Rubeen Salem (b. 1997, San Francisco) is a New York–based multimedia artist working primarily in figurative surrealist painting. Salem creates visual prayers.
Rooted in poetry and devotional symbolism, his work explores surrender, longing, divine timing, and emotional awareness. Central to his visual language is the recurring “tea-cup head” figure — an emblem of receptivity, discipline, and faith. The cup represents an openness to what is poured: love, loss, revelation, and transformation.
Raised between literature and image-making, Salem developed an early practice of pairing written word with visual narrative — a dialogue that continues to shape his paintings today. Each work operates as both confession and offering: intimate yet archetypal.
His compositions balance tenderness with scale, humor with reverence, and contemporary vernacular with spiritual symbolism. Through repetition of motif and emotional intensity, Salem builds a cohesive mythology, one in which devotion is not passive, but powerful.
He lives and works in New York City.