songs of the h’s video installation reclaims the back of the throat as a metaphoric and literal space for healing. this part of the body holds the thyroid gland that due to intergenerational and compressed life-stressors can trigger auto-immune diseases, a challenge that ali's navigates regularly. in popular culture, this part of the body is oft referred to as the the throat chakra, a place of communication and expression, and in turns of phrase, as a place where "words get stuck." in this work, through a series of songs that are remixed in succession throughout the 18 minute and 33 second-long video, ali reclaims the throat as a space of release and of collective power, where we are not only heard but understood.
in the work's inaugural solo exhibition , lullabies for the stars in our eyes (2024) curator nura ali writes, "we witness open-ended dancing bodies that exist as both multifarious entities and as chimeric avatars. these bodies—with flesh-borders porous enough to allow solid-seeming three-dimensional letters to rise out of their skin—collapse the separation between out and in, between this and that. their pluralistic world-building allows the work in the exhibition to be both complicated and comprehensible, to have meanings and possible interpretations that change, slip and—rather like the human spirit—refuse to sit still as any one single thing." in 2023, a version of this work was previous exhibited as part of the concluding group exhibition for the drinking gourd fellowship awarded by nat turner projects at oregon contemporary in portland, oregon.
in lullabies for tears, an vr immersive installation, visitors are guided by the star, ali’s avatar, and by bakhoor, a custom scent created by the artist, on a somatic body-processing journey. The star leads viewers through shimmer- and sparkle-based breathwork that connects sensory experience with embodied reflection. In the work’s associated exhibition catalogue, Lullabies for the Stars in Our Eyes, curator Nura Ali writes that the work “is a somatic journey into our sensorial body that brings with it an awareness of the primordial nature of our senses as our first means for understanding and mediating our experience of the world, but, more importantly, it also shows us avenues for coming back to ourselves, and consequently, back to the world.”
the project was first presented as part of the multi-site ar exhibition a phosphene rifts, organized by hearth for vector festival 2024at st. claires parkette in toronto, ontario, canada. later that year, it was expanded into a full-scale immersive virtual reality (vr) installation for ali’s solo exhibition lullabies for the stars in our eyes at women & their work gallery in austin, texas, u.s.a. (september 28 – november 17, 2024). most recently, lullabies for tears was included in ali’s 2025 solo exhibition digital somatics: to breathe as stars do at ori gallery in portland, oregon (february 7 – april 30, 2025), continuing the artist’s exploration of digital embodiment, sensory perception, and interstellar kinship.
