RIYADH: At the Kingdom’s inaugural Cultural Investment Conference, which opened in Riyadh on Sept. 29, auction house Sotheby’s presented a rare and significant acquisition from the Arab world: a piece by the late Safeya Binzagr, a seminal figure in the Saudi modern-art scene.  

“Coffee Shop in Madina Road” was painted in 1968, the same year in which Binzagr held her first exhibition with her peer, and fellow art pioneer, Mounirah Mosly in Jeddah.  

“(That exhibition) marked an early, visible moment for women artists in the Kingdom’s modern scene, shaping expectations for subsequent generations,” Alexandra Roy, Sotheby’s head of sale, Modern and Contemporary Middle East, told Arab News.  

Binzagr’s influence stretched well beyond her work. Perhaps even more significant is the eponymous cultural center she opened in Jeddah, which, Roy said, “cemented her role in preserving and presenting Saudi cultural narratives to the public.” 

It also helped bring through a new generation of Saudi women artists. One of the center’s former students, Daniah Alsaleh, told Arab News soon after Binzagr’s death last year: “Safeya was a true pioneer, dedicated to both art and education, and her contributions will continue to inspire many. I am incredibly grateful for the impact she had on my artistic journey.” 

“Safeya also collected traditional costumes and rarely sold or gifted unique painted works and actually stopped selling in the mid-1970s — a stance that placed artistic and cultural preservation above commercial circulation, while intensifying institutional interest and long-term esteem for her oeuvre,” Roy noted. 

That stance also means that Binzagr’s works rarely feature at auction.  

“Works like this are exceptionally scarce — making any appearance on the market a notable event — and very few are in private hands,” Roy said. “It’s from 1968, placing it at the very start of her public career and within the formative phase in which her visual language and cultural preoccupations were taking shape. 

“Seen against the backdrop of her later museum recognition, the work speaks to an artist whose practice is now preserved institutionally,” she continued. “So this early example carries both historical and documentary weight in the narrative of Saudi modern art.”