A Steel Rose Takes Shape at Riyadh’s Tuwaiq Sculpture Symposium

At the seventh edition of the Tuwaiq Sculpture Symposium, sculptor Raya Qassisiyah presents “Warda,” a new large-scale metal work rooted in personal memory, developed through a practice that treats material, time, and touch as part of the same language.

At Riyadh’s Tuwaiq Sculpture Symposium, currently running under the theme “Features of What Will Be,” Raya Qassisiyah’s latest sculpture frames remembrance as something engineered into form. Titled “Warda,” the piece is conceived as a tactile, visible translation of memory into metal, built to be experienced at close range rather than kept at a distance.

Qassisiyah has said the symposium, which continues until March 8, has given her room to scale her ideas further. She describes “Warda” as her newest work and the largest she has executed to date, positioning it as a decisive moment in her artistic trajectory.

The origins of the work trace back to her master’s studies in London, where she began shaping a rose in a metal workshop using raw mild steel, chosen for its endurance and its ability to carry the marks of time gradually. Over time, the rose project moved beyond a personal starting point into a wider research direction. She has pointed to her exploration of large-scale rose models during the Islamic Arts Biennale, where her focus turned toward the blacksmith’s practice and its relationship to form-making.

Now in its seventh edition, the Tuwaiq Sculpture Symposium brings together 25 artists from 18 countries, including Saudi participants. With live sculpting and direct public engagement embedded in the format, the event places process into the city itself, inviting audiences to encounter contemporary sculpture as it is made, not only after it is finished.