Mohamed Babelli, a consultant engineer who nurtured an extraordinary parallel career as a photographer, has spent nearly five decades documenting Saudi Arabia's archaeological and cultural treasures, culminating in the September 2025 publication of his most ambitious work, "Antiquity of Saudi Arabia." This 384-page volume, fifteen years in the making and supported by the Cultural Development Fund, represents the capstone of Babelli's journey from a teenager receiving his first camera in 1978 to becoming one of the Kingdom's most significant visual chroniclers and the founder of Desert Publisher, a Riyadh-based publishing house specializing in high-quality heritage publications.
Babelli's photographic odyssey began when his father gifted him a camera before a family trip to Cyprus in 1978, permanently linking photography with exploration in his mind. Throughout the early 1990s, he ventured into Riyadh's outskirts with international colleagues, documenting landscapes that remained virtually unknown to the wider world. His commitment deepened during a mid-1990s collaboration with an Australian photographer on books about Saudi Arabia's natural environment, which inspired his decision to create a comprehensive visual record of Madain Saleh, AlUla, and the Hejaz Railway. This five-year effort resulted in the 2003 publication of "Madain Saleh," a groundbreaking volume that merged Babelli's photography with text researched and written by his brother Ibrahim, becoming one of the first works to document these sites together.
In 2008, Babelli established Desert Publisher, naming it after a transformative expedition across the Empty Quarter that same year. The publishing house quickly distinguished itself through its multilingual approach, reflecting Babelli's conviction that cultural heritage should be accessible globally. His 2007 book "Saudi Arabia" pioneered this strategy, presenting the Kingdom's cities, traditions, architecture, people, and archaeology in four languages—English, French, German, and Spanish—simultaneously. Drawing inspiration from European cultural publications, Babelli expanded subsequent editions to include nine languages, adding Arabic, Russian, Chinese, Japanese, and Korean, making his books natural choices for Saudi embassies and international conferences, including Expo Shanghai.
Having witnessed photography's complete technical evolution, Babelli adapted from negative films through slide photography and medium format systems to embrace digital technology immediately upon its availability. "When digital cameras came into the market, I immediately started using the best of the line available," he recalls. "I never went back to film." Despite this technological progression, he maintains that equipment alone cannot create meaningful work. "What is important is the eye of the photographer," Babelli emphasizes, advising emerging photographers to begin with affordable gear and upgrade as their vision develops. This philosophy has guided his extensive documentation of Saudi heritage while maintaining artistic integrity across decades of technological change.
"Antiquity of Saudi Arabia," launched at the Riyadh International Book Fair, structures the Kingdom's archaeological heritage in comprehensive chronological sequence from the Stone Age through the 1950s unification. Developed with contributions from leading academics including university professors and former museum directors actively engaged in excavation work, the volume ensures rigorous accuracy in contextualizing images with their archaeological sites. The book traces human presence on the Arabian Peninsula from 1.3 million years ago through ancient civilizations, Arab kingdoms, the Islamic era, and the Saudi state, combining Babelli's carefully curated photographs with specialist texts and academic references.
While Babelli's primary focus remains Saudi heritage, his 2017 publication on Al-Aqsa Mosque in Palestine demonstrates his broader commitment to documenting significant cultural sites. Selection of photographs for "Antiquity of Saudi Arabia" was conducted jointly with Dr. Awad Al-Zahrani and Abdulaziz Al-Omari to ensure optimal representation. Seeing his books distributed by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to diplomatic missions worldwide and featured at official events represents "the ultimate success" for Babelli, who views visual documentation as both responsibility and legacy. His guiding philosophy, drawn from Quranic verse, remains unchanged: "Do the best work you can to the highest quality level," reflecting a career built on patience, precision, and profound respect for cultural preservation.
