7 must-visit art exhibitions in Dubai to see in January

Dubai: Are you an art lover wondering where you can find your dose of art and culture in the UAE? Don’t look too far, Dubai has some colourful art exhibitions this month. Here’s a list of seven galleries to visit.

Date: January 18 to May 20

Notations on Time is a group exhibition that explores the philosophical and political dimensions of time through the works of 20 contemporary artists from South Asia. The exhibition stages a dialogue between different artistic generations to highlight entanglements between the past, present and future. Notations on Time includes works by artists Sheba Chhachhi, Ladhki Devi, Gauri Gill and Rajesh Vangad, Aziz Hazara, Amar Kanwar, Mariah Lookman, Haroon Mirza, Lala Rukh, Dayanita Singh, Chandraguptha Thenuwara, and Zarina to name a few.

Date: Opening on January 18

Located in the city’s new art district, Al Khayat Avenue in Al Quoz, Bedia Gallery displays the unique artworks of Turkish-German abstract artist, Kemal Yazici.

Yazici explains that his art has been the result of the different experiences in his life, across cultures, countries and professions. His architectural background has instilled an appreciation for varied structures and textures. This has given rise to his style that is deeply personal and reflective of his history and heritage. He mainly works with oil and acrylic paints and his artworks feature harmonious textures and colours achieved through a process of layering and scraping paint on a stretched canvas. The gallery is open to public and has no entry fee.

Jameel Arts Center in Dubai has performance-focused events, as part of their ongoing group exhibition ‘An Ocean in Every Drop’ on view until April 2, 2023. Programmes are free and open to all; registration is required as capacity is limited.

Join artist Jumana Emil Abboud at the Jameel’s Chihuahuan Garden by the Dubai Creek to witness a spoken word performance marking the culmination of the Water Diviners IV, a three-month-long workshop with 12 UAE-based creatives. Together, the participants have worked on reading and writing exercises, leading to the collective co-authorship of this performance.

Timings: 5pm to 6.30pm

Departing from his installation A Few Decent Ways to Drown, Beirut-based artist Hussein Nassereddine leads a lecture performance in Arabic exploring the potential of language to create unstable monuments, and poetry as a point of access to long disappeared places and people.

Timings: 7pm to 8pm

Date: Wednesday January 11 to Monday February 20

For Gil Heitor Cortesão’s fifth solo exhibition with CARBON 12, À Rebours, translating to “backwards” in French. The artist brings to life new works using his inherent technique – reverse painting on plexiglass, which is a transparent glass substitute. The artist uses layers to create a sense of illusion and a duality between what the viewer can see and what they can imagine might exist within these layers.

Date: Until February 17

Lawrie Shabibi, an art gallery, which showcases contemporary works by Middle Eastern and North African artists in a minimalist space, is hosting artist Larry Amponsah’s first solo exhibition. Titled The Soil From Which We Came, the exhibition continues the artist’s experimentation, reconfiguration and modification of archival imagery through collage and painting. His artworks aim to evoke a deeper awareness of interconnectivity and focus on contemporary Black culture, identity, politics and history.

Date: Until January 28

It’s the last month to catch the iconic works by acclaimed Japanese artist Takashi Murakami. Murakami fuses modern techniques with the precision and skill of traditional Japanese art. He is known for his signature “superflat” aesthetic: a colourful, two-dimensional style that straddles the division between fine art and pop culture as it unites elements of anime, Japanese nihonga, and ukiyo-e woodcuts.

Date: Until January 31

Under Your Eyes is a solo exhibition by Emirati visual artist Ziad Al Najjar. His two and three-dimensional artworks push the boundaries of process, materiality, and visual perception.

For Under Your Eyes Al Najjar has produced a new body of work over 18 months that comprises silkscreen prints and works on canvas. Establishing an interplay between organic and inorganic forms Al Najjar infuses his symbolically dense work with icons and influences from the natural world and his everyday encounters. The artist considers the connectedness between the natural, constructed and spiritual realms, and how they relate to his lived experience in the contemporary moment.