MOUSSE MAGAZINE
Now in its seventeenth version, Artwork Dubai has skilled important development. May you share the guiding imaginative and prescient behind the honest, and pinpoint the elements that contribute to its success?

BENEDETTA GHIONE
Many elements affect the success of an occasion. The primary is after all the content material and being aligned with a bigger imaginative and prescient. During the last seventeen years, Artwork Dubai has adopted an analogous trajectory to the cultural scene right here and of town extra broadly. Guests to Dubai see a really completely different metropolis in contrast with even 5 years in the past, and it’s the identical with Artwork Dubai. Our ambition was at all times targeted on sustainable development, and we even have a chance right here to do one thing completely different in comparison with different gala’s in different cities by providing a platform for under-represented voices from the International South.

We’re after all a industrial platform, however we function extra like an establishment in that we play a job in constructing the cultural ecosystem right here by our partnerships, schooling and coaching packages, talks, and conferences. Any profitable occasion must carry folks collectively and convey a second of focus to a spot. Maybe an important ingredient is time—the time to develop alternatives for artists, for these artists to realize worldwide recognition, for galleries to construct their collector bases and artist rosters, for collectors to determine their very own collections, and for establishments to develop. The scene right here is maturing, and the outcomes of this are more and more evident.

MOUSSE
Artwork Dubai Week extends past the honest, with occasions in additional than fifty establishments and artwork areas throughout the UAE. How does this broader engagement contribute to the general cultural panorama of Dubai, and what function does Artwork Dubai play in shaping the cultural scene within the metropolis?

BENEDETTA
The programming throughout the UAE and the broader Gulf area goes from energy to energy, and we’re proud to have been a catalyst for it and to offer an anchor second and level of convening and gravity. We work in partnership with so many organizations year-round to develop the scene, whether or not that’s by coaching {and professional} growth alternatives, shared learnings, or collaborating on programming. A wonderful instance of that is the Dubai Public Artwork Technique, which launched this week. It’s led by Dubai Tradition and includes working with establishments throughout town to develop a blueprint for Dubai’s public areas. The commissions are carried out in partnership with Dubai’s establishments, together with Artwork Dubai, Alserkal Avenue, Artwork Jameel, and Tashkeel, amongst others. It’s only one instance of the long-term planning and of a metropolis that’s placing tradition on the heart of its future planning.

MOUSSE
Artwork Dubai emphasizes collaborations with native and worldwide companions, positioning itself as “the assembly level for the International South’s inventive communities.” How do these collaborations redefine the normal function of an artwork honest, particularly in supporting native and regional ecosystems?

BENEDETTA
It’s extremely necessary to us to be a platform for inventive communities which have lengthy been underrepresented. It’s additionally necessary that this evolves over time. We’re more and more wanting on the time period “International South” much less by way of economics and nation-states, and extra by way of the communities and individuals who create vibrancy. Being an impartial artwork honest, we’ve the pliability and alternative to innovate, whether or not that’s by our gallery programming, which will get stronger and extra numerous yearly, the launch of Artwork Dubai Digital being only one instance; the packages we develop with our companions and sponsors, together with what has grown to grow to be the UAE’s largest cultural schooling program in partnership with A.R.M. Holding; or our intensive commissioning packages. It’s about offering alternatives which are related and acceptable to our context slightly than copying and mirroring what different artwork gala’s are doing.

MOUSSE
The International Artwork Discussion board, organized by Shumon Basar and Nadine El-Khoury, will discover the cultures, applied sciences, sciences, and initiatives associated to excessive climate and alter, and it’s one of many key occasions of the week. How does this summit contribute to the broader dialog round local weather change and its impacts? Are concrete actions deliberate to handle these challenges?

BENEDETTA
We now have the most important talks and convention program of any main worldwide artwork honest. It’s one thing our audiences love, and demand at all times outstrips what we are able to program! The International Artwork Discussion board is the centerpiece of this and one thing we’re very proud to have launched within the first version of the honest; it has taken place alongside each version since. The summit’s remit is admittedly to look to the longer term and convey the brightest minds collectively to consider essentially the most urgent problems with our time. Only one instance is that we have been discussing matters like AI a decade or so in the past. Shumon and Nadine’s program this yr feels particularly related within the context of the local weather emergency and the contributing forces and the potential penalties.

MOUSSE
Complementing Artwork Dubai’s Bawwaba part, and curated by Emiliano Valdés below the theme Sanación/Therapeutic, this yr’s Artwork Dubai Commissions gathers a number of artists whose socially oriented practices interact with native communities. May you share some highlights of the part?

BENEDETTA
Artwork Dubai’s Bawwaba—that means “gateway” in Arabic—part options ten solo displays of recent artworks. Curated by Emiliano Valdés, the part explores the notion of sanación—or therapeutic—and options artists from Latin America, the Center East, and South Asia. Every has a social inventive apply and creates area for introspection, exploring notions of neighborhood and belonging, and artwork as a catalyst for transformation. By means of quite a lot of mediums, together with portray, sculpture, video, and efficiency, these our bodies of labor look at the methods through which artwork can operate as a catalyst for transformation and alter, evaluating how these processes differ from nation to nation or folks to folks. Increasing on this theme, this yr’s Artwork Dubai Commissions program features a collection of newly commissioned performances and interventions that can happen all through the honest. There will likely be some severely particular moments within the honest for pause and contemplation.

Sadhana is a site-specific efficiency that implies the necessity to return to human contact for therapeutic. Going down throughout three open-air public therapeutic massage stations location inside the honest, the efficiency invitations guests to pause and luxuriate in a second of self-relaxation and care. Hashel Al Lamki creates a layered expertise, utilizing delicate Japanese materials as curtains to create a protected area, and awakening and activating the senses by visible and auditory scapes. The apply attracts on historic methods to alleviate muscle rigidity in guests earlier than permitting them to renew and reintegrate into the assorted artwork honest actions.

The kundalini is a non secular life pressure or vitality believed to reside on the base of the backbone. It’s thought to ascend by the backbone like a serpent, symbolizing rebirth, transformation, immortality, and therapeutic all through historical past. Artist Cecilia Bengolea will lead audiences by her kundalini meditation apply, aiming to attach members to their increased selves by vibration, dance, meditation, and human contact. Draped in a poncho adorned with poetry from the desert, the artist invitations audiences to step away from the frenzy of the honest and participate on this deeply connecting ritual.

A Prayer Unanswered. Interval. is a poetry efficiency by Mithu Sen that explores problems with (un)translatability. The artist will make use of a non-language, a language invented from numerous tongues—together with parts of gibberish—to interact with guests, whispering poetry into their ears to name on them to cease and concentrate. Though lyrical and melodic, Sen’s poetry efficiency is aimed toward interrupting thought patterns and questioning seemingly abnormal environment. In doing so, the artist hopes to make use of the lack of voice and language as a potent instrument to make a press release concerning the world as we speak.

MOUSSE
Are you able to elaborate on the themes of therapeutic, hope, and the facility of artwork in difficult occasions as mirrored within the newly commissioned performances? I’m pondering for instance of the work Bitter Issues by Palestinian artist Mirna Bamieh.

BENEDETTA
Bitter Issues is a efficiency workshop that invitations audiences to concentrate to fermentation. In an ever-changing setting, the artist employs fermentation as a metaphor for a way time slowly however irreversibly impacts our our bodies, leaving a long-lasting change. The workshop commences with a screening of To Jar, a twenty-minute movie by the artist, which units the introspective tone for the next group lemon and spice fermentation workshop. That is adopted by a bunch listening session of Bitter Cities, a sound piece collaboration with Isaac Sullivan based mostly on Bamieh’s textual content “When life offers you lemons time and again.” Individuals will conclude the workshop by sharing small bites, marking the tip of the fermentation journey. By means of Bitter Issues, the artist turns to private mundane exercise to faucet right into a collective spirit, facilitating gradual change and transformation.

MOUSSE
The Artwork Dubai Digital Summit is ready to convene worldwide and native specialists to form the event of Dubai’s digital artwork ecosystem. What prompted the inclusion of this summit, and what impression do you foresee on the native digital artwork scene?

BENEDETTA
Dubai is a novel place with a novel spirit—it’s a metropolis of concepts, prospects, and innovation. We’re at all times questioning what function an artwork honest may play on this context, and we launched Artwork Dubai Digital in 2022 to take a look at the folks and forces shaping the cultural dialog within the digital area. We stay the one main honest with a digital artwork part, and this system is maturing as rapidly because the area is evolving. The Digital Summit is a pure extension of this and performs to our strengths in organizing conferences and talks. We needed to look not simply on the present second, but in addition at what the way forward for this area may maintain, and what Dubai’s place on this may very well be. Tradition and the digital economic system are two necessary pillars for Dubai, so we’re happy to be growing this with Dubai Tradition.

at Artwork Dubai
March 1–3, 2024