LEBANON
A few more days left to see the archival display at Sursock Museum, The Butterflies and Bumblebees of Middle East Airlines (until 22 August 2026), tracing the history of the Middle East Airlines (MEA) folkloric dance troupe. Presented as part of International Archives Week and the Modern Heritage Observatory, the display brings together a selection from an archive of around 500 photographs, documents and press clippings, many of which are being shown publicly for the first time. Preserved by the Bou Harb family, the collection offers a glimpse into the troupe’s international performances and its role in shaping representations of Lebanese culture abroad. Curated by Rowina Bou Harb and Nidale Hamouche Bou Harb, the display revisits a lesser-known chapter of Lebanon’s modern cultural history.
A parallel exhibition at the Sursock Museum, Material Stories (until 20 September 2026), turns attention to the often-unseen work of conservation and restoration. Curated by Karina El Helou and Clémence Cottard Hachem, the exhibition is presented in collaboration with the Beirut Museum of Art (BeMA), a platform dedicated to preserving, researching and promoting Lebanese and regional art. Bringing together ten case studies from the Sursock Museum and Ministry of Culture collections, the exhibition considers how artworks are assessed, how deterioration is understood and how restoration decisions are made. Across two sections, it explores the balance between scientific methods and the histories embedded within an artwork’s material traces, while foregrounding the conservator-restorers whose work quietly sustains Lebanon’s artistic heritage for future generations.
UNITED ARAB EMIRATES
The Blue Note (until 13 September), at Leila Heller Gallery in Dubai, brings together a new body of paintings and bead works by Sultan Bin Fahad, exploring jazz as more than music: a cultural language shaped by spirituality, memory, resistance and collective expression. Drawing on archival research and oral histories, the exhibition traces jazz across geographies, identities and belief systems, with particular attention to its relationship to African American histories and Islamic thought. Figures associated with jazz and Black cultural production appear in luminous, restrained portraits, including Yusef, Dakota, Dizzie, Etta and Coltrane. Rather than fixed likenesses, they evoke presence through atmosphere and gesture. Alongside them, bead works combine language, ornament and devotional forms, linking phrases about rhythm, faith and belonging. Together, the works treat jazz as an evolving architecture of memory and identity.
SAUDI ARABIA
ARTDOM Riyadh will return to Saudi Arabia on 20–21 October 2026 for its second edition, expanding its programme as an international platform for contemporary design. The two-day forum will bring together architecture, interior and product design, art, real estate and hospitality, with an exhibition of leading brands and a business congress featuring architects and designers from around the world. The 2026 edition will also introduce new professional initiatives and expanded collaborations between Saudi Arabia, Russia and Europe. Among its new projects is the ARTDOM Design Map Saudi Arabia, developed with ARCHINET to spotlight public spaces and destinations shaping the Kingdom’s evolving architectural and design landscape.
THE WORLD
The Mediterranean Season 2026 brings together cultural projects across the Mediterranean following an initiative announced by the French President in Marseille in 2023. Running across France through 31 October 2026, the season brings artists, creators and young practitioners into dialogue through exhibitions, performances, screenings, workshops and other forms of cultural exchange. Organised around five themes – including plural identities, migration and speculative futures- the programme also seeks to strengthen collaboration between Mediterranean societies, including Lebanon, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Egypt.
Among its exhibitions is Photographing Lebanon’s Heritage, 1864–1970 (until 26 September, 2026) at the Alcazar Library in Marseille, presented in partnership with the Arab World Institute and the Oriental Library of Saint Joseph University in Beirut. Bringing together photographs and rare books from collections in Beirut and Marseille, the exhibition offers a visual record of Lebanon’s landscapes, monuments and everyday life. Beyond documenting places and traditions, it considers photography as a form of preservation, particularly for heritage that has been lost, endangered or transformed. The Mediterranean Season also marks the first solo exhibition in France by the artist Hassan Darsi, Persistances (until 25 October 2026). The exhibition surveys more than three decades of the Moroccan artist’s practice. His installations, sculptures, photographs, films, performances and architectural interventions examine the social, urban and political changes of the environments he inhabits.
