Artist showcase · Portrait studies
Alim
Al-Hamim
Prepared works in graphite, pencil, and airbrush, brought together as one evolving body of portraiture.
Explore the works
Selected works · 01–09
A sequence of portraits and narrative scenes, arranged to let each prepared work hold its own space while the collection unfolds as one continuous visit.
Portrait studies
Voices that shaped a century
Work 04
Biggie Peace
A centered pause in the sequence gives this near-square portrait room to be read at its own pace.
Two studies of Prince
Works 05–06
Works 07–08
From figure study to narrative scene
The change in scale and orientation creates a natural turn in the visit without forcing either work into a uniform frame.
Closing work · 09
Tutankhamun
The collection closes on a centered study.
About the artist
Alim Al-Hamim
I draw the way I invent, in that I'm patient, precise, and I try not to speak unless I have something worthwhile to say.
I am a native Colorado-based artist, born and raised in Denver. I draw mostly portraits, animals, and on occasion, family portraits, and oil and acrylic paintings using both airbrush, oil or pastel pencils, and pastels. I prefer these media, because my tedious nature forces me to build each portrait layer by layer. This allows me to draw deep blacks and soft, luminous highlights out of the pencil until subjects hold the depth of a real photograph and the warmth of a living presence. My sitters are typically friends, families, and icons from Black music, culture, and freedom. Prince beneath his own symbol against a sky of rolling clouds, Muhammad Ali flanked by the butterfly and the bee, Nelson Mandela smiling as he did on the cover of Long Walk to Freedom, and Biggie Smalls in Biggie Peace.
I sometimes set symbols that carry the story further around my subjects, like the ankh and pyramids of ancient Kemet, a peace sign raised high, a single rose beside a Día de Muertos Catrina, a dainty pinup fairy cradled in an open hand, some of my earlier compositions.
I knew I would be pushing the medium itself with Biggie Peace as my first work combining airbrushed water-soluble graphite with traditional pencil in an all-graphite piece that stays true to the drawing. I have never liked mixed media, so I try to keep my works true. I also work in full-color pastel, including a portrait of Prince from the era of a popular 80's magazine.
That inventive spirit reaches beyond the studio. I hold a U.S. patent allowance for an in-ground aeroponic planter, and as founder of EarthWise Incorporated I bring an artist’s eye to projects from Aurora, Colorado, to Ghana’s Ashanti Region. With deep ties to Ghana and the African diaspora, I make work that honors where we come from and imagines where we can go.
Each piece in this collection is an invitation to look closer, and to see greatness rendered by hand.
Available from the collection