I approach the abstract plane through a “pile of forms;” shape, text, numbers and colors. A density is reached beyond figurative clarity, which is black with accumulation. My works, when made of wood, are uncoated, naked; when of paper, open to creasing and folding. I approach making art not by dominating, but rather by following and reacting with the material’s character. My works appear as “ruins,” the cycle of destruction visited upon my city Baghdad: its desecration and humiliation, I’m economic with color. In nature a leaf may be green for whatever reason, but in painting, why?     

– HANA MAL-ALLAH