṣ-ṣālāt,” Sabq, July 30, 2014, https://sabq.org/Avhgde; “Stānd Ab Kōmīdī,” Eye of Riyadh, August 8, 2013, www.eyeofriyadh.com; and Mālik Rūqī (@Mālik Rūqī), “Nujūm Stānd Ab Kōmīdī..al-Iḵbārīya,” YouTube video, March 2, 2012, www .youtube.com. 135. MacFarquhar, “In Saudi Arabia, Comedy Cautiously Pushes Limits.” 136. Ibid. 137. Ibid. 138. Harry Cheadle, “What’s It Like Being a Stand-Up Comic in Saudi Arabia?” Vice, January 16, 2013, www.vice.com. 139. Ibid. 140. Author in conversation with Alaa Soued, November 2013; and author in conversation with Ammar Awaad, November 2013. 141. Ibid. 142. Luxury advertises for its positions in English on Facebook with messages such as “We’re hiring rulebreakers, questioners, straight-A students who skipped class.” Luxury KSA (@LuxuryKSA), “We’re providing you with new opportunities to join our !"#$ creative team send your resume at [email protected] ! #luxuryksa,”

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Facebook, September 27, 2016, www.facebook.com/LuxuryEventsKSA/photos/a .149930945030523.26188.108515492505402/1291056627584610/?type=3&theater. 143. Author’s field notes from visit to Luxury Productions, November 2013. 144. Adolescent Saudi girls occasionally accompany their fathers to Luxury shows in Riyadh. 145. Šabāb is an Arabic colloquial word that means “the boys” or “the male youth.” 146. Luxury KSA (@LuxuryKsa_), “Yā Šabāb bāqī bis 3 ayyām li#junūn ašŠawāri‘ 2 #ar-Riyāḍ wa ad-Duḵūl majjānan! Bintiẓārkum,” Twitter, January 20, 2014, https://twitter.com/LuxuryKSA_/status/425351412856279040. 147. Author’s field notes from visit to Luxury Comedy Show “Street Madness 2,” Riyadh, January 2014. 148. Ibrahim, conversation. 149. Ibid. 150. Aisha Fareed, “Alcomedy Club: For Humor with a Saudi Twist,” Arab News, May 5, 2017. 151. Ibrahim, conversation. 152. Denize Marray, “Art and Culture: Saudi Artists Bring Fresh Perspective to London Exhibition,” Arab News, February 3, 2016 153. Ibrahim, conversation; and Mohammed Nagadi, “Mississippi Ibrahim— Black Sarcasm,” Arab News, September 23, 2013. 154. Mos, conversation. 155. Ibid. 156. Ibid. 157. Nada Altuwaijri, “Go On, Have a Laugh: Saudi Comedians Take to the Stage in Dubai,” Alarabiya, August 31, 2013, https://english.alarabiya.net. 158. Fareed, “Alcomedy Club”; Time Entertainment, “Yasser Baker,” http://timeentertainment.com; and Inside the Middle East, “The Rise of Comedy in Saudi Arabia,” on CNN, April 20, 2017, www.msn.com. 159. Fareed, “Alcomedy Club”; Time Entertainment, “Yasser Bakr”; and Inside the Middle East, “The Rise of Comedy in Saudi Arabia.” 160. Ibid. 161. AlComedy Club, “Ḥafl nādī Jiddat lil-Kōmīdiyā aṯ-Ṯānī ‘ušr bistaḏāfa alKōmīdiyān Mīssīsibī Ibrāhim,” Facebook, June 2, 2013, www.facebook.com/events /119966524877714; and Rehman Akhtar (@Rehman Akhtar), “Rehman Akhtar— LIVE at Jeddah Comedy Club,” YouTube video, March 30, 2015, www.youtube .com. 162. Fareed, “Alcomedy Club”; and Time Entertainment, “Yasser Bakr.” 163. Fareed, “Alcomedy Club.” 164. “Jidda tuḥaḍanu awwal nādī ‘lial-Kōmīdiyā’ fī al-Mamlaka,” Bāb, April 14, 2013, www.bab.com/node/175236. 165. Fareed, “Alcomedy Club”; “Yasser Bakr”; and Inside the Middle East, “The Rise of Comedy in Saudi Arabia.” 166. Ašraf Ḥusīnī, “Ḡurfa Makka: Al-Kōmīdī Klūb Muṭābiq litaqālīd al-Mujtama‘ al-Makkī,” al-Makka, February 23, 2017, http://makkahnewspaper.com /article/594789/. 167. Ibid. 168. Danielle Gutierrez, “Sand Up Comedy Tour Brings Much-Needed Laughs from Saudi Arabia to San Francisco,” Daily Californian, November 17, 2016. 169. Inside the Middle East, “The Rise of Comedy in Saudi Arabia.” 170. Hussn Ḥāmīdwa, “Nādī ‘Jidda lial-Kōmīdiyā’ Madrasa Muṣaḡḡar lilmawāhib as-Sa‘ūdīya,” Al-Arabiya, April 14, 2013, https://www.alarabiya.net/articles.

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171. Altuwaijri, “Go On, Have a Laugh.” 172. Luxury KSA (@LuxuryKSA), “The Fluffy Tour—Riyadh—with Gabriel Iglesias,” Facebook photographs post, March 13, 2011, www.facebook.com /LuxuryEventsKSA/photos/a.199675906722693.52325.108515492505402/1996767 23389278/?type=3&theater; and see also Luxury KSA (Luxury_) “Tickets for The Fluffy Tour—Riyadh—with Gabriel Iglesias: 1. VIP: 500 SAR including front rows seats, http://on.fb.me/LuxuryEvents,” Twitter, December 29, 2010, https://twitter .com/LuxuryKSA_/status/20156637671071744. 173. Luxury KSA (Luxury_) “Tickets for The Fluffy Tour.” 174. To get a feel of the reaction, read these tweets, which make reference to the performer’s love of cakes: Muath Khlifawi (@Mo3atho), “@fluffyguy A lot of people have been asking about the best way to get you cakes here in Saudi Arabia. You will have a blast!” Twitter, January 22, 2011, 4:52 p.m., https://twitter.com/Mo3atho /status/28978354958893056; Omar al-Omaireeni, “@fluffyguy welcome to “Saudi Arabia” . . . {We are Waiting for YOU! me and my friend OSAMA . . . ),” Twitter, January 31, 2011, 10:51 p.m., https://twitter.com/omaireeni/status/32330284292640 768; Ahmed Al-Mulhim (@mulhim), “@fluffyguy tweet once you get in Saudi Arabia,” Twitter, February 2, 2011, 1:14 a.m., https://twitter.com/mulhim/status/327285 72107948032; Sara al-Eid (@SaraAlEid), “RT he’s here :D ! Welcome to saudi arabia @fluffyguy: Just landed in Jeddah Saudi Arabia. It’s 3:39pm here on Feb . . . http://tmi.me/6fS03,” Twitter, February 2, 4:52 a.m., https://twitter.com/SaraAlEid /status/327832991978 00449; AlEisa (@al3isa), “Are u here in consultation visa ;-p RT @fluffyguy: Just landed in Jeddah Saudi Arabia. It’s 3:39pm here on Feb 2nd. My internal clock is all screwed up :p,” http://tl.gd/8i6ban,” Twitter, February 2, 2011, 5:38 a.m., https://twitter.com/al3isa/status/32793010160799744; NoufLRD (@NoufLRD), “@fluffyguy Welcome to Saudi Arabia, can’t wait for your show in Khobar :D,” Twitter, February 2, 2011, 6:14 p.m., https://twitter.com/Nouf LRD/status/32985361579778048; Maxito (@MaxitoSikEm), “that’s sounds good @fluffyguy: I’m at a McDonalds in Khobar Saudi Arabia. They got a chicken Big Mac. I’m (cont) http://tl.gd/8jod7m,” Twitter, February 4, 2011, 7:29 a.m., https://twitter.com/MaxitoSikEm/status/33547821789478912; I’m Famous (@Haifa_Ardhi), “@fluffyguy so how’s Saudi Arabia, Khobar so far?(: do u like it here? I can’t wait to see u, @Deanofcomedy and @FAHA_D