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Pakistani artist Rashid Rana’s installation on Gaza, Fractured Moment, is currently on display at the inaugural edition of Art Basel Doha, with proceeds from the sale of the work set to go towards Palestinian relief funds, according to The Art Newspaper.

Presented by Mumbai-based gallery Chemould Prescott Road, the large wall-based photomontage is composed of hundreds of sequential stills taken from an open-source CCTV camera in Gaza. The footage documents a single night of Israeli bombardment in the spring of 2025, showing a near-black sky intermittently punctured by flashes of white, red and orange as rockets streak across the frame and explode.

According to a collaborative post by the Beaconhouse National University Mariam Dawood School of Visual Arts and Design and Rashid Rana Studio on Instagram, Fractured Moment constructs the illusion of a single suspended instant, rendering the night sky over Gaza on an immersive scale. Drawing conceptual lineage from Kazimir Malevich’s Black Square, Rana reworks its austere gravity into a field of darkness repeatedly ruptured by airstrikes.

While the image appears still, time remains embedded within it, as the camera records each passing second, turning the starless expanse into a study of endurance shaped by absence and loss. The work is being presented as a solo booth by Chemould Prescott Road.

Priced at $30,000, all proceeds from the sale of the art are earmarked for Gaza relief organisations selected by Chemould Prescott Road’s director, Shireen Gandhy, in consultation with Palestinian community workers. The gallery first debuted the installation in June 2025 at Frieze’s No 9 Cork Street exhibition space in London.

Rana acknowledged the risks involved in representing violence through art, particularly the “potential risk in aestheticising horrific incidents, like the atrocities taking place in Gaza”, but asserted, according to The Art Newspaper, that “when stories take the form of art, they become more noticeable”. His use of the CCTV emphasises how “readily available” evidence of Israel’s brutality is. “It’s right there for anyone to witness,” he added.

The installation’s presentation in Doha comes amid heightened regional tensions. Israel-Qatar relations have been under scrutiny in the lead-up to Art Basel Doha, particularly following Israel’s missile strike in September 2025 in Doha — its first such strike in Qatar — which killed six people and was condemned by the Qatari government as a terrorist attack.

Security concerns across the Gulf have also intensified in recent weeks, with threats of further regional escalation and several international airlines suspending flights to parts of the Middle East. Art Basel, in a statement shared by The New York Times, said it is closely monitoring developments in coordination with its Qatari partners and is proceeding with the fair as planned, citing the safety and well-being of its community as a priority.

Despite the uncertainty, exhibitors and artists have continued to arrive in Doha. Gandhy told the outlet that Rana had already travelled to Qatar for the installation of the work. “The art world needs to speak out,” she said, adding that Art Basel Doha has encouraged galleries to present works that engage directly with difficult contemporary issues.

Palestine is no longer a marginal or abstract issue within international art spaces. Israel’s actions in Gaza have been documented by journalists, human rights organisations and the United Nations, which has acknowledged war crimes and warned of acts amounting to genocide.

Qatar supports full Palestinian sovereignty and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state based on the 1967 borders, with East Jerusalem as its capital, while also playing a central role in mediation efforts between Palestine and Israel.

Gaza has been subjected to sustained Israeli military assault since October 7. According to Gaza’s local health authorities, more than 71,000 Palestinians have been killed since, many of them women and children.

Art Basel Doha runs from February 5 to 7, with preview days held on February 3 and 4.

Cover via Rashid Rana Studio/Instagram