Ahmad Tallaa

Ahmad Tallaa (b. 1994, Damascus, Syria) is a Syrian artist who lives and works in Sharjah, United Arab Emirates. He works in painting, sculpture, printmaking and handmade paper. His large portraits are built up from sand, chalk powder, pigment and acrylic on canvas. He also makes figure sculptures, and artist books from recycled materials and raw canvas.

Tallaa makes many of his own tools and materials. His gallery links the worn, rebuilt surfaces of his work to the rubble and displacement of wartime Damascus. In The Living Archive (2026) the faces are made with sand from the UAE. They are shown with sculptures of sleeping figures and a tile installation of recycled wood panels. He also makes musical instruments by hand, among them the ney, and plays the ney and the oud.

He studied at the Faculty of Fine Arts, Damascus University, from 2012 to 2017. He received the Spring Annual Exhibition Award of the Syrian Ministry of Culture in 2017 and 2019. His work has been shown at the National Center for Visual Arts, Damascus (2016 and 2020), Kalimat Gallery, Istanbul (2021) and Foundry, Dubai (2023). He held a solo show at Marsami Art Gallery, Riyadh, in 2024.