Alia Rayyan holds an MA degree in international politics with a focus on the Middle East, sociology, and art history (University of Hamburg, SOAS – University of London). She is an art critic, writer, educator, and curator and has worked for international cultural organizations and art magazines in Berlin, Beirut, New York, Amman, Jerusalem, and Ramallah. She currently acts as a content developer for Filmlab Palestine, which she co-founded with Hanna Atallah in 2014. During her time as director of the Al Hoash – The Palestinian Art Court art gallery (2013–2016), Alia initiated an urban intervention program to address the special circumstances of Palestinians in public spaces in Jerusalem. Her experiences inform her doctoral dissertation, Decolonizing Socially Engaged Art Practice in Non-Western Context, which she is completing at Leuphana University, Germany.