Acrylic Painting

When I first arrived in the Emirates, I didn’t know what to expect. I had never seen the desert before, and I imagined vast emptiness, silence, and stillness. Yet what moved me most was not the desert itself, but the city that rose from it. In the heart of the sands, towers emerged—slender, almost fragile silhouettes from a distance, yet profoundly grounded and powerful as one draws closer. The skyscrapers have always fascinated me. They seem to defy gravity, suspended between الأرض and sky, reaching upward as if in quiet dialogue with the clouds. There is something paradoxical in their presence—both ethereal and unshakably real. At night, the city transforms into something even more enigmatic. Lights flicker and reflect, and I often had the sensation that the buildings were shifting, breathing, alive. The city feels less like a structure and more like an organism—constantly evolving, pulsating with unseen energy. The air, at times, can feel dense, almost overwhelming in this desert landscape.

And yet, toward sunset, something extraordinary happens. As the sun begins its descent, the entire atmosphere softens. Colors dissolve and reassemble—gold, amber, rose—washing over the facades of the buildings, transforming steel and glass into something almost fluid, almost tender. Then the wind begins to move. It arrives gently, almost imperceptibly at first, carrying with it a sense of calm. Each breath of air feels like a quiet touch, a soft reminder that even in a place defined by scale, ambition, and intensity, there is space for subtlety. I did not know, when I first came here, that the desert holds many winds—each with its own character, its own story. I discovered this later through the words of Bodour Al Qasimi in her book Let Them Know She Is Here, where she writes about the four winds of the desert. What I felt in those moments was Saba—the gentle east wind. She wrote about it “ Poets once called it the wind of lovers, for it carries fragrances and the whisper of rain. It is a softer presence, an embrace at dawn, reminding us that not all power is forceful. Some forms of strength reveal themselves through tenderness.” The City is an exploration of this contrast—between structure and fluidity, intensity and softness, permanence and change. It captures not only a physical landscape, but an emotional one: the experience of encountering a place that challenges perception and reshapes inner space. In this work, the city is not merely seen—it is felt.

Adina Mazhar is a Romanian artist based in Sharjah whose travels across Asia and the Middle East shaped a deeply personal practice, where every painting is both a confession and an invitation to explore light and shadow

NOTE: The image shown is a close up image of the Painting. The 2nd image shows the full painting, with the following images showcasing closeups of the artwork, detailing the work done by the artist.

Painting is signed by the artist

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