Sophia Al-Maria (b. 1983, Tacoma, USA) is an artist, writer, and filmmaker. Her work spans many disciplines including drawing, collage, sculpture and film, and it is driven by a preoccupation with the power of storytelling and myth. Al-Maria interrogates the enduring orientalist gaze and residual histories of resource extraction and colonial authority in the context of contemporary culture and society. Her works can be viewed as a thorough investigation and dramatisation of the socio-political, economic, and environmental present, weaving together collective and personal narratives. Al-Maria has had solo exhibitions at: Henry Art Gallery, Seattle (2023); Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art, Qatar (2022); Tate Britain, London (2019); Whitney Museum of American Art, New York (2016); among other institutions. Her work has been displayed in group exhibitions at: La Biennale di Venezia, Venice (2022); LUMA Arles, Arles (2021); Palais de Tokyo, Paris (2020); Museum of Contemporary Art, Toronto (2019); Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago (2019); Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing (2017); New Museum, New York (2014); Institute of Contemporary Arts, London (2014), and numerous other venues. She was writer in residence at the Whitechapel Gallery, London. She is the author of three books: Sad Sack (Book Works, London, 2019), Virgin with a Memory (Cornerhouse Publications, Manchester, 2014), and The Girl Who Fell to Earth (Harper Perennial, New York, 2012).