Agenda

Known for her large scale, colorful ‘trapunto’ works, Pacita Abad (1946-2004) was a Philippine-American artist whose prolific oeuvre spanned continents and ranged from abstract forms to social realist depictions of everyday life in the U.S.A, the Philippines and elsewhere. Having lived and travelled widely across Asia and many parts of the world, Abad’s work is an amalgamation of techniques and subject matter drawn from her lived experiences and mostly worked in her signature trapunto technique of padding and stitching canvas before painting and layering it with textiles, printed objects and other materials such as jewelry, buttons, and shells.

This exhibition brings together a selection of her ‘trapunto’ paintings and is curated in collaboration with the Pacita Abad Art Estate and London based artist Pio Abad.

Born in the Philippines in 1946, Pacita Abad studied painting at the Corcoran School of Art in Washington, D.C. and the Arts Student League in New York.Her work has been featured in numerous solo exhibitions including: Life in the Margins, Spike Island, Bristol (2020); Pacita Abad: A Million Things to Say, Museum of Contemporary Art and Design, Manila (2018); Circles in My Mind, Singapore Tyler Print Institute, Singapore (2003); Exploring the Spirit, National Gallery of Indonesia, Jakarta (1996); The American Dream, National Museum for Women in the Arts, Washington D.C. (1994); Masks from Six Continents, Metro Art Center, Washington D.C. (1990); Pacita Abad: A Painter Looks at the World, Museum of Philippine Art, Manila (1984) and Assaulting the Deep Sea, Ayala Museum, Manila (1983).She has participated in numerous group exhibitions, including: Minds Rising, Spirits Tuning,13th Gwangju Biennial (2021); SWEAT, Haus der Kunst, Munich (2021); Whose Tradition?, Tate Liverpool (2021); The Crack Begins Within, 11th Berlin Biennial for Contemporary Art (2020); Asia/America: Identities in Contemporary Asian American Art, a travelling exhibition organised by the Asia Society, New York (1996); Beyond the Border: Art by Recent Immigrants, Bronx Museum of the Arts, New York (1994); La Segunda Bienal de la Habana (1986); and the 2nd Asian Art Show, Fukuoka Art Museum (1985).Her work can be found in the collections of Tate Modern, London; The National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington D.C., M+ Museum, Hong Kong, Art Jameel, Dubai and the National Gallery of Singapore.

She died in Singapore in 2004.

H.E. Mohamed Khalifa Al Mubarak, Chairman of the Department of Culture and Tourism – Abu Dhabi, inaugurated Louvre Abu Dhabi’s exhibition, Dragon and Phoenix – Centuries of Exchange between Chinese and Islamic Worlds. The exhibition opens to the public on 6 October 2021 and will run until 12 February 2022. With more than 200 artworks on display, visitors can explore the cultural and artistic exchange between the Chinese and Islamic worlds from the 8th to the 18th century. A rich cultural programme will accompany the exhibition, offering an array of events, from dragon boating to kayak cinema and family film screenings.

Organised by Louvre Abu Dhabi in partnership with Musée national des arts asiatiques – Guimet and France Muséums, the exhibition is curated by Sophie Makariou, President of Musée national des arts asiatiques – Guimet, with the support of Dr. Souraya Noujaim, Louvre Abu Dhabi’s Scientific, Curatorial and Collections Management Director, and Guilhem André, Louvre Abu Dhabi’s Chief Curator of Asian and Medieval Art.

The artworks in Dragon and Phoenix represent long-lasting dialogue between China (the dragon) and the Islamic world (the phoenix), chosen from the collections of Louvre Abu Dhabi and Musée national des arts asiatiques – Guimet, alongside those of 12 international museums and institutions. The exhibition delves into the cultural exchange and prolific artistic production between the two worlds resulting in coveted luxury materials and artworks across a span of more than 800 years.

Manuel Rabaté, Director of Louvre Abu Dhabi, said: “Through the poetic title of Dragon and Phoenix, the many interpretations of these two fantastical creatures evoke the significant artistic exchange between two great cultures. The flourishing artistic production, the exquisite objects and materials that came from these two civilisations, brought together across land and sea, is extraordinary. We cannot wait for visitors to experience this fascinating exhibition. My sincere thanks to Sophie Makariou, the Musée national des arts asiatiques – Guimet, the Musée du Louvre, the Shanghai Museum and all our lending partners, without whom Dragon and Phoenix would not have been possible.”

Visitors will be taken on a journey organised in five chapters, through both land and sea trade routes, to explore the connections, artistic influences and remarkable untold stories, beginning from the establishment of the first Arab merchant colonies in Canton in the 8th century until the threshold of the 18th century. ‘The Islamic world’ references the regions that include countries, cultures and ethnic groups, who shared their affiliation to Islam during this period, such as the Mashriq region, Eastern Africa, Central Asia, the Indian Subcontinent and South-East Asia.

Sophie Makariou, President of Musée national des arts asiatiques – Guimet, said: “From the 8th century up to the beginning of the 18th century, the Islamic world never ceased to regard China as an ideal of technical achievement and beauty, while the Islamic world supplied China with precious luxury objects in metal and glass. This unique exhibition deals with this long history of cultural interactions, of material and immaterial exchanges, and with peaceful relations between those two high-world cultures.”

Dr. Souraya Noujaim, Scientific, Curatorial and Collections Management Director at Louvre Abu Dhabi, said: “This exhibition brings mythical creatures, dragon and phoenix among many others, on precious objects to life. Textiles, jades, lacquer, silks and ceramics circulated from the Middle Kingdom to the shores of the Mediterranean and inspired production of both cultures. The circulation of persons and manufactured goods through diplomatic, commercial and cultural exchanges is at the core of this exhibition. The five dramatic chapters reveal a story of mutual influences where external inputs and processes of transfer did not undermine the longevity of aesthetic expression, but on the contrary stimulated its creativity.”

Lending institutions for the Dragon and Phoenix exhibition include: Musée national des arts asiatiques – Guimet, Musée du Louvre, Shanghai Museum, Musée du quai Branly – Jacques Chirac, Archives nationales, Cité de la céramique – Sèvres et Limoges, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Musée de Cluny – musée national du Moyen Âge, Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Musée Jacquemart-André – Institut de France, Musée national de la Renaissance – Château d’Ecouen, Muséum national d’Histoire Naturelle and Musée des Tissus de Lyon.

Cultural and Education Programming

The programming for Dragon and Phoenix is a sensory journey across the narrative of the exhibition and presents a variety of events and activities. The cultural programme will include a hand-picked selection of weekend family film screenings and kayak cinema shows, with two sessions in November and one in December. Young visitors can watch The Monkey King and an episode of The Adventures of Sinbad on November 19 and return to the museum on November 26 to watch a second installment of The Adventures of Sinbad alongside the screening of Bilal: A New Breed of Hero. The saga of Sinbad continues with a final screening on December 10 and, on the same day, children will have the opportunity to explore the world of Raya and the Last Dragon. Animated Tales of the World (shorts) will be available to watch on all the three days of the film screenings. The Adventures of Sinbad screenings will be shown as part of the kayak cinema, allowing visitors to watch the episodes while paddling around the museum.

In addition to the ongoing yoga and kayaking activities at the museum, there will also be a new seasonal offering, inspired by traditional Chinese culture – Dragon Boats from November 18 to December 31. Early next year, visitors will also be able to witness a performance piece by local artist Ahmed AlAreef whose installation responds to figures of the zodiac, as seen by both cultures.

Alongside the exhibition, a series of educational activities and programmes are available at the museum starting October. These include daily Express Tours for adults that will assist visitors to follow a journey and delve deep into the long history of cultural interactions, material and idea exchanges between the two civilisations. Students will be able to discover how cultural exchanges across communities in Asia influenced artistic production and ways of living via the Take Me to Asia interactive encounters with Museum Educators. Families can participate in the new #MakeandPlay activities inspired by the exhibition on site and those at home can follow our instructional videos online to create their very own Iznik dish. A series of Masterclasses will be offered starting from November featuring artists invited to respond to artworks within the exhibition and, later, share their skills with participants aged 18 and older in creative activities. Finally, #ARTLAB is back this winter led by UAE-based artists to encourage museum-goers to create their own art inspired by dragons and phoenixes.

Courtesy of Louvre Abu Dhabi
Image caption: Dragon & Phoenix. © Department of Culture and Tourism – Abu Dhabi

Qatar Museums—Qatar’s preeminent institution for art and culture—will present a mid-career retrospective of the acclaimed American artist and designer, Virgil Abloh, at the Garage Gallery at the Fire Station. The first museum exhibition of his work to be presented in the Middle East, Virgil Abloh: Figures of Speech will be on view until 31 March 2022. With more than 55 works, the exhibition will offer an in-depth look at Abloh’s diverse pioneering media practice that ranges from visual arts to music, fashion, architecture, and design. Figures of Speech is organised by Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, adapted for this presentation by Qatar Museums, and designed by and in collaboration with AMO. It is part of the Qatar-USA 2021 Year of Culture programme, an annual international cultural exchange designed to deepen understanding between nations and their people.

Her Excellency Sheikha Al Mayassa bint Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, Chairperson of Qatar Museums, said: “We believe that people in Qatar and throughout the Gulf will be enthralled by this introduction to the visionary, barrier-defying work of artist and designer Virgil Abloh. We are especially thrilled that Figures of Speech will open during our week-long event Qatar Creates: Fashion and Design, which will bring together creative professionals from around the world in celebration of our local and regional talent. With both the exhibition and the event, Qatar Museums is carrying forward its commitment to nurturing artistic talent, opening career opportunities, and offering inspiration to our audiences.”

Sheikha Reem Al Thani, Acting Deputy CEO of Exhibitions & Marketing, said “We are looking forward to presenting Figures of Speech, which will trace Virgil Abloh’s inventive practice and his many achievements. This special exhibition, combined with an extensive programme of workshops and talks we have planned to complement it, is sure to inspire and engage our audiences.”

Virgil Abloh (American, b. 1980) cultivated an interest in design and music at an early age, inspired by the urban culture of Chicago. While pursuing a master’s degree in architecture from the Illinois Institute of Technology, he met American musician Kanye West and joined West’s creative team to work on album covers, concert designs, and merchandising. In 2013 Abloh founded his stand-alone fashion brand Off-White™ in Milan, Italy, and in 2018 he assumed the position of Men’s Artistic Director of Louis Vuitton.

Virgil Abloh: Figures of Speech was curated by the MCA’s former James W. Alsdorf Chief Curator, Michael Darling with creative direction from Virgil Abloh, and Samir Bantal, Director of AMO (the research studio of the acclaimed architecture firm OMA). Curatorial assistance was also provided by Chanon Kenji Praepipatmongkol, Marjorie Susman Curatorial Fellow at the MCA Chicago. This exhibition has been on view at the MCA Chicago (10 June – 29 September 2019), the High Museum of Art Atlanta (12 Nov 2019 – 8 Mar 2020) and is currently on view at the ICA Boston (through 26 September 2021).

Michael Darling stated, “The exhibition has been laid out and designed to be in dialogue with the dynamic spaces of the Fire Station. As a result, there are new resonances between artworks and visitors will see a refreshed and renewed exhibition.”

Through Abloh’s own work and many collaborations, Virgil Abloh: Figures of Speech shows the complex universe of fashion, music, art and design he moves in, demonstrating his ability to fluently speak the language of each discipline. Transcending the idea of a discipline, Abloh’s work, since the initial show in Chicago, has grown to a continuous broadcast of creativity. The exhibition is designed to provide an overview of the disciplines, pivotal moments, and statements of one of the most important contemporary cultural phenomenons. The Fire Station provides a unique setting for the exhibition. Two large gallery spaces give the visitors the immersive experience to feel the variety of works, while the more intimate gallery 3 puts emphasis on the theme of race in Black Gaze. The outdoor courtyard connects all galleries and places some of Abloh’s works where they belong, in the city. The Doha edition of Virgil Abloh: Figures of Speech contains the Inflatable Bouncy Castle as well as the never before exhibited Customized Mercedes G-Wagon. The exhibition design also repurposes a number of elements from Qatar Museums’ previous exhibitions, such as the LED ticker signs and steel grates minimizing waste.

As a continuation of the works in the galleries, a concept store uses one of Fire Station’s warehouse spaces as the ideal setting to browse the exhibition merchandise. The concept store features a retrospective of best-selling Off-White™ products and exclusive new collections inspired by the exhibition. The products are available in-store, on-site only.

Virgil Abloh: Figures of Speech is sponsored by ExxonMobil, Qatar Airways, Astro Automotive Services, Mazaya Real Estate Development Company and Qatar-USA Year of Culture.

The exhibition is presented as part of the Qatar-United States 2021 Year of Culture, sponsored by ExxonMobil, which was formalized in September 2020 with a cooperative agreement between the State of Qatar and the United States of America during the 2020 Qatar-United States Strategic Dialogue in Washington, D.C.

Courtesy of Qatar Museums

Image caption: Installation view, Virgil Abloh: “Figures of Speech”, MCA Chicago. June – September, 2019. Work shown: Virgil Abloh, A Series of Events, 2019. Ceramics. Private Collection. Photo: Nathan Keay, ©MCA Chicago. Courtesy of The Gymnastics Art Institute & Virgil Abloh Art Studio and Design Practice. ©️ 2021.

Run With The Wolves – an exhibition featuring five contemporary women artists – explores mythology, identity, gender and sexuality through figuration as the central motif. The show takes its title from the book Women who Run with the Wolves – Myths and Stories of the Wild Woman Archetype by Clarissa Pinkola Estés. A Jungian analyst and storyteller, Estés uses multicultural myths and fairy tales as ‘psychic archaeological digs’ to access what she refers to as the ruins of the female unconscious. The exhibition reflects on how five women artists access their own memory and experiences – conscious and subconscious – to express the contemporary experience.

Natalia Gonzalez Martin works on a small scale, using traditional painting techniques that draw their influence from Christian religious iconography and medieval illuminated manuscripts, informed by her Spanish customs and heritage. Predominantly working with the female figure, she uses minutely detailed brushstrokes to paint intimate corners of the female body – the curves of the neck, the ear, the toes – creating an erotic tension between desire and the forbidden.

Shailee Mehta works extensively with elements of figuration and embodiment, situating the female body as a central agential subject in her explorations around femininity and visibility. Her work is descriptive of a poetics of space where elements of the interior and the exterior blend into each other, giving her protagonists an unsettling ‘untamed’ appearance. Rooted in the female gaze, her figures subvert patriarchal tropes, and the narratives of looking and being looked at take up multiple meanings such as desire, contemplation or rejection.

Sola Olulode’s paintings are nuanced and tender visions of intimacy and community; her wistful images celebrations of Black identity, womxnhood and non-binary people. Distinguished by their use of gestural brushwork, indigo dye, wax, oil bar, impasto and monochromatic schemes, they speak strongly of her Nigerian heritage. Allowing the body to take centre stage, she creates utopian scenes which give prominence to movement, gesture, and romanticised acts; her works exposing a unique tenderness and a fluid ability of bringing to life representation and visibility of Black Queer lived experiences.

Wawi Navarroza works in photography and employs her own figure to create formal staged compositions in large tableau vivant format. In her Tropical Gothic series she reconstructs and rediscovers herself amongst layers of disparate objects rendered in eccentric and vibrant colours. Following in the tradition of other female artists (Frida Kahlo, Mickalene Thomas and Cindy Sherman) who use history, appropriation, and citation as a form of cultural critique, these self-portraits reference a shared condition among women across time and space, history and geography.

Saelia Aparicio’s practice finds inspiration from classical mythology and transformative hybrid forms between animals and humans, such as the sphinx, Anubis or the Mayan Camazotz. Her wall tapestries – a collaboration with fashion designer Craig Green – feature a series of folk-inspired portraits that deliver an expressive take on the human form. Completely imagined and very specific in their gender fluidity, they draw from the ‘two-spirited’ idea that comes from Indigenous North American culture. From conceptual nature-inspired motifs like parts of walnut trees and poison ivy, the hand-stitched artworks showcase an imaginative mashup of ancient anatomical diagrams and contemporary art.

Image caption: Wawi Navarroza, May in Manila/Hot Summer, 2019. Archival pigment print on Hahnemühle, cold-mounted on acid-free aluminum, 135.38 × 101.6 cm. Edition of 5 plus 2 AP

Courtesy of Lawrie Shabibi

After the success of the first edition last year, Zawyeh Gallery launches 6 December 2021 the second edition of Ramallah Art Fair. This year the show is organised with wider participation amongst artists. The art fair includes over 150 artworks; some were created recently or produced specifically for the fair by over 30 Palestinian artists living in Palestine and the diaspora in addition to artists from the occupied Syrian Golan, an artist from Lebanon, and a Turkish artist. The artworks deal with different topics; some are stemmed from the Palestinian reality using a wide range of materials. One of the main features that the fair maintains this year is exhibiting the works of young artists, side by side works for prominent artists.

Ziad Anani, Zawyeh Gallery director, stated: “The main goal of the event is to provide original artworks at reasonable prices for new collectors to enjoy Palestinian art.” He added that the art fair is a rare opportunity that gives glimpses on the new art production mainly in Palestine and allows the audience to read into the new artistic paths and directions that new and prominent artists are embarking on these days.

Participating artists are Sliman Mansour, Nabil Anani, Abed Abdi, Khaled Hourani, Shada Safadi, Tayseer Barakat, Fouad Agbaria, Bashar Alhroub, Yazan Abu Salameh, Ibrahim Mozain, Shafik Radwan, Mahdi Baraghithi, Vera Tamari, Ahed Izhiman, Ahmad Canaan, Akram Al-Halabi, Alaa Attoun, Alaa Albaba, Asad Azi, Ayman Essa, Benji Boyadgian, Dima Hourani, Easam Darawshi, Mohamed Abusal, Nidal Morra, Reem Masri, Ruba Salameh, Saher Nassar, Taqi Spateen, Ikram Awidat, Rafat Asad, in addition to Stephanie Bou Chedid (Lebanon) and Cem Polat (Turkey).

Image caption: Alaa Attoun, Scene III, 2021. Photography on fine art paper, 48 x 34 cm. Edition of 10
Courtesy of Zawyeh Gallery

Andakulova Gallery is delighted to present the artworks of Timur D’Vatz in its gallery spaces for its latest exhibition. The inaugural of the Russian-born Uzbekistaneducated artist’s works will be held on December 1, 2021 and the exhibition will continue till March 1, 2022.

Timur D’Vatz is an artist bestowed with unique talent and knowledge. He is inspired by ancient history, medieval tapestries and Celtic mythology. His paintings also reflect a fascination with alchemy and the ideals of Pre-Raphaelites.

This year, he won the Grand Prix at the NordArt exhibition. Based in Germany, NordArt has established itself as one of the largest exhibitions of contemporary art in Europe, representing all facets of visual arts. D’Vatz has won several other awards, including the Guinness prize for First Time Exhibitor at the Royal Academy of Arts Summer Exhibition, the A. T. Kearney Prize, and the B.P Portrait award at London’s National Portrait Gallery 2002.

D’Vatz has won several other awards, including the Guinness prize for First Time Exhibitor at the Royal Academy of Arts Summer Exhibition, the A. T. Kearney Prize, and the B.P Portrait award at London’s National Portrait Gallery 2002.

Noble deer, elegant horses, energetic hounds and speedy birds of prey, are frequent images in his artworks. They are considered majestic symbols of freedom, power and beauty.
Legends and symbols of early Byzantine art, medieval tapestries and stories of King Arthur, come to life in D’Vatz’s artworks.
At an early stage of his life, he was influenced by Russian icon painting; he expressed the spiritual images of saints and Apostles. Their serene faces and refined hands are preserved in his works as a distinctive feature.

Each figure displayed in Timur’s paintings is symbolic. If the mission of Art is to transfer inner meaning, the light of the plot, comprehended through contemplation and if a painting is not just a design spot on wall, but rather a means of contact with another space, then the artist involves the viewer in the world he has created, with special energy and a certain aura.

Timur D’Vatz was born in 1986 in Moscow. In 1983, he attended Art College in Tashkent. It was a beautiful complex of old buildings with a few enclosed courtyards shaded by tall trees and refreshed by fountains.

There was the ambience of an inspiring little oasis in the middle of the big and busy city. It was wonderful to be painting in the atmospheric art studios. Lunch breaks would be just across the street, in a little café situated above the Anhor River. Traditional food such as pilaf, lagman and nan bread, were accompanied by the music of a mountain river, as artists talked about their current art projects and dreams about the future.

Timur D’Vatz’s journey continued when he moved to Moscow in 1990, where he started to exhibit. He was a regular visitor to the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts, where he was drawn to works of antiquity. Timur also did extensive research on the human body in the museum library.

Five years later, he moved to London, where his education continued at the Royal Academy of Arts School. He was the recipient of the Sir James Walker and Jack Goldhill Scholarships and while studying, began exhibiting in several art galleries. He actively participated in the London art world.

He was commissioned by the church for an altarpiece painting in Notre Dame de France Catholic Church in London and also won a commission to paint two paintings in the Four Seasons hotel Moscow as well.

His artworks are collected by King of Bahrain and British Royal families. Timur D’Vatz’s artworks are displayed in the magnificent Coutances Cathedral, which is a Gothic Roman Catholic cathedral constructed from 1210 to 1274 in the town of Coutances, Normandy, France.
The artist explores pictorial space with his stylishly constructed mis-en-scenes. The art offers a modern day take on ancient legends and re-appropriated symbols sourced from early Byzantine art and medieval tapestries.

Perhaps the most compelling aspect of Timur D’Vatz’s works is the way in which his art is inextricably linked to the world of textiles: he excels at depicting the rich fabrics of Chinese silk printing and is influenced by intricate patterns of the Nabis School.

The School consisted of a group of young French artists active in Paris from 1888 until 1900, who played a large part in the transition from impressionism and academic art to abstract art, symbolism and the other early movements of modernism.

D’Vatz’s shapes and patterns take on a life of their own, giving to the composition a lyrical harmony. The painter alleviates any possibility of visual heaviness or monotony by leaving elegant and refined forms to serve and to complicate the pictorial space.

The splashes of Baroque colour and elongated body shapes create a surface pattern, which communicates the decorative and abstract qualities of his compositions.

The insistent flatness of the image, moreover, renders the elongated figures of his protagonists, the hounds and the falcons, inseparable from their environment: they seem not so much to inhabit the space, as to merge with it.

Timur D’Vatz spends time between his studios in Normandy and London.

Image Caption: Timur D’Vatz, Falconers, 2021. Oil on Canvas, 81 x 122 cm.

Courtesy of Andakulova Gallery

“For me it has always been a city of ruins and of end-of-empire melancholy. I’ve spent my life either battling with this melancholy or (like all Istanbulus) making it my own.”

-Orhan Pamuk, Istanbul: Memories and the City

I will build a boat

I will keep sailing

I will keep sailing

Beyond the seas there IS a town

Where windows are open to epiphanies

The rooftops are inhabited by pigeons

Gazing at the fountains of Human Intelligence

Every ten-year-old child holds a bough of knowledge

The townsfolk see in a brick row a flame,

Or a delicate dream;

Dust can hear the music of your feelings

The fluttering wings of mythical birds are audible in the wind

Beyond the seas there is a town

Where the Sun is as wide-open as the eyes of early-risers

Poets are the inheritors of water, wisdom, and light

Beyond the seas there is a town,

So one should build a boat.

-Sohrab Sepehri

“A destruction, an annihilation that only man can provoke, only man can prevent.”

-Elie Wiesel

You walk down alleyways and dead-ends. You circle the squares and roundabouts of your memory. You recognize the feel of the summer heat on your skin. That is yours for ever. Passing by an open window, you know the smell of the mid day meal cooking on a stove. You are sure the fried onions would have a sweet taste on your tongue if you were called in to share the repast. You should be in sync with the city’s pulse, this beating heart that you sense against the soul of your shoes.

And yet.

And yet you see it cracking, crumbling, crashing. For years now, for a long time. It is soundless, slow, steady. You are walking down narrow lanes, tree lined avenues and around street corners, all renamed reshaped. Where there was a door there is gaping hole. Where there were windows, blind darkness within an empty frame. A three legged chair abandoned to its fate, a stuffed bear for the alley cats. Cities no longer in control of their past or their destiny, abandoned to the pillage of the greedy, of the small limited minds.

You walk down narrow lanes and pass by filigreed garden gates. You look for stories, memories contained within the walled ruins that were home to all that. And so much more than that. The heart and soul of the city.

And yet.

You find a city without borders a city with no past, no future. And you remember having read this:

“If I see my city as beautiful and bewitching, then my life must be so too.”

-Orhan Pamuk, Istanbul: memories and the city

-Parinaz Eleish Gharagozlou

Courtesy of Leila Heller Gallery

Image caption: Parinaz Eleish Gharagozlou, Seven Pillars of Wisdom (Amnesia Series), 2020. Acrylic paint, oil paint, oil pen, pencil, paper, collage on canvas, 183.51 x 239.08 cm

Staying with the Trouble—Reading the Present through the Past and the Future

“We […] live in disturbing times, mixed-up times, troubling and turbid times. The task is to become capable, with each other in all of our bumptious kinds, of response. […] Our task is to make trouble, to stir up potent response to devastating events, as well as to settle troubled waters and rebuild quiet places. In urgent times, many of us are tempted to address trouble in terms of making an imagined future safe, of stopping something from happening that looms in the future, of clearing away the present and the past in order to make futures for coming generations. Staying with the trouble does not require such a relationship to times called the future. In fact, staying with the trouble requires learning to be truly present […].”

In Staying with the Trouble, theoretician Donna J. Haraway imagines a world in which we live together with various planetary organisms in a sustainable way. She does not put humans at the core of her thinking but coexistence with other species and creatures. The eponymous group exhibition deals with the Chthulucene, an age established by Haraway, in which the human and the inhuman are inextricably linked: “Chthonic ones are beings of the earth, both ancient and up-to-the-minute.” A theoretical structure that allows for reflection on our present oscillating between utopia and dystopia, reality and fantasy, this is an attempt to read the present through the past and future and to have them enter into a dialogue with each other.

“Our task is to make trouble”

2019 marked the thirtieth anniversary of the world wide web. A technological revolution that has become indispensable in our daily lives—and yet we are already envisioning a reboot. Social networks dictate our life. “Fake news” and populist systems are gaining the upper hand. Yet, none of this is new. Let’s remember how drastically the first industrial revolution in the second half of the eighteenth century changed our economic and social system, as did the transition from monarchies to democracies. A look into the past teaches us that change seems to be the only constant in our society. All the more important, then, is a critical examination of artistic positions that enable us to change our course, develop new ways of thinking, and look inconvenient realities straight in the eye.

The works created specifically for this exhibition by three Austrian-born or Austrian-based artists, Monika Grabuschnigg, James Lewis, and Laurence Sturla, share the use of “traditional”-looking materials like clay and concrete, while their unusual, almost uncanny styles harbor a common interest in science fiction. This is also reflected in the technoid soundscape pervading the Carbon 12 exhibition space. James Lewis culled twelve hours’ worth of crackles, beeps, and buzzes from an open-source archive. This sonic environment turns out to be an arrangement of various water noises: human-made on the one hand, as in the case of a sewage system or a flushing toilet, and natural on the other, as in the case of a burbling stream. The sound can be traced back to three manhole covers cast from aluminum that are tagged with almost unpronounceable numbers of seconds, which correspond to the average duration of various everyday activities, and which are surrounded by an architectural structure. Lewis’s installation addresses not only the ambivalent relationship of two clashing realities—culture vs. nature—but also the confrontation of individual and communal interests. The sound emanating from the depths of the space symbolizes a kind of invisible danger that raises the question of whether such noises will soon be a thing of the past, or whether surmounting individual needs might still lead to change for the sake of the common good.

Whereas Lewis’s structure calls an existing system into question, Sturla toys with the idea of a contaminated history and the relics of a no-longer-extant industrialized world. In their mode of production, the ceramic sculptures tie in with historical boatbuilding techniques and heating constructions. They evoke ruinous fragments visualizing a bygone time in their overfired, scorched surfaces covered in cracks and residual salt lines: origin and function uncertain. Sturla dares to attempt to recall a forgotten age with all its tried-and-true techniques and formal repertoires while at the same time directing our attention to an elusive future. Not least, he demonstrates this in the deliberately chosen contrast between handmade ceramics on the one hand and an appearance reminiscent of industrial engineering on the other.

Utopia and dystopia are also close neighbors in Monika Grabuschnigg’s work. The historically fraught symbol of the Atropa belladonna —better known as deadly nightshade—runs like a thread through her new work group. Originally, the plant, which bears black cherry- like fruit, was associated with a feminine beauty ideal, as the sap had a pupil-dilating effect—an aesthetic kinship that is reflected in the plump, oversize form of the bouquets modeled from clay. In her works, Grabuschnigg plays with the ambivalent appearance of nature, which may generate both pleasure and unease in us humans. This is also evident in the deliberately ambiguous choice of subject matter: While belladonna was initially known as a medicinal and magical plant with aphrodisiac effects, it turned out to be deadly in higher doses. Nature presents itself not only as a “victim” of human endeavors but also as an autonomous trigger of uncertainty and danger. The bouquets in their fiery-red, lasciviously rose-gold form are equally attractive and uncanny, harmonious and melancholy.

In this world split by contradictions, Haraway’s wish “to be truly present” requires not only breaking with common patterns of thought but especially not viewing dichotomies like fantasy and reality, utopia and dystopia, nature and culture as separate from each other and instead—as Lewis, Sturla, and Grabuschnigg demonstrate—allowing them to blend with each other.

Courtesy of Carbon 12

Image: Work by Laurence Sturla

Architectures of confinement are imposing and suffocating, they prevent those who are subjected to their immanence from living with ease and often even in a dignified way. Stemming from a series of works created during the last year, my most recent textile-based performance, documented photographically and through video, The Echo of the Void, portrays the growing mass of an apparently innocuous, soft whiteness, which becomes obsessive, and physically oppressive, in relation with the human body.

The interaction and the tension between the two components – the human body disappearing under the textile, which is the result of the human very action – can be read from multiple perspectives: the unresolved interaction and tension between the human body and an abused, reactive nature; the outrageous treatment imposed under carceral rules by oppressive judicial and legal/ised systems; the global experience of confinement within the limited perimeter of our domesticities.

The knitted piece references in its dimensions (2 x 2 m) the size of the smallest prison cell, as per human rights activists’ records, thus highlighting the inhumane condition of this space of confinement, where notions of punishment are associated with humiliation and diminishment.

At the core of the work lies the relation with the space, which inevitably becomes an interlocutor: the space can be haunting at times, and at times it can be comforting, almost protective. As an act of empowerment, the attempt to overgrow the architecture of confinement becomes an extreme acknowledgment of the potential of the bare corporeal dimension in the face of challenges of either political, environmental or social nature, and ultimately brings the human body to the centre of the investigation.

Cristiana de Marchi,

2021

Courtesy of 1×1 Art Gallery

Feature image: Cristiana de Marchi, The Echo of the Void, 2021. Chromogenic print on Hahnemuhle paper, 56 x 67.5 cm

Ayyam Gallery is pleased to present to (t)irony the first solo exhibition featuring Sharjah-based Iraqi sculptor Muatasim Alkubaisy’s work.

(t)irony features Alkubaisy’s largest body of work yet, composed of a selection of figures, portraying those that have been ruined by power. These non-deserving and corrupt characters utilise their positions to suffocate and belittle the common man. The artist transforms misery and discrimination into sophisticated and intricate characters through a delicate yet deliberate touch. He magnifies and exaggerates traits creating caricatural portraits, presenting a sarcastic consciousness, and exposing the arrogance of their behaviors and practices.

The figures are merely cartoon characters with puffed bellies and swollen jugular veins. Concealed by dress, their physical deformities, malignancy, and evil schemes still show through the bronze’s smooth surfaces. The intimidation, evil, and terror are deprecated into mockery, becoming objects.

The characters are situated in different environments, positioned with different stances, alone or in groups. Some read a paper or are on the toilet, trivialising and making them more humane, more attainable. Embedded, are tokens of symbolism, the rats representing vermin qualities such as filth, cruelty, and disease.

Courtesy of Ayyam Gallery

Image caption: Muatasim Alkubaisy, Untitled, 2020, Bronze, Edition of 8, 23 x 40 x 21 cm

In his solo exhibition Through the Colour Terrain, Osama Said presents a series of abstract works where he mixes reality with illusion depicting fleeting images and emotional memory. He explores with colours, textures, and light, using predominantly tones of blue, red, purple, and yellow.

Influenced by German expressionists, Said’s style has been a mixture between expressionism and abstraction. In this exhibition, he follows a terrain of colours, presenting abstract works that could be viewed as mere experimentations, although a closer look shows more details. Said’s works are stemmed from memory; they are a recollection of reminiscence from the past. Throughout his career as an artist, he explored themes of memory and forgetfulness, identity and alienation, illusion and reality, especially when he lived in Germany for 16 years. He imagined home and family and did not stop producing artworks inspired by his homeland.

In his works, one can see or imagine skies, seas or pouring rain, hidden faces, shadows of people here and there. The details in the artworks are hidden and can be spotted sometimes between bold colors and lines or in the far background; a wall or a fence descending downhill and what might be houses or fields or a neighborhood under the scorching sun.

With wide brush strokes, Said embarks on a journey of exploration of color. Matisse once said, “The chief function of color should be to serve expression as well as possible. I put down my tones without a preconceived plan. If at first, and perhaps without my having been conscious of it, one tone has particularly seduced or caught me.”

Along with this concept, Said deals with colors. He departs from reality using unique visual language. Blues dominate his paintings while yellows, fiery reds, and purples manifest on his canvases, yet not in the same manner. The colour leads him through the canvas to serve expression. In his mind, colours have an abstract aesthetic function; therefore, he executes his works using unrestrained high intense colors, painting broad areas with free, spontaneous brushwork and generous paint application, capturing the essence of memory rather than its details.

His bold strokes and unique composition of light create a special ambiance, a kind of passage that can be spotted between the colours and the bold brushstrokes. It is a parallel universe that appears between his fleeting images. Through the striking colours, he creates a sort of cavity or a secret passage that leads to a third concealed dimension or a hidden illusionary world. Perhaps a world from memory that he presents in a blurred manner.

His artworks are enveloped with an intimate atmosphere reflecting light at times, beauty and harmony at others, capturing the movement of faded subjects that appear elusively in the background. He connects with the unnatural nature of his subjects, coming very close to pure abstraction. Said’s journey through the color terrain is an aesthetic party and an enjoyable visual experience.

Courtesy of Zawyeh Gallery

Caption: Osama Said, Through The Colour Terrain #17, 2021. Oil on canvas, 120 x 100 cm

Curated by Founder and Director of Tashkeel, Sheikha Lateefa bint Maktoum and veteran Emirati photographer Jassim Al Awadhi, the exhibition features a series of thought-provoking images that demonstrate the ever-evolving process of art and creation by six Emirati photographers: Ola Allouz, Yagoub Al Hammadi, Mousa Al Raeesi, Faisal Al Rais, Mona Al Tamimi and Maitha Bughanoum.

From End to End prompts the viewer to question mankind’s synergy with the natural world. With selected works depicting intimate aspects of human existence spanning vast geographical distances from the streets of Satwa to the remote mangroves of Al Dhafra and the bustling coastlines of Zanzibar, the subtle details of each work highlight man’s unrelenting disruption of the environment around him: The microparticles of plastics worn by fisherwomen drifting into the seas; the remnants of fishing nets deposited in the seas of the Arabian Gulf; the dredged tidal flats off the shore of Abu Dhabi; and the plastic waste generated from communal feasts. While in an untouched area of Dubai nests an owl and her chicks. As their existence and that of their species hangs in the balance, the images stand as a bold reminder of the fragility of the natural world and the need for mankind to step up and fulfill its unequivocal moral duty to protect and preserve it for all time.

Courtesy of Tashkeel Studio

Image caption: Mousa Al Raeesi, The Big Tree, 2020

Sabrina Amrani is pleased to present Floridas, the second solo show by Anastasia Samoylova in the gallery, showcasing a new body of work which depicts the state of Florida as a nuanced portrait of the contemporary United States and tests for endurance the narratives of the iconic American Dream.

Sunshine state. Swampland paradise. Tourist aspiration. Political swing-state. Real estate racket. Refuge of excess. Sub-tropical fever dream. The place where image and reality become inseparable. With forms of nature and culture found nowhere else, Florida is unique. It is also among the most elusive and misunderstood of places.

Samoylova’s series Floridas documents it all in a layered portrait of contemporary Florida, while establishing a dialogue with the oeuvre of Walker Evans, the American photographer who documented the state between the 1930s and the 1970s. Like Evans, Samoylova moves between color and black and white, looking closely at the telling details in landscapes, cityscapes, people, objects and interiors that speak volumes about culture and social values. With her vivid bright images and sharp juxtapositions, Anastasia Samoylova offers a test for endurance to the iconic American narratives of the American Dream.

Floridas seems to exist on the thin border between observational documentary photography and a crafted photo-collage. It is the way the artist frames the shot of her subject of choice, in combination with her loaded depiction of color, that creates a slightly surreal atmosphere — none of which is staged. Posters, storefronts, signs, and utilitarian objects are meticulously observed as silent reminders of the character of American culture as a whole.

Since 2016, Anastasia Samoylova has been travelling Florida on intensive, wandering road trips, from the Keys to the borders with Alabama and Georgia. She makes acutely observed photographs that distil our contradictions and confusions, looking for unexpected resonances in familiar motifs. The images are visually striking but complex, with subtle references both to Florida’s conflicted history, and to the way it has been imaged by others. She portrays Florida in all its intensity as a stark place — culturally, politically, economically and climatically. In Samoylova’s imagery, it wears this starkness quite visibly. It is there in the fragile landscapes, in the precarious tourist industry, in the boom and bust of its cities, and on the faces of its residents.

The state of Florida has a reputation across the United States, and internationally, as an extremist place of extravagance, indulgence, hedonistic tourism and sunny retirement but the reality is very different. Its politics and culture are as mixed as its demographics, and in this it has become a microcosm of the divisions and difference of the country as a whole. This ongoing project is amounting to a nuanced portrait not just of Florida, but of contemporary USA more broadly. “I believe that what is happening in the extremes of Florida is happening across the country,” recounts the artist.

A book published by Steidl and edited by David Campany, including the images of Floridas and a selection of Walker Evans’ photographs, will be released in early February 2022.

Courtesy of Sabrina Amrani

Image caption:

Leila Heller Gallery is pleased to announce artist Mouna Rebeiz’s solo show ‘Colour Power’ opening on 20th January 2022.

What would the world be without coloUr? How would we perceive reality without red, blue or green? Can we imagine living in black and white? ColoUr is what gives life its intensity, its depth, but also the possibility of joy. It is light, a vital momentum, energy. In an attempt at total renunciation, in the exile of solitude and a silent retreat, Mouna Rebeiz endeavored to grasp what the purest, most authentic and “truest” in coloUr is. Kandinsky had already noted that “Vermilion attracts and irritates the beholder like the flame, which has always moved man to irresistibly contemplate it. Bright lemon-yellow eventually hurts our eyes in the same way as the shrill sound of a trumpet pierces our ears. Our eyes blink, they can no longer bear to look and will seek relief in the tranquil depths of blue or green.” (Concerning the Spiritual in Art, 1911). Later, Yves Klein invented a shade of blue that now bears his name…

Can painting be considered a form of metaphysics that attempts to solve the enigma of color? Merleau-Ponty aptly suggests, in Eye and Mind, a certain vision of the world: “Painting celebrates no other enigma than that of visibility.” Mouna recreates this same vision in this attempt to penetrate the enigma of coloUr, which is also that of visibility. But Mouna Rebeiz remains faithful to her own spirit, faithful to that mystery that characterizes her creative momentum, as shown by these twelve canvases in which we plunge ourselves: “We use coloUrs but we paint with feeling” (Jean Chardin).

Elsa Godart
Philosopher and psychoanalyst
Research fellow at Université Gustave Eiffel

The word “puzzle” not only denotes a game but can also refer to the mysteries of life. Rebeiz searches for the meaning of life and her latest series gives shape to this quest. Like the child who questions what seems obvious, Rebeiz is not easily taken in. Totems, symbols of power and unity, have only the ephemeral stability which the men who built them were willing to grant them. Put to the test by the artist’s fundamental questions, these erect monuments are seen for what they are: a body of fragile beliefs.

A murmur of doubt, on a nationwide scale or within a couple’s intimate relationship, suffices to sever the silken thread of trust. The artist is confronted by this disturbing fragility: the monumental totem crumbles into scattered fragments. Our world is volatile, and there is a great temptation to avoid loss of tranquillity. Rebeiz reminds us that the seemingly perfect arrangement of things and men is subject to chance. Empires suddenly collapse; the Colossus of Rhodes fell to the ground, as did Manhattan’s Twin Towers, and our illusions of omnipotence can be dashed to pieces.

The artist’s doubts thus awaken ours, yet Rebeiz also has hope. She reminds us that each part, albeit isolated, symbolises a whole. The piece of the puzzle towards understanding the stones of a temple destroyed thousands of years ago; the relic keenly contested, safeguarded and sanctified. This tiny little bit of almost nothing retains the original principle of a great work that no longer exists; the DNA from which it could be reborn.

When the pieces of the puzzle are reassembled, landscapes reappear in all their splendour, as if by magic. The faces take shape again, the genre scenes come alive once more, as in Flemish paintings. Life begins anew.

Courtesy of Leila Heller Gallery

Feature caption: Mouna Rebeiz, XI, 2021. Oil on canvas, 256 x 192 x 8 cm

Hady Boraey is an independent visual artist as well as a lecturer for the Fine Arts department at Alexandria University. Boraey has amassed a world of artistic knowledge in the past 20 years as he experimented with painting, drawing and sculpture. Despite his affinity for experimentation, Boraey consistently seeks to take his viewers on a journey, opening the mind to new perspectives and blurring the lines between physical and psychological.

His latest exhibition, Eden Dance is born from the pandemic and a desire to reconnect with nature. In classic Boraey fashion, the collection depicts a rich and textured fantasy world. Stoic figures feature center-stage in almost every artwork. Sharp-edged facial features are made sharper by their geometric figures — a stark contrast to the muted backdrops that lay behind them. Cacti, leaves, and budding plants, not surprisingly, are present in many of the pieces as well, denoting the obvious desire to rejoin not only nature, but the outdoor world beyond the confines and isolation of lockdown.

The sun, stars, and birds make an appearance in a few of the paintings, breathing life into the collection and suggesting the figures are, in fact, outside. In some pieces, the figures look up longingly to the starry or sunny sky, in others, they dance in an almost spiritual appreciation of the great outdoors. And in yet others, they simply appear at peace.

Courtesy of Fann Á Porter

Image caption: Hady Boraey, The Bliss Dance, 2021, acrylic on canvas, 100 x 100 cm

Imprisoned by the absurd reality we are living in currently, we dream. Between the elusive past and the illusive future we imagine, reinvent, project and explore the possibilities of utopic cities.

IMAGINARY CITIES is a project that unfolds in 4 chapters: Collaborations exploring cities through the prism of reveries and realities, fluidity and friction, the magical, the playful, and the futuristic…

KEVORK MOURAD
Born in Qamishli, Syria, Mourad now lives and works in New York City. He received his Master of Fine Arts from the Yerevan Institute of Fine Arts in Armenia. Mourad employs his technique of live drawing and animation in concert with musicians – developing a collaboration in which art and music harmonise with one another.

Collaborators include Yo-Yo Ma, Kim Kashkashian, the Los Angeles Master Chorale, Brooklyn Rider, The Knights, Perspectives Ensemble, Paola Prestini, and Kinan Azmeh and he has performed in many institutions, including The Aga Khan Museum (Toronto), The Art Institute of Chicago, The American Museum of Natural History, The Brooklyn Museum of Art, The Bronx Museum of Art, Carnegie Hall, ElbPhilharmonie (Germany), Rhode Island School of Design, Nara Museum (Japan), Lincoln Center Atrium, the Metropolitan Museum of Art and The Walt Disney Concert Hall. Mourad has been a resident teaching artist at Brandeis University, Harvard University, and Holy Cross (Worcester). He is a member of Yo-Yo Ma’s Silk Road Ensemble and is featured in the film “Music of Strangers” (2016).

Recent commissions include Sound of Stone to accompany the exhibition “Armenia!” for the Metropolitan Museum of Art and Well Wish Ya, a dance performance piece with the OYO Dance Troupe in Namibia. His performance Home Within, co-produced with clarinetist Kinan Azmeh, has toured the world. The 2016 recipient of the Robert Bosch Stiftung Film Prize, he premiered his animated film, 4 Acts for Syria, at the Stuttgart Animation Festival. In 2019 he had a solo exhibit at Tabari Artspace in Dubai. In September 2019, he exhibited at Latitude, in Yerevan, Armenia, alongside Imran Qureshi, Roberto Pugliese, and Walid Siti. That year he was also commissioned by the Aga Khan Foundation to create a site-specific 20-foot drawing-sculpture called Seeing Through Babel, at London’s Ismaili Center, addressing the importance of diversity in our contemporary times. The piece was exhibited starting in October 2020 at the Asia Society Triennial in New York. In October 2020 he also premiered the visuals for Beethoven’s Fidelio for the Korea National Opera. His works are in the permanent collection of the Institut du Monde Arabe in Paris.

Courtesy of Galerie Tanit, Munich

Galerie Janine Rubeiz is proud to present Aida Salloum’s first exhibition at the gallery: “Whispering – وشوشات”. A selection of paintings which find their roots in Salloum’s earlier work in lyrical abstraction, enchants us with her sense of colour and compositional explorations.

Today, her focus has grown to encompass more interiorized states of mind, feelings, surface, and light. “My explorations have pushed me further in contemplating light and space”, Salloum says.
Her recent works have expanded deeper in a spiritual quest through the materiality of colour, light, and surface treatments, which painting, as a medium of expression, offers. The vision is refined and focused. The paintings are demanding in their mystical quest. The outlook is of positive nature, as light with its interplay and structure become the tool of joining the transcendental world, the existential realm, with hems of mystic interiors.

Centered on the experience of thinking, feeling, and acting, her surfaces capture the “dance” of marks, of colour and of light. Felt spaces, as she “weaves” her paintings.
In these paintings, light is a direction that guides her in her “writing” of the surface. A visually captivating prose, which calls upon and plays with our sense of touch and vision.
Lyrical, Salloum remains in her expression; yet, she offers us vibrant visions of new dimensions, reflections of what roots her joy of life.
– Hanibal Srouji

Courtesy of Galerie Janine Rubeiz

Order of Magnitude marks Jitish Kallat’s first major solo exhibition in West Asia and the Levant. Presenting new works that include paintings, multimedia installations, drawings and site-specific interventions, the exhibition reflects Kallat’s profound deliberations on the interrelationship between the cosmic and the terrestrial.

Kallat’s oeuvre sits between fluid speculation, precise measurement and conceptual conjectures producing dynamic forms of image-making. Using abstract, schematic, notational and representational languages, he engages with different modes of address, seamlessly interlacing the immediate and the cosmic, the telescopic and the microscopic, the past and present. In Order of Magnitude, one finds a contemplation of overarching interconnectivity on the individual, universal, planetary and extra-terrestrial dimensions.

Jitish Kallat: Order of Magnitude will be accompanied by physical and virtual tours, educational and public programmes, a newly commissioned text by Amal Khalaf and artist conversations over the duration of the exhibit.

Courtesy of Ishara Art Foundation

Image caption: Jitish Kallat, Detail view of Covering Letter (terranum nuncius), (2018-20). 116 parallax barrier multi-scopic prints on plexiglass with programmed LED, circular wooden table, wooden bench, 4 horn speakers, video projection, display dimensions variable. Image courtesy of the artist

Ishara Art Foundation opens 2022 with Order of Magnitude by Jitish Kallat, the artist’s first major solo exhibition in West Asia and the Levant.

Presenting new works that include paintings, multimedia installations, drawings and site-specific interventions, the exhibition reflects Jitish Kallat’s profound deliberations on the interrelationship between the cosmic and the terrestrial.

Jitish Kallat’s oeuvre sits between fluid speculation, precise measurement and conceptual conjectures producing dynamic forms of image-making. Using abstract, schematic, notational and representational languages, he engages with different modes of address, seamlessly interlacing the immediate and the cosmic, the telescopic and the microscopic, the past and present. In Order of Magnitude, one finds a contemplation of overarching interconnectivity on the individual, universal, planetary and extra-terrestrial dimensions.

The viewer is first confronted with Integer Studies (Drawings from Life), which run through the space resembling both the horizon and the equator. Since the beginning of 2021, Kallat followed a ritual of making one daily drawing as part of a durational study in graphite, aquarelle pencil and gesso stains. Each work comprises diverse forms anchored by the same three sets of numbers: the algorithmically estimated world population, the number of new births, and the death count noted at the particular moment of the work’s creation. Human life and death are abstracted in drawings that are both graphic and painterly, prompting questions of extinction and evolution.

Seen alongside these studies is a wall-sized painting titled Postulates from a Restless Radius, whose perimeter takes the form of the conic Albers projection of the Earth. The work begins as an unstable, cross-sectional grid (in aquarelle pencil) that opens up the globe on a flat plane. There is no cartographic intent here; in place of planetary geography it assembles signs and speculations, at once evoking botanical, suboceanic, celestial, and geological formations. Postulates from a Restless Radius is an exploratory abstraction of forms that suggest signatures of growth and entropy.

Placed centrally are four double-sided and multi-scopic photo works titled Epicycles. This series began during the early days of the pandemic in 2020 with a hand-drawn journal capturing minute changes in Kallat’s studio – such as cracks surfacing on walls. Kallat embeds these chance encounters with iconic pictures from the Family of Man exhibition organized by photographer Edward Steichen at the MoMA, New York, in 1955. The resulting prints combine the artist’s everyday observations with archival images of human solidarity taken by photographers from around the world. Meticulously composed on a lenticular surface, the depicted figures appear and disappear as one moves around the work, yielding a complex portrait of time in its transience and ephemerality.

A new iteration of Kallat’s immersive installation Covering Letter (terranum nuncius) occupies Ishara’s mezzanine floor. Images from the Golden Records that travelled as part of NASA’s 1977 Voyager 1 and 2 space mission rest on shelves along two opposite walls. Placed inside programmed LED frames, 116 parallax prints flicker in a breath-like cadence. They include scientific, anatomical and cosmological diagrams as well as flora, fauna and architecture, in an attempt to encapsulate a summary of life on Earth. Permeating the exhibition space are the sounds of salutation to the universe that were on the Golden Records in 55 languages. As the two Voyagers continue their journey in space, now over 14 billion miles away from Earth, this work is a reminder of an epic presentation of “our” world to an unknown other. At a time when we find ourselves in a deeply divided globe, Kallat foregrounds these images and reverberations for a collective meditation on ourselves as residents of a single planet, where the !other”#is an unfamiliar !intergalactic alien.

An obsolete map of our cosmic neighbourhood, the return address marked on the Records is projected within the installation facing a bench in the shape of the Doomsday Clock. The symbolic clock proposed by the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists is reset every year, representing our growing proximity to a hypothetical man-made global catastrophe that is expected to strike at midnight.

Finally, a site-specific intervention by the artist titled N-E-S-W serves as an allusive clue to reading this exhibition. Embedded within the foundation’s architecture, a functional magnetic compass is inset within the flooring. N-E-S-W summons the cardinal directions of the Earth, aligned to invisible force fields, rendering both the exhibition and Ishara into planetary surveying devices.

Finally, a site-specific intervention by the artist titled N-E-S-W serves as an allusive clue to reading this exhibition. Embedded within the foundation’s architecture, a functional magnetic compass is inset within the flooring. N-E-S-W summons the cardinal directions of the Earth, aligned to invisible force fields, rendering both the exhibition and Ishara into planetary surveying devices.

Courtesy of Ishara Art Foundation

Feature caption: Installation view of ‘Jitish Kallat: Order of Magnitude’ at Ishara Art Foundation, 2021. Image courtesy of the artist and Ishara Art Foundation. Photography by Ismail Noor/Seeing Things.

Art Madrid is returning to Madrid Art Week and will be held for its 17th edition from February 23–27 in the Glass Gallery at Cibeles Palace. A unique, open, and luminous space, this venue is located in the “Landscape of Light” right beside the Prado Museum, Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, and Reina Sofia Museum.

An Madrid Art Week fair with a markedly multidisciplinary character, Art Madrid’22 will bring together 35 Spanish and international galleries representing artists who work with painting, sculpture, graphic work, photography, and video art from the early 20th century to the present day. The fair is an inviting, open opportunity for all audiences to discover the contemporary art world.

PROGRAMS

One Shot Hotels is once again a sponsor of Art Madrid and has prepared two initiatives to renew its unwavering commitment to contemporary art.

The first is the program curated by Natalia Alonso, who will offer a tour of various works exhibited at Art Madrid’22 to give the audience a closer look at the art market ecosystem.

The other initiative is the collecting program. This service aims to both boost the galleries’ sales activity and advise new buyers on art acquisition.

Finally, the fair is co-organising, together with video art platform Proyector, a parallel program focused on video creation, action and performance art under the curatorship of Mario Gutiérrez. In this edition, Proyector will focus on investigating and rethinking the concept of the “loop” through the pioneers of video art, from the points of view of creation as well as distribution and collecting. During the fair, audiences will also enjoy an installation by Gary Hill, considered the founder of New Media Art, and two live works by Hill himself; alongside creations by sound art pioneer Llorenç Barber.

This year, the Art Madrid selection committee was once again in charge of evaluating applications from galleries interested in participating in the fair’s 17th edition. To guarantee an Art Madrid’22 program with a high level of artistic quality, the committee based its selection on the proposals received and the careers of the artists represented. This year’s committee was made up of Alfonso de la Torre (critic and curator), Aurora Vigil-Escalera (gallerist), Natalia Alonso (critic and curator), Angel Samblancat (gallerist and consultant at international fairs), and Javier López (gallerist).

Galleries that will participate in Art Madrid for the first time include: Galerie Alex Serra (Köln, Germany), Arena Martínez Projects (Madrid, Spain), ARTITLEDcontemporary (Herpen, Netherlands), Dr.Robot Gallery (Valencia, Spain), GARNA Art Gallery (Madrid, Spain) y Jackie Shor Arte (São Paulo, Brazil).

Visitors will also have the chance to discover the following international galleries at Art Madrid: Art Lounge Gallery (Lisboa, Portugal), ARTITLEDcontemporary (Herpen, Netherlands), Collage Habana (La Habana, Cuba), Galeria São Mamede (Lisboa, Portugal), Galerie Alex Serra (Köln, Germany), Galerie LJ (Paris, France), Jackie Shor Arte (São Paulo, Brazil), Nuno Sacramento (Ílhavo, Portugal), Studija Mindiuzarte/ Kaunas (Kaunas, Lithuania) y Yiri Arts (Taipei, Taiwan).

More than 160 artists will showcase their works at the fair in different disciplines, such as painting, sculpture, photography and installation, offering visitors a unique experience to enjoy contemporary art.

They include some of today’s most prominent emerging artists, such as Mária Švarbová, Carmen Pastrana, Chang Teng-Yuan, Costa Gorelov and Camille Bonneau; mid-career artists like Carlos Cartaxo, Gerard Fernández Rico and Marcos Tamargo; and established artists such as Chema Mádoz, David Rodríguez Caballero, Carmen Calvo, Uiso Alemany, Alberto Guerrero, Josecho López Llorens, Manolo Valdés, Rafael Barrios and Lars Zech, among others.

Art Madrid has announced an online sales campaign as a teaser for its next edition, which will take place from February 23 to 27 in the Glass Gallery of Cibeles Palace in Madrid. “Art&Collect: your artwork in one click” offers a selection of more than 50 works from the galleries participating in Art Madrid’22, available at prices of up to 1,800 euros.

Featured artists include: Costa Gorelov (Dr. Robot Gallery), Jo Hummel (Victor Lope arte Contemporáneo), Jaime Sancorlo (Inéditad), Isabela Puga (Galería BAT alberto cornejo), Fidia Falaschetti (Galería Hispánica Contemporánea) y Herminio (Aurora Vigil-Escalera).

These pieces can be purchased with the click of a button until February 12 at the following link: https://www.art-madrid.com/es/shop/exposicion/artcollect

In addition, anyone who buys a work of art will receive one VIP pass, valid for two people, to Art Madrid.

Courtesy of Art Madrid.

Image caption: Roberto López Martín, Avatar Aracne, 2021. Head covered in fiberglass and resin, 36 cm. DDR Art Gallery

Huguette Caland’s life and work have often been described as unconventional. Born in 1931 in Beirut, she was the only daughter of the first president of the Republic of Lebanon, Bechara El-Khoury. Shortly after her father’s death in 1964, she enrolled in the Fine Arts programme at the American University of Beirut where
she studied painting and drawing. In 1970, she abruptly left her family in Beirut and moved to Paris, where she, tired of being the daughter of, the wife of, the mother of, built her own identity and began exploring themes of sexuality and desire in her work. In 1987, Caland relocated to Venice, California, USA, where she built a home and her studio. The artist lived alternatingly between there and Beirut until her recent death at the age of 88 in 2019.

Tête-à-Tête presents how Caland challenged traditional representations of sexuality, the body and desire, transgressing inhibitions and conventions, drawing ideas from (and talking back to) Surrealist body scapes (body as a landscape and vice versa), Pop libidinal icons as well as orientalist sensuality or abstract patterns drawn from traditional weaving. Across diverse work groups, it is through the sensuous line that one observes the themes of mutability, sensuality, and the basic human desire for intimate connection that motivated Caland in her work and life. Participating in the vein of 60s liberation and disinhibition, Caland developed a mesmerising and highly singular aesthetic language, confirming her work as a keystone of middle-eastern modernism.

The exhibition offers a survey of Huguette Caland’s unconventional and exuberant perspective on life and art. It celebrates how the artist challenged traditional representations of sexuality, the body, and desire, transgressing inhibitions and conventions.

Curated by Claire Gilman, Chief Curator, with Isabella Kapur, Curatorial Associate, The Drawing Center, NYC. Coordination at WIELS by Devrim Bayar, curator WIELS.

The exhibition is accompanied by a programme of activities, including guided tours with Brigitte Caland (25_02) and Samah Hijawi (16_03), lectures (‘Kunst of pornografie’ by Petra Van Brabandt and Hans Maes on 20.03), workshops and more. More information at WIELS.ORG

Courtesy of WIELS

Feature caption: Huguette Caland, Bribes de corps, 1973. Oil on linen, 49 x 35 cm. Private collection

More than five decades of work by the prolific Lebanese artist Aref El Rayess (1928 – 2005) is presented in the artist’s first major institutional exhibition to date.

More than five decades of work by the prolific Lebanese artist Aref El Rayess (1928 – 2005) is presented in the artist’s first major institutional exhibition to date. The exhibition includes a wide range of painting, drawing, sculpture and collage that together reveal the rich and complex artistic practice of this important Arab modernist.

A restless traveller, El Rayess’s oeuvre often reflects the places and times in which he lived and worked. From the early influences of his years spent between Lebanon and Senegal, his travels and studies through Europe and the United States, through his return to the Arab world, the artist captured the essence of the world around him in a body of work that is anchored in his deep inner-self. While much of his work reflects the political struggles of his time—the Algerian War of Independence, the Lebanese civil war—the artist was also an active member of the engaged Lebanese art community, teaching, writing, organising and participating in conferences and exhibitions on politics and arts in the Arab World.

Organised by Sharjah Art Foundation and Sharjah Museums Authority with the support of the Aref El Rayess Estate and Sfeir-Semler Gallery, Beirut/Hamburg.

Courtesy of Sharjah Art Foundation

Image caption: Aref El Rayess, Technologies et revolution, 1968. From “Blood and freedom”. Oil on canvas, 139 x 200 cm. Courtesy of the Aref El Rayess estate and Sfeir-Semler Gallery, Beirut / Hamburg

“The ego is not master in its own house.” (Sigmund Freud, 1917, From A Difficulty in the Path of Psycho-Analysis)

In Freudian psychology the ego is what mediates between our primal desires and our social conditioning in a manner that is realistic and socially appropriate, playing a major role in how we show up in the world.

In a series of paintings Lesi explores the questionable side of the ego’s mediation. What happens when the line is blurred between our desire for connection and being seen, and what is socially acceptable?
The characters in Lesi’s paintings are self-absorbed, considering themselves the center of the universe, seeing themselves everywhere and making everything about themselves.

His comically critical paintings are sourced from photographs, which echo a particular visual language and format of images that has become familiar and normalized on social media platforms. In his works, the line between sharing and connecting with others and excessively celebrating oneself has thinned, and images that seem ‘normal’ start to reveal the underlying glitch in this mediation. As a global wave of wellness culture encourages self-love for mental wellbeing, Lesi’s characters challenge the existence of a line at all.

Lesi is an Egyptian artist born in 1995. His work satirically examines pop culture and daily Egyptian life using collage, photomontage and drawing.
Lesi has participated in group exhibitions, competitions and workshops in Cairo Including the Youth Salon, Mohamed Abla Competition, and Naima Bleeds, among others. His work was shown in 2015 at the Supermarket Exhibition in Sweden alongside other Egyptian artists. In 2019, the artist held his first solo at Cairo’s Mashrabia Gallery, titled Please enter my Inner Space.

Courtesy of Mashrabia Gallery

Feature caption: Ahmed Lesi, Untitled. Acrylic on canvas, 140 x 120 cm.

Saleh Barakat Gallery presents “Hiya”, an exhibition of giclée prints by artist Hussein Madi, Samir Sayegh and Mohammad El Rawas.

Giclée Printing Process
The word Giclée comes from the French word for “to spray” and refers to the process of making fine art prints from a digital source using a high-quality inkjet printer. It connotes an elevation in printmaking technology and requires proper training and years of experience to perfect.
Images are generated from high-resolution digital camera or scan and printed with archival quality pigments onto various archival quality substrates, including canvas, fine art, and photo-base paper.

The Giclée printing process provides better colour accuracy than other means of reproduction and are capable of producing incredibly detailed prints for the reproduction of conventional fine art, photography, and digital art, keeping all the tonalities and hues of the original piece. As such, images reproduced using the Giclée process are used in museums, libraries, and historical databases, and many Giclée prints can be found on display at the world’s leading museums, including the Louvre, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Guggenheim.

Giclée printing allows for the ability to create large formats of almost any scale, while remaining highly faithful to the original copy. It is also estimated that Giclée prints can remain colorfast for 200 years or more.

The Giclée process is ideal for artists who want to create a limited number of reproductions with a superb quality print.

Courtesy of Saleh Barakat Gallery

Feature: Samir Sayegh, Hiya, 2021. Pigmented giclée on canvas, 104 x 74 cm

How does one make visible the stories that exist outside of the human field of vision? Can rendering and imagining the frequencies, simulations and stimulations of sound reveal narratives concealed from history? Artist and ‘Private Ear’ Lawrence Abu Hamdan’s projects express how the experience of listening—the nuances of a cyclic stutter or how the incongruency of an anxious murmur can reveal intricate details of the contested social, political and economic spheres in which we live. In the multi-sensory exhibition, The Sonic Image, the Turner Prize winning artist Abu Hamdan presents various studies of splintered aural leaks. Through research and analysis, the artist crafts a new form of image-making—a new aesthetic politics. ‘What does it mean to sonify images?’, asks Abu Hamdan. Here, the artist perceives of an image that behaves akin to sound itself—a picture that fluctuates between the ear and the eye—that may only exist through the accumulation of both senses.

Tracing the contours of immaterial forms of surveillance and control, The Sonic Image presents a distinctive form of visual expression that explores concepts of ‘atmospheric violence’ and the politics of listening. In the exhibition, the artist maps out an aesthetic atlas for how we see sound—that leaking of substances, which cannot be held by the membrane of either state or person; body or apparatus.

The largest institutional solo exhibition by the artist to date, this presentation features new iterations of recent multisensory works, including an ambitious new commission titled, Air Conditioning (2022) and a site-specific performance Daght Jawi: A Live Audio-Visual Essay (2021-2022), presented in the Foundation’s venue, The Flying Saucer. Together this constellation of artworks collectively investigate the boundaries between voice and speech; translation and testimony; representation and reincarnation as well the power of sound and image to operate as mutual progenitors of and in public testimony—dissonant wisdom is open for investigation.

Lawrence Abu Hamdan: The Sonic Image is curated by Dr Omar Kholeif, Director of Collections and Senior Curator, Sharjah Art Foundation.

Courtesy of Sharjah Art Foundation

Feature image: Lawrence Abu Hamdan, Air Conditioning (production concept detail), 2022. Full colour inkjet print on matt fibre photo paper, 90 x 5475 cm; sound, 40 minutes (looped), Visualisation by Cream Projects. Commissioned by Sharjah Art Foundation. Courtesy of the artist

‘Daydreams’ is Fahd Burki’s first survey exhibition, bringing together works spanning the last fifteen years of the artist’s practice. Burki’s paintings, drawings and sculptures are inspired by a wide range of influences including architecture, nature and various strands of contemporary popular culture. The selection of works range from his figurative work, through to abstraction, and a selection of commissioned reliefs.

The early figurative works are playfully executed using flat graphic colours, symbols and shapes. Over the years, his practice has evolved through slight variations and reductions resulting in more minimalist abstract compositions consisting of grids, lines and blank spaces; created using subtle materials to make barely visible marks and light washes.

In his more recent works, Burki explores the space between painting and sculpture, through a new series of commissioned reliefs. He reduces the work to its most essential elements, focusing on materiality, with an emphasis on weight and form.
A publication featuring commissioned texts by Murtaza Vali, Saira Ansari and Dawn Ross will accompany the exhibition.

Courtesy of Jameel Arts Centre

Feature image: Fahd Burki, Untitled, 1100×500 cm

The Third Line is pleased to present a solo exhibition by artists and filmmakers Joana Hadjithomas & Khalil Joreige. The exhibition proudly debuts The Third Line’s newly renovated space, which is being unveiled alongside this show. Messages with(out) a code presents a selection of new and seminal pieces from their ongoing project Unconformities, which began in 2016 when the artists started collecting a series of earth core samples that revealed the subterranean worlds of cities omnipresent in their personal imaginaries: Athens, Paris, Beirut and Tripoli.

The exhibition is being presented in parallel with Hadjithomas & Joreige’s three-week film retrospective at Cinema Akil that runs from 3rd – 23rd March, 2022. This retrospective also includes the premiere GCC release of Memory Box which had its worldwide premiere at the 71st Berlin International Film Festival.

Unconformities is a geological term used to explain temporal ruptures, natural disasters and geological movements. Working alongside geologists and archaeologists, Hadjithomas & Joreige recuperated drilled and extracted core samples at construction sites from which interconnected works have been created that reveal natural and manmade histories from beneath the earth’s surface.

The exhibition presents a Time Capsule and a series of framed works entitled Trilogies which have both been developed from sites in Monastiraki, Athens. In their Time Capsule works, the artists re-sculpted extracted cores from cities and set them within experimental resin, exposing these buried histories in a vertical, cylindrical structure. In Trilogies, the artists photographed the cores which were then given to archaeologists and historians who drew the significant findings. Hadjithomas & Joreige wrote fragments from the stories they were told as possible narratives behind the findings.

“In these cores, history appears as complex actions, a diverse mix of traces, epochs, and civilisations. It is a constant cycle of destruction and construction, catastrophe and regeneration… Cities mix, erase, bury and recycle the same stones over and again… as a vertiginous palimpsest.” Joana Hadjithomas & Khalil Joreige.

An excerpt from the artists’ recent interview with writer and curator Shumon Basar, February 2022.

Palimpsests is also the title of a short film that takes place over several sites across Beirut, and records the various processes used to create the drilling cores, notably the manner in which the material is sorted in order to determine the suitability of the foundations. Palimpsests plays with scales of time and size; the massive confronts the minuscule, and the viewer passes from the macro to the microscopic.

In 2019, the artists created A State which is a series of three images of a drilling core sourced from a large landfill site in Tripoli, Lebanon that has accumulated waste for over 25 years. This site has radically altered the local landscape, and today forms hills that rise 45 metres above sea level. The treatment of waste is at the centre of questions regarding the inheritance of the planet and what we leave behind.

The exhibition also presents three new tapestry works by Hadjithomas & Joreige titled Messages with(out) a code. Derived from their personal experience on archaeological sites, the artists have witnessed the intricacies of the archaeological process where findings are set on a flat surface, giving a one-dimensional aspect to time itself. Hadjithomas & Joreige were fascinated by this process and, using photography, they documented it and became enthralled by the photographs taken which became the point of departure for these tapestry works.

“Tapestry implies a weaving, a juxtaposition of materials. It is an ancestral technique — a tradition — which can render the density of these archaeological compositions. Choosing colours from a multitude of possibilities and materials, the complexity of layers, making and unmaking, knotting and unknotting, restoring the link… Weaving is a way of restoring something that we have lost. A loss that we all feel now — perhaps even more painfully — given the recent events in Lebanon.” Joana Hadjithomas & Khalil Joreige.

Courtesy of The Third Line

Feature caption: Joana Hadjithomas & Khalil Joreige, A State, 2019, Digital Photography, Edition of 4 + 2APs (L-R) Borehole 1, 235 x 140cm; Borehole 2, 212 x 140 cm; Borehole 3, 230 x 140cm

COLOUR | GARDEN is the forth solo exhibition of Hamra Abbas (b. 1976, Kuwait) at the gallery, presenting a set of conceptual prints alongside new marble inlay works that extend her investigation of color theory, geometry and the garden motif in architecture. The show coincides with her EXPO 2020 Dubai commission Garden (2021), which forms part of the Public Art Programme curated by Tarek Abou El Fetouh.

Every Colour 2 (2022), comprised of six monochromatic digital prints, builds upon Abbas’ seminal series Kaaba Picture as a Misprint (2014) in which she deconstructs a black square to reveal hidden multiplicity in cyan, magenta and yellow. In her most recent iteration Abbas goes a step further, setting the hues free from their shapes to create individual color blocks, so that what were once components of the black square are now no longer bound by it.

Abbas’ phenomenology of colour takes a new direction in her experimentation with the potentialities of marble inlay (pietra dura), breaking new ground as she pulls this traditional practice away from its historical function to create a new form of aesthetics. Her works reference the Mogul architecture of Lahore Fort and its traditional use of garden motifs, where idyllic images of landscapes epitomize paradise and perfection, immortality and mortality; an earthly utopia in which humans coexist with nature in perfect harmony.

In her work Abbas seeks to unearth the symbolic significance of garden imagery in relation to architecture and their interplay in the representation of nature and colour. For her permanent public art commission at Expo 2020 Dubai, Abbas produced a magnificent utopian garden on a grand scale, combining vibrant colored stones into images of waterfalls, trees, flowers, skies and mountains. In COLOUR | GARDEN she revisits some of these motifs but on a more intimate scale.

In Tree (2022) Abbas appropriates an image of a cypress tree engraved in the Palace of Mirrors in Lahore Fort, and reimagines it enriched with vivid blocks of color that recall the paintings of Paul Klee and the geometric patterns synonymous with Bauhaus architecture. Abbas’ Flower (2022) series, on the other hand, are much softer, baring the aesthetic of 19th century still life paintings such as Van Gogh’s Sunflowers.

In Mountain 1 (2022) – a magnificent triptych made entirely out of lapis lazuli – Abbas takes in the iconic imagery of K2 Mountain. Captured by countless photographers, this archetypal image of white snow, rock formations and perfect blue skies has become a symbol for the quest of perfection and truth.

Finally, her Waterfall (2022) series consists of repeated chevron patterns in bold colours that extend across and down each piece. Analogous to the divided colours in her Misprints, the chevron patterns fuse her color investigations and her marble inlay sculptures into a seamless body of work.

Courtesy of Lawrie Shabibi

Feature caption: Hamra Abbas, Waterfall 2, 2022. Marble, lapis lazuli, onyx, jasper, serpentine, calcite, 41.91 x 41.91 cm. Courtesy of the Artist and Lawrie Shabibi

An integral part of Tashkeel’s annual exhibition programme is an open call exhibition addressing a theme of timely relevance to society and the world in which we live. So, in January 2022, Tashkeel called upon artists and designers living and working in the UAE to submit artworks and design pieces in all mediums that explored issues around the philosophy of food through a wide range of interpretations, whether literal or abstract.

In a place that currently imports 80 per cent of its food, can we ever become a self-sufficient society, able to nourish ourselves while preserving the natural resources around us and reducing waste? Will such a major shift restrict the way we live or give us greater autonomy, enabling us to realise a vision where the true agricultural and culinary potential of this country is fulfilled?

A monumental shift is required in the way we approach food; how we source it, prepare and consume it. So how do we change our thoughts as well as our actions? Where do we begin? Technology will provide countless solutions for the future, from climate-proofing land agriculture to bio-designing aquaculture. It will help us identify alternative proteins and other new sources of nutrition. Yet it is us who require the greatest inquiry of all to truly change. Today’s sustainable food movement is global. Unled yet inspirational, it requires us to be more reflective on food, our values and choices, living by principles based on the importance of science, the recognition of restriction and the need for wholesome sustenance.

We must adopt, adapt and embrace a new philosophy of food.

Courtesy of Tashkeel

Feature image: Yosra Emamizadeh. Avocados. 2022. Coloured pencil on paper. 56 x 38 cm.

Art Dubai’s 15th edition will take place at Madinat Jumeirah, Dubai from 11- 13 March 2022 (previews on 9 and 10 March).

Welcoming over 100 exhibitors from 44 countries, including more than 30 first-time exhibitors, Art Dubai 2022 will be the most extensive edition of the fair to date, and one of very few major international art events to take place this spring. This year’s programme will feature newly commissioned site-specific works by internationally renowned artists; a unique new digital section that will act as a bridge between the crypto and art world; ground-breaking group exhibitions; and an ambitious multi-strand talks programme, including the 15th edition of the Global Art Forum.

Across the UAE, for Art Dubai Week, the country’s leading institutions will present a parallel programme of significant solo and group exhibitions, talks and events.

Art Dubai Programme 2022

Art Dubai’s commission for 2022 is INLAND, represented by Fernando Garcia-Dory, who will present a new multi-site installation at the fair and in a variety of locations across Dubai. Sand Flow will manifest in a range of places and moments, combining visions of Dubai’s past, present and future and examining the ways in which the multiplicity of cultures and communities inhabit the city and their contributions to it. The artwork will incorporate archaeology, hydrology, urbanism and transport as well as the Middle East’s rich oral storytelling traditions, heritage and crafts.

A new fair section exploring the digital and NFT art worlds will examine the context out of which NFTs, cryptocurrency, video art and virtual reality (VR) have grown since the rise of digital art in the 1980s, including those who are leading the way in the rapidly expanding digital art space. Art Dubai Digital will feature a curated selection of 17 top international galleries and platforms, and include presentations by some of the most exciting and innovative artists working in the digital space today, including Refik Anadol (Pilevneli) and Uta Bekaia and Denis Davydov (Window Project) as well as multi-artist presentations by Institut, Bright Moments, Fingerprints DAO, Postmasters, Emergeast and Cyber Baat.

COSMODREAMS, an interactive installation by Marina Fedorova, will explore the effects of technological advancements on our lives and environment. The installation combines traditional art and digital technologies in the form of large-scale paintings, sculptures, life-size objects and virtual reality video with interactive panels. Art Dubai Digital will also include an exhibition of new NFTs created by the 12 UAE-based and international artists taking part in this year’s expanded edition of Campus Art Dubai.

Art Dubai’s 2022 programme will feature an innovative talks programme for a range of audiences. Entitled ‘This is the Picture’ and taking place across four days, the 15th edition of the Global Art Forum will examine the worlds of digital artefacts and crypto economies, inviting leading artists, curators, creators, thinkers and technologists to consider a range of topics from NFT art and curatorial projects, to crypto gaming and the metaverse, Web 3.0 and Dubai’s new crypto zone. Confirmed participants for 2022 will include noted collectors Guy Ullens and Ryan Zurrer, and pioneering artists Holly Herndon & Mat Dryhurst and Hito Steyerl, and UAE blockchain advocate Saeed Al Darmaki.

Bybit Talks, an eclectically curated series of conversations presented by the titular and leading cryptocurrency exchange, will give visitors greater understanding about the rapid growth in digital platforms, inviting guest speakers to explain more about the basics of cryptocurrency, digital media and NFT art. Participants will include Tamas Banovich, co-founder of Postmasters; Seth Goldstein, cofounder of Bright Moments and Jenn Ellis, co-founder of Aora Space.

Art Dubai’s Modern section will be accompanied by three days of Art Dubai Modern Talks (10th-12th March), this year held in collaboration with the Dubai Collection, that will examine the life, work and influences of 20th century Modern masters from the Middle East and North Africa. These important artists’ works form the art history of the region from the turn of the 20th century to the 1980s, and the series will significantly add to the existing scholarship and research. Participants will include Art Dubai Modern curator Sam Bardaouil, leading Emirati curator Munira Al Sayegh and Nima Sagharchi, Director of Middle Eastern, Islamic and South Asian Art at Bonhams.

Art Dubai this year will debut a new exhibition commissioned by and in partnership with Warehouse421 and Salama Bint Hamdan Emerging Artist Fellowship (SEAF). Curated by Maryam Al Dabbagh and Mays Albaik, this show will present a selection of works from the fellowship’s eight-year tenure, drawing on threads and recurring research themes that persist across the programme’s different cohorts. Including painting, textile, video, and photography, the exhibition will reflect a collective questioning of memory in relation to place, time, and a sense of rhythm and repetition.

Julius Baer has commissioned Filipino-American light and media artist James Clar (Silverlens) to create an interactive video installation entitled Cloud Seed, for the Julius Baer lounge at the fair. The installation will immerse visitors in a large-scale real time simulation of raindrops and fog, using custom technology to create a slowly morphing visual system that reflects our control of the environment. Through the commission, Julius Baer wants to showcase the emergence of mega trends such as digital disruption and how artists are using cutting-edge technology in their practice.

This year’s A.R.M. Holding Children’s Programme will feature artist-led workshops for children aged 5- 17 years. With a focus on sustainability, the programme will be led by Kenyan artist Cyrus Kabiru, who will work with participants to retrieve and repurpose everyday materials from their homes and schools, and transforming them into works of art. Through these workshops, Cyrus will challenge participants to alter their perspectives, and re-examine how they see everyday objects and their wider surroundings. The first A.R.M. Holding Children’s Programme will take place at Art Dubai before expanding to take place in 80 schools – reaching more than 5000 children across Dubai, in line with A.R.M. Holding’s long-term commitment to artistic education and Dubai’s creative economy.

Around Town – Art Dubai Week

Art Dubai Week takes place during the final month of Dubai Expo 2020 with a range of solo and group exhibitions taking place across the city. Highlights include: Jitish Kallat: Order of Magnitude at Ishara Foundation; A Slightly Curving Place, curated by Nina Ghouse, at Concrete, Alserkal Avenue; two important solo shows: Taus Makhacheva: A Space of Celebration and Fahd Burki: Daydreams at Jameel Arts Centre. Sharjah Art Foundation will present Lawrence Abu Hamdan: The Sonic, the largest solo exhibition of the artist’s works to date, including a major new commission Air Conditioning and a sitespecific performance. When Images Speak: Highlights from the Dubai Collection continues at the Etihad Museum, featuring a selection of nearly 70 modern and contemporary art works drawn from the collections of 11 patrons of Dubai Collection, the first institutional art collection of its kind.

Gallery List 

CONTEMPORARY

+2 Gallery, Tehran
Gallery 1957, Accra/London
Aicon Art, New work
AKKA Project, Dubai/Venice
Galerfa Albarrân Bourdais, Madrid
Andréhn-Schiptjenko, Stockholm/Parts
Gallery Artbeat, Tbilisi
Aspan Gallery, Almaty
ATHR, Jeddah
Ayyam Gallery, Dubai
Ballon Rouge, Brussels
Saleh Barakat Gallery, Beirut
Thomas Brambilla, Bergamo
Carbon 12, Dubai
Circle Art Gallery, Nairobi/London
Comptoir des Mienes Galerie, Marrakech
GALLERIA CONTINUA, San Gimignano/Beijing/Les Moulins/Havana/Rome/São Paulo/Paris
Custot Gallery Dubai, Dubai
Galerie Dar D’art, Tangier
Dastan’s Basement, Tehran
Dirimart, Istanbul
Experimenter, Kolkata
Gallery Isabelle van den Eynde, Dubai
Selma Feriani Gallery, Sidi Bou Said/London
FORO.SPACE, Bogota
Gazelli Art House, London/Baku
Green Art Gallery, Dubai
Grosvenor Gallery, London
Mark Hachem, Beirut/New York/Paris
Hafez Gallery, Jeddah
HELDENREIZER Contemporary, Munich
Leila Heller Gallery, Dubai/New York
Hestia, Belgrade
Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery, London/Berlin/Nevlunghavn/Schloss Goerne
IsIa Flotante, Buenos Aires
Jhaveri Contemporary, Mumbai
Keumsan Gallery, Seoul
Gallery Dr. Dorothea van der Koelen, Mainz/Venice
Galerie Kornfeld, Berlin
Galerie Krinzinger, Vienna
Gallery Latitude 28, New Delhi
Anna Laudel, Istanbul/Düsseldorf
Lawrie Shabibi, Dubai
LOFT ART GALLERY, Casablanca
Primo Marella Gallery, Lugano/Milan
MARUANI MERCIER, Brussels/Knokke/Zaventem
Meem Gallery, Dubai
Mohsen Gallery, Tehran
Mono Gallery, Riyadh
MONO8, San Juan City
Galerie Nathalie Obadia, Paris/Brussels
Gallery One, Ramallah
P42O, Bologna
Parallel Circuit, Tehran
Perrotin, Paris/Hong Kong/Seoul/Tokyo/Shanghai/New York
Giorgio Persano, Turin
Rhizome, Algiers
RONCHINI, London
The Rooster Gallery, Vilnius
Rosenfeld Gallery, London
SANATORIUM, Istanbul
Sfeir-Semler Gallery, Beirut/Hamburg
Silverlens, Manila
Stems Gallery, Brussels
Walter Storms Galerie, Munich
Tabari Artspace, Dubai
TAFETA, London/Lagos
TEMPLON, Paris/Brussels
The Third Line, Dubai
Volte Art Projects, Dubai/Mumbai
Wadi Finan Art Gallery, Amman
Window Project, Tbilisi/Moscow
x-ist, Istanbul
Yusto/Giner, Marbella/Madrid
Zawyeh Gallery, Ramalah/Dubai
Zidoun-Bossuyt Gallery, Luxembourg/Paris/Dubai
Zilberman Gallery, Istanbul/Berlin

MODERN

Curated by Sam Bardaouil (Lebanon) and Till Fellrath (Germany), Founders and Directors of Art Reoriented and Directors of the Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin.

Agial Art Gallery, Beirut
Aicon Art, New York
Sabrina Amrani, Madrid
Comptoir des Mines Galerie, Marrakech
DAG World, New Delhi/Mumbai/New York
Eye For Art Gallery, Houston
Leila Heller Gallery, Dubai/New York
Gallery Misr, Cairo
Sfeir-Semler Gallery, Beirut/Hamburg
Zamalek Art Gallery, Cairo

BAWWABA

Curated by Nancy Adajania (India), cultural theorist and independent curator.

Blueprint12, New Delhi
Canvas Gallery, Karachi
Jahmek Contemporary Art, Luanda
Madragoa, Lisbon
NATURE MORTE, New Delhi
Rele Gallery, Lagos/Los Angeles
Galerie–Peter–Sillem, Frankfurt am Main
TARQ, Mumbai
Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi
VIGIL GONZALES, Cusco

ART DUBAI DIGITAL

Curated by cultural researcher Chris Fussner (Philippines) of Tropical Futures Institute, a multi-disciplinary studio based between Cebu and New York.

Bright Moments, Los Angeles/New York/Berlin
Cyber Baat, Metaverse
Emergeast, Digital
Fingerprints DAO, Digital
Gazell.io, Baku
HORIZONS by so-far & AORA, Digital
Institut, London
Keumsan Gallery, Seoul
Anna Laudel, Istanbul/Düsseldorf
Morrow Collective, Digital
NFT Asia, Singapore
PILEVNELI, Istanbul
Postmasters Gallery, New York/Rome/Blockchain
SANATORIUM, Istanbul
Volte Art Projects, Dubai/Mumbai
Wadi Finan Art Gallery, Amman
Window Project, Tbilsi/Moscow

Courtesy of Art Dubai

Caption: Maruani Mercier, Ross Bleckner, A Year of Conquering Negative Thinking, 2021, 213.5 x 152.5 cm

Beirut Unpublished, Salwa Eid’s second solo exhibition, re-visits the unreleased negatives from her first solo exhibition Inkblots, with an exclusive new perspective, the point of view of the photographer. Questions related to agency in photographic practices when documenting people and places were at the center of Inkblots. “How do you perceive a city you call your home? I’ve been asking myself that question for a long time now. I first tried to answer it by going around town and capturing what is left of Beirut’s heritage when I quickly realised that to me, it’s the people that make the city, they make it a home,” said Eid, back in 2018. Beirut Unpublished stems from the desire to find a new approach to the process of photographic documentation by turning the lens inwards. In a place that has witnessed unexpected occurrences in the past 4 years, resulting in a constant state of flux, how can one ground oneself? In a place that seems more foreign than ever, how can its inhabitants give it meaning? Romanticism aside, what does Beirut mean to you, today?

Courtesy of Zalfa Halabi Art Gallery

Feature: Beirut Unpublished, Salwa Eid’s second solo exhibition at Zalfa Halabi Art Gallery

Mashrabia Gallery of Contemporary Art is thrilled to host solo exhibition by the well-known Syrian Artist Youssef Abdelké.

After a long absence from the Egyptian scene, Youssef Abdelké comes back with a new exhibition entitled “Quartets Salah Jahin”.

Written by the Egyptian poet between 1959 and 1962, the quartets inspired Abdelké a series of impressive drawings executed between 2015 and 2019. Abdelké made later a limited edition of 10 numbered and signed prints, including hommages to famous artists like Marcel Duchamps, Mahmoud Mokhtar, Hokusai, Mahmoud Said and Sheikh Imam.

​Youssef Abdelke’s hyper -realistic charcoal works on paper evoke a nation at war as they attempt to “express the concerns and emotions of the ordinary Syrian citizen amid this huge river of blood,” says the artist, referring to his native country’s recent history. His carefully rendered still lifes are splattered with red paint and often include overt memento mori such as skulls, bones, and even a heart impaled on a nail. Abdelke lived in Paris from 1981 through 2005 and attended the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts. However, he was later forbidden from leaving Syria after his passport was confiscated and he was arrested for his activism.

Courtesy of Mashrabia Gallery of Contemporary Art

Feature: Work from Youssef Abdelké’s exhibition “Quartets Salah Jahin”

The red thread of destiny by Andrea Pacheco González

This is my home this fine line of barbed wire Gloria Anzaldúa

The Red Thread of Destiny is an ancient Asian legend that can be found in both Chinese (红线) and Japanese (赤い糸) mythology, which relates to the idea that a thin and invisible red thread emotionally connects people. Beyond the place, context or circumstances that one might have to live through, they will end up meeting at some point, for they are bound by an unbreakable bond. Although this belief has been appropriated by the fantasy of romantic love, the myth actually alludes to the force of destiny tying our lives together, regardless of the nature of the union. On a deeper level, it relates to trust, and to the faith that something beyond our actions sustains us, invoking a red thread tied to the pinkie as a symbol of a constellation of infinite connections; an amorous web that is able to contain the solitary existence of an individual. It is, no doubt, a charming belief. Oh, if only all persons, regardless of their origin, could trust in destiny like this.

Many artists, mostly non-European women, have made use of red strands or lines as a vindication, as a political and emotional gesture that touches on another aspect of this Asian myth: its counter-narrative. At times, it has been a path, a seam, a stain, a red cascade that falls to the ground. At others, it was blood traced over a surface, as in Teresa Margolles’s shrouds, Ana Mendieta’s bloody face or her silhouette outlined in the sand. But it is also in Cecilia Vicuña’s quipus, in the seams of Catalina Parra’s dismembered bodies, in Mona Hatoum’s undercurrents, and in the photos embroidered with red thread of the series, A Fine Line (2022), presented by Mónica de Miranda in this show. This collection juxtaposes a variety of artists’ works, practices and aesthetics, that communicate with each other across time and space in an almost spectral manner, as part of a web of irrevocable connections. The ghostly matters are important Avery F. Gordon affirms when she states that apparitions of past forces come to the present time and time again in various and complex forms. It is also the red thread of destiny that, in this case, underlines a universal unlove.

Mónica de Miranda (Porto, 1976) has developed a strong body of work around the African diaspora in Europe, specifically within the context of Portugal. Using photography and video as her main media, her work has explored the memory of the earth and of the landscape as a result of the colonial processes that were initiated by Europeans in the XVI century. In the collaborative format that her works often assume (her practice always dialogues with other creators) the artist delves into the colonial wounds of oppressed territories. However, the visual composition is diametrically opposed to an image of disgrace. “Her images are lyrical, performative, contemplative: they show moments of calm that offer a kind of comfort,” writes curator Mark Sealy about Mónica’s photos. Indeed, there is a duality, a contrast of representation apparent in her works: they allude to tensions in history that operate as a form of cryptography, and deciphering them offers an opportunity for reparation.

For the project Shadows Fall Behind, De Miranda realized deep research on the border between Spain and Morocco on the North African coast. She traveled to the cities of Ceuta and Melilla in an attempt to understand this other form of warp that intertwines—always tragically—a border fence and the promised land dreams of the migrant. The photos depict the landscape that these dreams look in. Might there be someone on the other side, with a red knot tied to my pinkie? Might the strand that kept us safe, be broken? Those could be the questions of someone who is no longer here to be answered. Like a subtle decoration, the artist overlays traditional Islamic patterns upon the horizon of the Spanish coast. And there it is once more, the phantasmal, the spectre of a denied cultural hybridization. Here, the red thread symbolises an imaginary cartography that transgresses the geopolitical outline of this border, giving it texture and warmth; a pattern, as though it were something that could function as a sort of refuge.

Alongside the photos, the artist presents the video piece, Border Song (2022), made in collaboration with the afro-Portuguese musician Xullaji. The video follows the border of Ceuta and Melilla—a contour of no more than 20 kilometres—from a moving car. The images summon a painful procession of intertwined voices, sounds and chants from both sides of the steel line. There, blood has lost its colour. In this mesh, there are only severed threads; undone, ripped apart, dismembered, divided.

During her field research, Mónica de Miranda listened to dozens of people who remain stuck to the border, in between “who can live and who must die,” as stated by Achille Mbembe. The project is layered with accounts of those who are forced to be away from where they were born, of lives at the limit of all humanity, when the dream landscape transforms into a nightmare. Through the fiction created by these fabrics and interwoven voices, the artist ventures a sheltering gesture, a symbolic refuge in the face of the catastrophe of staying in those lands.

The border-town Chicana writer Gloria Anzaldúa proposes the idea of a “mundo surdo” [left-handed world] where all dissidence and all otherness are included, going directly against the principle of why borders were created in the first place. Her words are interspersed by the images that Mónica de Miranda shows in this exhibition, for at least they offer the possibility of imagining a destiny.

I am becoming-being
the questor the questing the quest
You and I have already met
We are meeting we will meet
The real unknown is feeling
The real unknown is love

[…]

We are the awakening feminine presence
We are the earth
We are the second coming

Notes
Achille Mbembe, Necropolitics, Melusina, 2006.
Avery F. Gordon, Ghostly Matters, University of Minnesota Press, 2008.
Gloria Anzaldúa, Borderlands/La frontera: The new mestiza, Capitán Swing, 2016.
Gloria Anzaldúa, “The coming of el mundo surdo”, in The Gloria Anzaldúa Reader, ed. by AnaLouise Keating, Duke University Press, 2009.
Mark Sealy, African Cosmologies: Photography, Time and the Other, FotoFest Biennial, Schilt Publishing, 2020.

Courtesy of Sabrina Amrani Gallery

Join TINTERA for the closing reception of Barry Iverson’s solo exhibition The Truth of the Desert.

Made throughout his career as a TIME Magazine photographer and his many years of living in the region, the thirty five photographs on display, both hand coloured and black and white, show us Iverson’s deep passion and respect for the desert.

“I photograph in the desert in search of the truth of the desert. It is the unaltered landscape of sand and stone and sky. I seek the landscape that is not compromised, and which exists according to the rules of nature. Ansel Adams sought to photograph the beauty of the American West in all its glory and majesty. I seek to photograph the beauty of the desert to lay bare (or reveal) its truth and majesty. Rather than eye the desert as a place to extract its mineral riches, it offers the soul a space for peace and solitude.” Barry Iverson

In 1985 Barry Iverson (American b.1956), a former TIME Magazine photographer, won a Fulbright Scholarship to research the history of photography in Egypt; he has remained in Egypt since then working on several fine art portfolios and reviving the hand coloured process made famous by master photographer Van Leo. It was Iverson’s research and study of 19th & 20th century photography and the early works of photographers like Francis Frith and Maxim Du Camp as well as the documentary work of Walker Evans, which influenced his own vision and style. Iverson has long explored issues of memory and its historical context and the desert landscape has been of particular interest to him for many years. Using film and a large format camera for much of his work and printing in a traditional wet darkroom, Iverson’s photographs, rich in detail and tone, hark back to the earlier days of the medium. Iverson’s work is represented in several private and public collections including Harvard University and the American University in Cairo.

Courtesy of TINTERA

Feature: Barry Iverson Two boulders and a tree, Wadi Masar, South Sinai, 1995. Silver gelatin print, hand-coloured.

The vision of the figure, in Joseph Harb’s exhibition is defragmented. The “parts” are raw. The expression is direct and brutal. The treatment is callous, straightforward, and experimental.
The narration and re-narration are left to the imagination of the beholder. The spectators are forced in the position of the “witness” of the ghastly dissection of a body, their body?

After the explosion of the 4th of August, which seems to have passed in the annals of sufferings for many Lebanese enduring, every day, new calamities; this show may raise anguish, recall stressful memories and induce pain. Harb digs into his own soul offering the raw reality of the state of things.

An expert in assemblage, Harb looks at our social and physical condition by examining his own existence. The figure is a “figuration” of the self, the individual and the collective. Harb confesses that he “watches life as a theater,” always questioning what is real and what could be fiction – existentialist questions, which keep surfacing.

The sculptures alternate between the fragment, which is represented as a monument dedicated to the gods of destruction, the complete figures dedicated to the goddess of love: Venus, and the figure encompassing its immediate space. Harb’s pieces fall short of attaining any final refinement. The propos is to point to this stressful shift in time and space, never attaining “perfection.”

The paintings in the exhibition reflect at, yet, another state of figuration of the body, meditative or serene. The paintings place the figure as fragments, elements in space and time. The human representations are also conceived as “parts” in their construction. Fiction and reality are, here, put in question. Harb is allowing himself to speak on our behalf. He is not in denial. He addresses the beast that is bound to peak out in these hard circumstances. Another painting series addresses the brutal force in different reinstatements of the Bull.

These “narratives” by Joseph Harb speak of being “Here and Now.” They are constructs, restatements of his sensitivity and vision.

Hanibal Srouji

Courtesy of Galerie Janine Rubeiz

A 2022 edition of very high calibre that reflects the growing momentum of this major spring event for modern and contemporary art in Paris.
Boosted by the success of the September 2021 edition that inaugurated the Grand Palais Ephémère on the Champ-de-Mars with a record-breaking 72,745 visitors, Art Paris is back from 7-10 April 2022 with a strong selection of 130 modern and contemporary galleries from some twenty different countries.

Both regional and cosmopolitan, this 24th edition counts 30% new exhibitors.
Returning heavyweights Continua, Lelong & Co, massimodecarlo, kamel mennour and Perrotin are joined by Max Hetzler (Berlin, Paris, London) and Bernier Eliades (Athens, Brussels). As far as French galleries are concerned, gb agency, Christophe Gaillard, Catherine Issert, Pietro Sparta, Praz Delavallade and Denise René will be exhibiting for the first time at Art Paris alongside international newcomers such as Fernando Pradilla (Madrid), Rodolphe Janssen (Brussels) and Xippas (Brussels, Geneva, Montevideo, Paris, Punta del Este).

This edition also sees the arrival of Brame Lorenceau, Galerie des Modernes and Galerie Jacques Bailly who will be enhancing the modern art offer. The African art scene takes root at the fair with 1957 Gallery (Ghana), Loft Art Gallery (Morocco) and Véronique Rieffel (Ivory Coast), who are joined by Parisian galleries 31 Project, Magnin-A, Templon, Anne de Villepoix and Carole Kvasnevski. The latter will be devoting its stand to South African artist Zanele Muholi. Focusing on discovering and rediscovering artists, Art Paris puts the spotlight on independent and emerging galleries such as Backslash, Félix Frachon, Ibasho, Eric Linard, Irène Laub and Oniris.art, which will all be joining the fair in 2022. Art Paris also encourages the presentation of monographic exhibitions, whilst supporting young galleries and emerging artists in the “Promises” sector that brings together around ten exhibitors.

In 2022, Art Paris is also characterised by its commitment in favour of the environment with two themes – “Natural Histories” and “Art & Environment”- combined with an innovative and sustainable approach to organising an art fair.

Solo Show: seventeen monographic exhibitions
Seventeen solo shows spread throughout the fair allow visitors to discover or rediscover in depth the work of modern, contemporary or emerging artists: Alia Ali (193 Gallery) • Shagha Arianna (Septieme Gallery) • Jean-Charles Blais (Catherine Issert) • Marion Boehm (Loft Art Gallery) • Julien Colombier (Le Feuvre et Roze) • Thomas Devaux (Bacqueville) • Alina Frieske (Fabienne Levy) • Philippe Hiquily (Patrice Trigano) • Vincent Laval (Sono) • Carlos León (Fernando Pradilla) • Antoine de Margerie (Eric Linard) • Zanele Muholi (Carole Kvasnevski) • Ernest Pignon-Ernest (Art to be Gallery) • Rao Fu (Vazieux) • Hala Schoukair (Bessières) • Tyler Thacker (Pact) • Tony Toscani (Stems Gallery)

Promises: a sector supporting young galleries and emerging artists
“Promises”, a sector focusing on young galleries created less than six years ago, provides a forward-looking analysis of cutting-edge contemporary art. In 2022, this sector will play host to nine galleries around half of which are new for this edition: Double V Gallery (Marseille, Paris), Galerie Felix Frachon (Brussels), Hors-Cadre (Paris), La Galería Rebelde (Guatemala City), Fabienne Levy (Lausanne), Gallery M9 (Seoul), Septieme Gallery (Paris), She BAM! Galerie Laetitia Gorsy (Leipzig), Galerie Sono (Paris)

Paris, the place to be!
Paris is in the midst of an exceptional period of cultural and artistic renaissance illustrated by the opening of new galleries and venues, the renovation of existing cultural institutions and the inauguration of new ones. More than ever before, the City of Light is asserting its role as the place to be for contemporary art. The activities on offer as part of the VIP programme, reserved for collectors and art professionals, bear witness to the transformation of Paris’s art scene, whilst showcasing the sustainable initiatives of its cultural stakeholders.

NATURAL HISTORIES.
A FOCUS ON THE FRENCH SCENE
Guest Curator: Alfred Pacquement

List of selected artists:
Etel Adnan (1925-2021), Galerie Lelong & Co.
Gilles Aillaud (1928-2005), Loevenbruck
Dove Allouche (1972), gb agency
Carole Benzaken (1964), Galerie Nathalie Obadia
Damien Cabanes (1959), Galerie Eric Dupont
Philippe Cognée (1957), Templon
Johan Creten (1963), Perrotin
Marinette Cueco (1934), Galerie Univer / Colette Colla
Hugo Deverchère (1988), Dumonteil Contemporary
Edi Dubien (1963), Galerie Alain Gutharc
Eva Jospin (1975), Galerie Suzanne Tarasiève
Jacqueline Lamba (1910-1993), Galerie Pauline Pavec
Guillaume Leblon (1971), Galerie Nathalie Obadia
Jean-Michel Othoniel (1964), Perrotin
Anne & Patrick Poirier (1941 et 1942), Galerie Mitterrand
Eric Poitevin (1961), Dilecta
Armelle de Sainte Marie (1968), Galerie Jean Fournier
Barthélémy Toguo (1967), Galerie Lelong & Co.
Tursic & Mille (1974), Galerie Max Hetzler
Justin Weiler (1990), Paris-B

ART & ENVIRONMENT
Guest Curator: Alice Audouin

List of selected artists:
Noémie Goudal (1984), Galerie Les Filles du Calvaire
Elsa Guillaume (1989), Backslash
Romuald Hazoumè (1962), Magnin-A
Suzanne Husky (1975), Galerie Alain Gutharc
Fabrice Hyber (1961), Galerie Nathalie Obadia
Tadashi Kawamata (1953), Galerie kamel mennour
Vincent Laval (1991), Galerie Sono
Douglas Mandry (1989), Galerie Binome
Lucy & Jorge Orta (1966 et 1953), Galerie Marguerite Milin
Michelangelo Pistoletto (1933), Galleria Continua
Recyclegroup – Andrey Blokhin (1987) et Georgy Kuznetsov (1985),
Galerie Suzanne Tarasiève
Pia Rönicke (1974), gb agency
Lou Ros (1984), Galerie Romero Paprocki
Lionel Sabatté (1975), Galerie 8+4
Pascale Marthine Tayou (1966), Galleria Continua
Sarah Trouche (1983), Galerie Marguerite Milin
Capucine Vever (1987), Galerie Eric Mouchet