The fonds documents the personal, professional, artistic, and academic activities of Omar Al-Samadi from approximately age 12 to 38, covering the period from the late 1990s through to 2025. The records reflect a wide range of functions including creative production (primarily photography), cultural and event organizing, academic study and research, social justice engagements, professional development, and personal communication.
The fonds consists of 7 series:
2025-01-01: Correspondence – includes email communication organized into five-year chronological groupings (post-high school to present), handwritten letters from adolescence to early adulthood (ages 12–24), and greeting cards spanning from age 12 to 38.
2025-01-02: Personal documentation – contains administrative and professional records such as CVs, licences and certifications, and other official documents such as expired IDs, passports, and transcripts.
2025-01-03: Photography and creative projects – comprises analog and digital photography, select creative projects, and exhibition materials. Analog records include 35mm negatives, contact sheets, digitized scans, and selectively printed photographs.
2025-01-04: Event production and talent management – includes artist contracts, event planning documentation, promotional materials, and correspondence related to cultural organizing and music industry work.
2025-01-05: Academic work and research – documents undergraduate and graduate academic work, including essays, annotated readings, and research projects.
2025-01-06: Social justice and advocacy – includes records related to community engagement, activism, and advocacy work.
The internal arrangement of the fonds respects the original order of the donor, particularly in personal correspondence and digital photography. Intellectual arrangement was applied to group records by function and format across series and sub-series, particularly in cases where the creator’s working order was informal or evolving.
The fonds includes both analog and digital formats, with principal documentary forms including: email and handwritten correspondence, photographic negatives and prints, digital image files, event flyers, contracts, academic papers, protest materials, and administrative records.
Geographically, the fonds is centered on activities in Toronto, with international components relating to cultural engagement, travel, and correspondence.
Al-Samadi, Omar