Samia Halaby: Kinetic Paintings

Pioneering artist Samia Halaby has spent over sixty years exploring abstraction through evolving mediums, from traditional painting to groundbreaking digital work. Beginning in the 1980s, she taught herself computer programming to create what she terms "kinetic paintings"—animated compositions that bring lines, shapes, and color into dynamic motion, echoing the time-based innovations of early modernist movements. This exhibition features four of her seminal digital works displayed on a monumental screen in SFMOMA's atrium, marking the first time these computer-generated pieces have been preserved and shared through contemporary technology, allowing viewers to witness the living, generative quality Halaby envisioned as she merged art with code.