My once in a lifetime experience of becoming a child again while exploring Desert X Al Ula in Saudi Arabia this January. As part of the 21,39 Jeddah Arts programming, a group of art lovers boarded a flight to witness 14 artist commissioned installations, playing in an artist’s jungle gym of ambitious projects scattered in the surreal and breathtaking desert landscape nearly 2,000 years old.
Read MoreA weekend at Warehouse 421 discussing the alternative artistic publishing methods in the Arab World and naming a few of my top 6 publications! The Publishing Maneuvers Symposium was part of their recent show curated by Maha Maamoun and Ala Younis ‘How to maneuver: Shape-shifting texts and other publishing tactics''
Read MoreLatif Al Ani, whose role as ‘Father of Iraqi Photography’ encompasses three decades of documentation, from the 1950s through 1970s. His work captures the belle époque of the cosmopolitan and modern Iraq during these years.
Read MoreAn overview of my interviews with one of these respected artists was Saleh Al Ustad, who sadly departed us in April 2018. Saleh was one of the first fine arts photographers and instructors in the UAE, actively contributing to the contemporary photography movement since the early 1980s.
Read MoreIn one of the most groundbreaking international shows for an artist from the UAE, Abdulqader Al Rais achieved his first international retrospective at the Institut du Monde Arabe in Paris earlier this September, writes Suzy Sikorski
Read MoreSeven graduating female architecture students at the American University of Sharjah are challenging the timeless elements of this work out of their love for Renaissance.
Read MoreAmidst the dirt, unpaved paths and rusted buildings deep into the farmlands of Sharjah, I uncovered Emirati artist Khalid Al Banna’s oasis: a single room, glistening in color, with bookcases, sofas and objects arranged in careful precision.
Read MoreNouf is an experimental photographer and visual communications designer who uses her background in English Literature and Linguistics to explore identity politics and gender issues from a feminist perspective.
Read MoreKamrooz Aram, the Iranian-born, Brooklyn-based artist and 2014 Abraaj Group Art Prize recipient is back in Dubai with his second solo show at Green Art Gallery. Aram creates a site-specific installation that encompasses his passion for exhibition design, focusing on how an exhibition space stirs emotional response.
Read MoreKhalil reflects on his time as Hassan Sharif’s student and his perspective on the direction of the UAE art scene. He was part of a progressive and close-knit group that would incorporate Hassan’s practices within their own respective traditions. Image courtesy of Ammar Al Attar.
Read MoreFor the first time on the US West Coast, the San Francisco community welcomed GENERA#ION, an exhibition of contemporary art from Saudi Arabia this August. Spearheaded by the King Abdulaziz Center for World Culture and in partnership with Culturunners and Gharem Studio, the exhibition was part of a multi-city tour trekking across interstate highway systems ranging from Houston, Texas to Aspen, Colorado.
Read MoreInCube Arts’ “INTERLACE,” curated by Loredana Pazzini-Paracciani, features three artists who weave into their work their personal life stories of growing up outside their homeland, as well as the challenges they faced while assimilating within a society that either ignored or misconstrued their native culture.
Read MoreAs part of Art Dubai’s Artist-in-Residency program this year, Kaoud’s Brigade D’Urgence (2016) questions how repetitive body movements and unforeseen gestures simulate narratives of emergency disaster scenarios
Read MoreExtending her creativity to the Washington DC streets, artist Ebtisam Abdulaziz shares her newest projects at DC Arts Studio’s Spring Open group exhibition this April.
Read MoreThe group exhibition “White Cube…Literally,” curated by Amanda Abi Khalil at Dubai’s Gallery Isabelle van den Eynde (IVDE), reopens a debate posed by art critic Brian O’Doherty in his book Inside the White Cube: The Ideology of the Gallery Space (1976) and forces us to tackle a complex and decades-old topic centered around artistic practices vis-à-vis the exhibition space.
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