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← STORIED OBJECTS / Palm Eye Flower
A collection of several dozen colorfully painted cross-sections of palm leaf stems sits on a round black background. The assemblage is photographed from a slight angle, making it appear like a rounded oval, receding into the background, highlighting the dimensionality of the eye-shaped palm paintings.

Photo by Sonya Pencheva, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives

Image Description A collection of several dozen colorfully painted cross-sections of palm leaf stems is mounted on a round metal disk. The assemblage is photographed from a slight angle making it appear like a rounded oval, receding into the background. The angle provides a view of the individual palm paintings in partial profile, showing that each is an inch or two thick and about four inches long. The palm eyes are decorated with painted images and other materials such as yarn, rope, pearls, and coffee beans. The designs reflect the different craft and occupational areas that were featured in the United Arab Emirates program.

Palm Eye Flower

For Emirati artist Azza Al Qubaisi, the date palm is a medium to examine the link between craft, heritage, and sustainability. Using date palm in art has enabled her to celebrate tradition and reinforce a connection with her ancestors.

A humble material transforms into art

  • Photo by Erin Younger, Smithsonian

After studying abroad in the UK, Al Qubaisi returned home to the United Arab Emirates and began incorporating elements of the local environment into her artwork, including these flat, eye-like shapes cut from the leaf bases of date palm. Known as kurub, these palm fibers are reminiscent of eyes and, in Al Qubaisi’s hands, have great narrative potential.

The date palm is an Emirati symbol of prosperity and abundance, coveted for its boundless uses. For thousands of years, the local community relied on date palm for survival in the harsh desert climate. Not only was the fruit eaten, but the palm was also used for building houses among countless other uses. The Emirati landscape is dotted with date palm trees—which Al Qubaisi saw as a source of sustainable, local material for making art. 

  • Photo by Sonya Pencheva, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives

To create the Palm Eye Flower at the 2022 Festival, Al Qubaisi invited other UAE program participants to paint or provide materials to decorate the palm eyes with designs and objects that represent their area of expertise. Each artfully expressed themselves in paint, collage, calligraphy, or assemblage—as did Al Qubaisi, who also affixed magnets to the back of each and set them out on round, steel disks. If you look closely, you can see green coffee beans and spices, a split falcon’s hood, delicate fish netting, and a beautiful painting of a dhow under sail.

Gallery
  • Photos by Sonya Pencheva, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives

Each piece is unique and remarkable, yet they blend together elegantly to form a dimensional flower, each petal complementing the next. These artworks leave behind lingering stories of the Festival’s participants, creating an everlasting connection to the maker’s identity. Al Qubaisi choreographed this collaborative effort twice over: creating one for the Center and one for the co-sponsoring UAE Embassy. In the vibrant array of colors and patterns, the memories of the 2022 Folklife Festival live on.

—Raneem Atiyeh, Festival intern
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