Al-Mansour Advocates for Equality Through Art

Hend Al-Mansour ’02, MFA, was recently featured in The Free Press.

As a child, Al-Mansour carved large female figures into sand. Growing up, she was acutely aware of her limited opportunities as a Saudi Arabian woman. In this article, Al-Mansour talks about her journey from being in the medical field to working as an artist who embraces women's equality and Islamic cultures.

With self-taught skills in drawing with pencil, charcoal, and colored pencils from her youth, Al-Mansour didn’t have much training or exposure because she said art education in Saudi Arabia wasn’t very good. She soon began taking classes at Minneapolis College of Art and Design and continued her education to earn her MFA in 2002.

Her recent show at the 410 Project, Portraits from the Margins, includes both paintings and prints, showcasing interviews with women in Minnesota who came from the Middle East and other Arab-speaking countries. The installation is decorated with fabric that emulates the mihrab, which is a prayer niche in the wall of the mosque. The installation is a way for Al-Mansour to take a stance and call for women’s rights and equality within the Islamic faith.

“That’s why I go to the stories that empower women that show the power and wisdom of women in Islam,” she said. “We should have a platform within Islam for women’s equality.”

Learn more

• "Woman of Islam advocates for equality through art"
  (mankatofreepress.com—April 2022)
• Al-Mansour's Website