Alia has been an artist and a designer since childhood. Art is a form of meditation for her, a conversation with the Almighty, expressed through colour, texture, light, and darkness. Her inner thoughts, feelings, and experiences, as well as her discussion with the divine, are shared on the canvas, through photographs, through poetry, and through the third dimension as well – be it sculpture or design of a space.

Alia’s art and design, from paintings to buildings, have won international awards and commissions, and have been featured in TV and print. Her body of work includes painting, photography, sculpture, furniture design, custom cabinetry, light fixtures, clothing and costume design, as well as graphic design.

Growing up in a household with artistic parents, she was encouraged to pursue her passion and was able to nurture and explore her creativity through art and design. This nurturing and exploration led her to receive scholarships and awards for her work in school. Her undergraduate studies were in architecture, receiving a degree from Carleton University. Growing up with a father who is an architect and a mother who is an interior designer, she was immersed in the design world, and it continues to draw her in further.

Alia has been working in the architecture and design field for well over 16 years, and started a home staging company 13 years ago, which she still continues to do, among other forms of design. Alia received a 2007 Awards for Design Excellence (ADEX) for her coffee table and lamp design and a 2013 Northwest Design Award for best contemporary room design for a house in North Vancouver. Her paintings, furniture, and lighting have also been published in four magazines, and one of her projects was featured in September 2014 on television. Alia had the privilege of taking part in an event named Dinner by Design, a charity event where selected designers were given a 12 ft by 12 ft space in CBC studios to design a dining space and an intricate “table scape”. One of her projects was included in the Contemporary Homes Tour of Western Canada, with coverage on CBC.

The sculpture on the right hand-side of the image is ‘Prostration’. The very act of submission to he who is above all else, is transformative and straddles the material and spiritual.
This sculpture depicts part of the body kneeling before the almighty in prayer and supplication. The imagery of the human kneeling before his creator is not only a powerful one but the first image that comes to my mind when thinking of the physical action of prayer. This sculpture is made from a wire mesh. The material is pliable yet has some rigidity as well. The material allows for a play of light and shadow, and when sculpting abstract human forms, the material helps to create curves similar to that of the human body. Like the human it represents, the material itself carries the properties of being able to be molded based on its surroundings whether it be negatively or positively.

The sculpture on the left hand-side of the image is ‘Prayer and Contemplation’ The second piece of this set of sculptures shows that abstract form of a body in contemplation and remembrance of the almighty and can be seen from one angle as a person standing as if to recite a prayer or zikr, and seen from a different angle, a person appears as though sitting in a meditative state. This sculpture is made from a wire mesh. The material is pliable yet has some rigidity as well. The material allows for a play of light and shadow, and when sculpting abstract human forms, the material helps to create curves similar to that of the human body. Like the human it represents, the material itself carries the properties of being able to be molded based on its surroundings whether it be negatively or positively.

As an artist, Alia has been participating in group and solo exhibitions since 1999. She has received commissions for hotels, offices and private homes across Canada since 1999. Her first solo show entitled LIGHT ran for two months in Ottawa at the Box Gallery in August 2006. Another solo show ran for three months at Espana Gallery in Vancouver in 2014.

Alia was named the winner of the Fantini Design Award, which she received in Milan in October 2017. She has had the great privilege of being the design lead for four Canadian jamatkhanas: Kingston Jamatkhana, Calgary Westwinds Jamatkhana, Downtown Toronto Jamatkhana, and Ottawa Jamatkhana. She has just completed the design for a net-zero jamatkhana which is to be built in Quebec in the near future. Alia’s greatest honour thus far was during Mawlana Hazar Imam’s Diamond Jubilee, leading the design team across Canada for his private spaces during his visits, as well as being a senior part of the team who designed and executed venue and stage designs.