Street Cats
Al-Quds neighborhood park, Riyadh
June 2024
This photo series documents the everyday presence of street cats in Riyadh, situating them as integral participants in the city’s social and spatial landscape. Unlike the Western notion of the “stray,” these cats occupy a distinct cultural role within many MENA (Middle East and North African) urban contexts: they are communal animals, sustained through informal networks of care. Residents routinely provide food and water, and the cats, in turn, inhabit public and domestic thresholds—alleyways, courtyards, markets, and parks. Their integration into the urban environment reflects broader cultural frameworks rooted in Islamic teachings on mercy and responsibility, as well as deeply embedded social values around kinship and collective care. In a rapidly expanding metropolis marked by environmental extremes and intense development, these animals embody a kind of adaptive resilience. As figures of companionship, survival, and mutual recognition, the cats serve as quiet witnesses to the rhythms of daily life, occupying a liminal space between the human and nonhuman, the built and natural, the intimate and the overlooked.
Al-Quds neighborhood, Riyadh
June 2024
Al-Quds neighborhood park, Riyadh
June 2024
Al-Quds neighborhood, Riyadh
June 2024
Al-Falah neighborhood, Riyadh
January 2022
Al-Falah neighborhood, Riyadh
January 2022