Maha lives and works in London.
She paints with oil paints on cotton or linen canvas. She loves this medium for the challenges and the malleability it offers. Each painting is crafted over months owing to the layers she uses to finish the effects in the image.

Drawing on an archive of references of collected imagery and backgrounds she works through her compositions to create deeper angles and visually exciting paintings. With figuration at the centre of her work, she uses colour fields to capture and create light and layers of space in her imagery. Found images and her own aesthetic intuition guides her choices when putting the final reference together. She is principally interested in playing with levels of focus and includes viewpoints that invite the viewer to experience the scene, including them as a part of it. 

Maha also spends her time sketching and painting her son that documents her personal journey as a mother, creating a collaboration between her work and her personal life. She is a keen reader and follows the lives and work of many women artists. Particularly interested in the synergies and conflicts owing to the inter-twined co-existence of domestic and individual threads in their lives. 

When asked why she paints so many Dogs, Maha said  “I find myself continuously challenging the idea of me and my work being seen as an ambassador of a certain section of the social hierarchy.

"I once heard Yinka Shonibare talking about his choice of subjects … and somewhere he mentioned a turning point in his career, based on a teacher’s suggestion, that led to his explorative journey into cultural identity and historical contextualisation.
“At the start, I remember thinking a good deal about what would make interesting modern subjects… Because I figured, people are interested in the decision trail of your work.  Whether I painted dogs or spoke at depth about impressionism or Krasner-Pollock’s life, I found a territorial tension being generated … almost like a trespass situation... reminding me of who I am. Of how I have, in so many instances, been ‘recommended’ to paint sacred Indian cows, or try miniature painting.
“Much of these experiences and explorative thoughts have led me to paint themes that sometimes obscure my labels and expand into an otherwise less traversing world."
Maha's themes in the past have included county cricket grounds in England, portraits of people with their everyday possessions like shoes or glasses or sewing tools, a series of sketches of the iconic moments of The Football World Cup.
After qualifying as a Chartered Accountant and working as a bank consultant for what seemed like endless number of years, Maha went back to college to study painting at Saint Martins UAL. (Largely self-taught for most of her painting career, she has completed advanced painting courses with Roger Gill at the UAL). She also works for a sports publishing house designing book covers and  illustrations for their publications. A resident artist at the Mansion Beckenham Place Park, Maha has a studio here. She is available for appointments for a studio visit and to discuss her work.
She has exhibited in different shows across England and abroad. More recently her work has been shortlisted at the:
  • Women in ART prize 2024 
  • Society of Women Artists at the Mall Galleries 2023
  • Guildford House Open 2023
  • Women in Art prize 2023
  • Football Art Prize 2022
  • National Open Art competition for contemporary portraits 2017
    Her other notable exhibitions and work include:
  • Permanent Exhibition at The Sussex County Cricket Club.
  • Successful solo exhibitions at the Brunel Museum 2016 & 2018.
  • Group exhibition at the Burgh House Hampstead - 2017
  • Co-authored and illustrated the ‘Illustrated History of The Ashes - This Thing Can Be Done’ - a book with over 1000 illustrations.
  • Co-authored a book with 400 illustrations – Sudden Death, an illustrated history of the football world cup as a mystery thriller