Welcome to Rowaa Art, an Islamic art gallery in support of our parent project, El Magalla — a revivalist project that aims to disseminate the message of Islam in a way that is a pleasure to receive.

Symbolic of revival, at Rowaa Art we bring the past to the present through a preservation of the spirit of past artistic sensibilities. We hope our work is appreciated not only for its aesthetic, but for the soul it encapsulates, and the heritage and the history it attempts to honour.

El Magalla

Leaving behind familiar lands and a stable career, El Magalla is spearheaded by a medical doctor who has crossed the oceans in search of spiritual breathing space. Treating ailing bodies is a much-needed and noble vocation; more needed still is the quest to treat the ailing soul of our ummah. It may be a gamble, but it is one taken in good faith, inshaa’Allah.

Inshaa’Allah, El Magalla will bring together creative minds aligned on a vision of Islamic revival, and on a methodology of returning to the origin rather than complying with the current times.

The name is an endearment. ‘El Magalla’ was my mother’s long-held dream: a children’s magazine with which to fight the ideological decay in the Muslim ummah, and the name she gave it long before there was anything to give a name to. Her guidance and her vision shaped me into the person I am today, and I hope to fulfil her dream by carrying her revivalist vision, and her care for the younger generations, into this project.

Rowaa Art

In Arabic, the word ruwaa’ means beauty — something beautiful to behold. A fitting name for an art gallery, and a way to honour its eponym, whose guidance and vision inspired the very core of the El Magalla project.

The work hanging here is that of a husband and wife. We both share a love of Islamic art, and hope that through what we make we can share it with you.