‘Artist’s Rooms’: Risham Syed, Daniel Genadry, Ayesha Sultana Drawn largely from the Art Jameel Collection, Artist’s Rooms is a series of solo exhibitions by influential, innovative artists, with a particular focus on practitioners from the Middle East, Asia and Africa. These capsule shows are collaborative and curated in dialogue with the artist. Autumn 2022 - Winter 2023 features rooms by Ayesha Sultana, Risham Syed and Daniele Genadry in galleries 1, 2, 3. Artist’s Rooms: Ayesha Sultana
Bringing together recent works on paper by artist Ayesha Sultana, the exhibition looks at the artist’s long standing engagement with the materiality and every day iconography of her home city of Dhakah; rendering forms of street corners, architectural features, wall textures and construction detritus encountered during her day-to-day life in Dhaka and other cities she travels to. These impressions accumulate in her subconscious and find themselves on paper. They are not just observations of form, but of material, movement, and distance; key aspects that have held Sultana’s interest over time. Ayesha Sultana (b.1984) lives and works in Georgia, USA. Ayesha Sultana completed her Bachelors in Fine Art (2007) and a Post-Graduate Diploma in Art Education (2008) from Beaconhouse National University, Lahore. Artist’s Rooms: Daniele Genadry
The exhibition presents Daniele Genadry’s work Blind Light (2017) in addition to new works based on her recent research in la Rochelle and Cassis, France and the Grand Canyon, USA. Genadry works with various media to examine how distance, light and movement affect visual experiences. Her practice focuses on the relationship between painting and photography, exploring the potential of an image to generate its own temporality (through light) and how a mediated field of vision can sensitize our perception. Daniele Genadry (b.1980) Lives and works between Paris, France and Beirut, Lebanon. Daniele Genadry completed her BA at Dartmouth College (2012) Hanover USA in Studio Art and Mathematics, and her MFA at the Slade School of Fine Art (2008), London, UK. Artist’s Rooms: Risham Syed
The exhibition presents Risham Syed’s work The Seven Seas, (2012), a series of large scale quilts where the artist connects the intricacies of contemporary geopolitics with the 19th and early 20th Century cotton trade of the British Empire. With fabric sourced from travels to Turkey, Bangladesh, the U.A.E, Sri Lanka, U.K., India and within her native Pakistan, Syed weaves the history of the location-specific craft of textile production with tales of political resistance. All her quilts depict 20th-century maps of various port cities that were strategically located on the colonial European trade route such as Izmir in Turkey, Kandy in Sri Lanka, Mumbai in India, and Ras al-Khaimah in the U.A.E. Apart from being trade gateways, these cities were also sites of resistance and rebellion against imperial powers. Each quilt is made by combining a variety of techniques, wherein the stitching and layering of fabric echo the layering of historical and post-colonial narratives. The Seven Seas was originally commissioned for the ABRAAJ Capital Art prize 2012 Risham Syed (b.1969) lives and works in Lahore, Pakistan. Risham Syed received a BFA in Painting from the National College of Art, Lahore (1993) and an MA from the Royal College of Art, London (1996).
Night School 2023: Make History
January 8-29, 2023 | 7:00 pm - 9:30 pm (click here for the full schedule)
Project Space
In Dubai, you witness history being made. It happens most emphatically across the landscape, in the construction of towers, ports, roadways and bridges. You could say that builders, architects, engineers, and planners are hired to write that history. And the work requires creative engagement with both the past and the future. At Night School this year, we will encounter assembled skylines alongside other ways that history gets made: filed inside halls of institutions, resurfaced during a garage renovation, concealed in the ground below, or sprouting from the landscape around us. Gathered in a city that arises through its connections to the world, we will examine how the evidence of Dubai’s history streams through places nearby and far. Join architect and writer Todd Reisz for the second Night School at Jameel Arts Centre. This year’s theme is Make History. Local and international scholars will join a seminar of Dubai residents over three weeks in January to explore how history gets written, and constructed, in Dubai and the greater region. The seminar will meet from January 8 until January 29, on Sunday and Wednesday evenings at 7:00 p.m. There are also some planned evening film screenings. Professionals, students and everyone who is curious are welcome to register for the free course. No prior academic experience is necessary. The only requirements: a commitment to all 7 seminar sessions and proficiency in reading English texts. Deadline for applications has now passed. Accepted candidates will be contacted by December 10, 2022. Todd Reisz is the author of Showpiece City: How Architecture Made Dubai (Stanford University Press, 2020) explores architecture’s packaging to sell Dubai on a global stage. At Jameel Arts Centre, he curated the exhibition Off Centre/On Stage (2021), wrote the eponymous publication (Khatt Books, 2021) and led the first Night School (2022). He also co-edited with Sultan Sooud Al Qassemi Building Sharjah (Birkhäuser, 2021), an archival investigation of that city’s vanishing 20th-century landscape. Workshops and programming Family Tour and Workshop: Drawing Through the Galleries
December 23, 2022 | 11:00 am - 1:00 pm
Galleries
RSVP here
Drawing through the galleries follows a guided tour of the current exhibitions; Artists Rooms: Ayesha Sultana, Daniele Genadry, Risham Syed, An Ocean in Every Drop, and Proposals for a Memorial to Partition, as well as the artist’s garden and insights into the unique way Jameel builds its library collection.
As children and families tour the centre, participants gain a deep engagement with artists’ themes, techniques, and processes and learn various experiential drawing techniques to stimulate hand-eye coordination and ways of seeing. Drawing techniques include fragmented drawings, layered drawings, and continuous one-line activities.
The workshop held by Jameel Arts Centre’s Learning Coordinator Hadeel Al Heeti is free-to-attend.
This workshop is suitable for families of all ages. No prior art experience is required. All materials and equipment are provided.
Registration for this event is now full. Kindly RSVP to add your name to the waitlist in case of cancellations. Bimonthly workshops from September 2022 to January 2023:
The Water Diviners IV: Collective Story-Making Inspired by Folklore and Water
September 10, 2022 - January 14, 2023
Online, Sahaab
RSVP here
This workshop is related to the exhibition ‘An Ocean in Every Drop’ (see below) As part of her long-term practice on Palestinian folk tales and their connection to landscape and water sources, artist Jumana Emil Abboud will be leading a participatory workshop exploring natural water sources in Dubai and the wider U.A.E. Through discussions, collective readings and writing exercises, workshop participants will contribute to the co-authorship of a story of water; thinking through both personal histories and relationships to sites of water as well as tackling broader questions of humanity’s entanglement with ‘the natural’. Water divining- the ancient art of locating natural sources of water- is the conceptual driver for this workshop series, where storytelling is used to locate sites of water geographically, historically and culturally. The workshop series will culminate in a performance based on the co-authored texts and imaginaries, to be performed collectively at selected sites of water on Sunday, January 15th 2023. The initial meeting for the workshops will take place at the Jameel Arts Centre, continuing online approximately every two weeks. Please note this is a series of workshops and participants are expected to commit to the full series. Session will be led in English but writings can be in a language of choice Jumana Emil Abboud uses drawing, video, performance and text to navigate themes of memory, loss, and resilience. Her creative practice is inspired by Palestinian oral history, with a focus on folktales and their connection to actual sites within the landscape, and to water sources in particular. Abboud lives and works in Jerusalem and London where she is currently a PhD candidate at Slade School of Art. The dates, times and locations of the workshops are as follows: Saturday 10 September 2022 Online, 11am-3pm with lunch break
Saturday 1 October, 2022 Online 3pm-5pm
Tuesday 11 October, 2022 Online 6-8pm
Saturday 29 October 2022 Online 3pm- 5pm
Tuesday 08 November, 2022 Online 6-8pm
Saturday 26 November 2022 Online 3pm- 5pm
Saturday 10 December 2022 Jameel Arts Centre 3pm- 5pm
Saturday 14 January 2023 Jameel Arts Centre 3pm- 7pm with break Expert-led gardening programme: My Winter Garden
September 24, 2022 - December 10, 2022 | 9:00am-12:00pm
RSVP here The Friends of Jaddaf Community Garden and Dr Nasser Rego, founder of SoWeGrow and Zoë: farm for life, are back this summer with an inspirational programme for all gardening enthusiasts. In collaboration with Art Jameel, ‘My Winter Garden’ is a twelve-week programme designed for all to learn firsthand how to grow organic vegetables as experts do. The programme allows participants to cultivate gardens that thrive in the high temperatures of Dubai and is facilitated by an organic farmer. The sessions are workshops that range from theoretical to practical and deep dive into permaculture, transplanting, composting, and community building. The programme takes an organic approach to building and looking after your garden while reconnecting with nature to boost your holistic well-being. Participants will get a chance to nurture gardens and explore how they can contribute to their community by learning about agriculture, education and sustainability. Join Dr Nasser Rego, organic farmer and educator, and gardening enthusiast Amin Rashidi, from The Friends of Jaddaf Community Garden, for an introductory session about ‘My Winter Garden’ on Wednesday, 7th and 14th, September at 7:00pm at Jameel Arts Centre to learn more. Whether you’re a beginner with basic knowledge of plants or an experienced grower looking to hack the art of growing abundantly, this course is designed for you. The programme is aimed at participants aged 16+ and runs every week for 3-hour sessions; limited spaces are available (early booking recommended). The programme cost is AED 2,200 (USD 600) per person, and course fees include a take-home starter kit to kick-start your gardening journey! If you book with friends and family, you can avail a 10% discount on your total bill. On the payment page:
A. Select the number (Qty). of persons (has to be more than one person) registering for the programme and
B. Apply the following discount code: JAMEEL10OFF
Terms and Conditions apply. Currently on view Exhibition: An Ocean in Every Drop
September 22, 2022- April 2, 2023
Galleries Water is a force that produces history, culture, language and social relations. Bodies of water shape human development, sustain trade and empire, and offer means of escape and refuge. The belief in water as the wellspring of life is a tale as old as time itself, held in memories written and recited, from the ancient Greeks and Egyptians, to the indigenous North American origin story of Turtle Island, to the Bible and the Holy Quran. Over time, much has shifted in our understanding of water. Currently, water is in crisis; simultaneously scarce, through drought, and threateningly over-abundant, through floods and rising sea levels. How can we understand this life force through its production of myth and its anchoring of spiritual beliefs? Can connecting to a range of world views relating to bodies of water as living beings transform our own approach to the climate emergency? Bringing together works from around the globe that explore human relationships to water, ‘An Ocean in Every Drop’ asks us to think with water, following its flows through the past to inform our present. With works by: Jumana Emil Abboud, al-Istakhri, Martha Atienza, Raven Chacon, Cian Dayrit, Léuli Eshrāghi, Asunción Molinos Gordo, Abul Hisham, Candice Hopkins, Sohrab Hura, Hussein Naserreddine, Thảo Nguyên-Phan, Daniel Otero Torres, Karan Shrestha, Fatima Uzdenova, Munem Wasif. Detailed media alert and high-res images available here Library Circles: Rashed Qurwash
September 14, 2022- February 13, 2023
Jameel Library Library Circles is a series of research, talks and experimental interventions by UAE practitioners in the Jameel Library and Jameel Arts Centre. The programme explores alternative research methodologies and representations with a focus on “thinking in public”. For the Fall iteration of Library Circles, Jameel Library presents a research display by artist Rashed Qurwash. Qurwash investigates the Jaddaf neighborhood in Dubai and the practices it had once held through images, documents and interviews conducted with people who have occupied the area at various capacities. In addition to individual accounts, Rashed investigates Jaddaf’s urban planning prior to the development within the local area in the 2000s. This iteration of Library Circles will feature two public programmes - announcements to follow. Rashed Qurwash (b.1990, Dubai, UAE) lives and works between Dubai and Los Angeles. Qurwash’s practice joins film, set design, and sculpture to explore themes of collective identities shaped through traditions, rituals, religion and trade. His practice relies on subtextual content to mirror collective identities, heavily coded existences and their functionalities within society. Rashed is a recipient of the Salama bint Hamdan Emerging Artists Fellowship (2018), the Cultural Foundation Residency in Abu Dhabi (2022) He has a BSc in Political Science and a Minor in Architecture from Drexel University (2014). He is currently pursuing his Film/Video MFA at the California Institute of the Arts (2025).
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