DUBAI: Palestinian artist Salma Dib is among six creatives featured in “No Trespassing,” the summer exhibition at Dubai’s Ishara Art Foundation.
Running until Aug. 30, the show brings the raw energy of street art into a gallery space, inviting artists to explore physical, political and personal boundaries through their work.
“It’s very exciting for me,” Dib told Arab News. “I’ve always enjoyed Ishara’s programming and the way they completely transformed the space each time. This show is extra special for me as an artist because I got to be part of this transformation alongside all the other great artists in the show working inside the space the whole time.”
Salma Dib is among six creatives featured in “No Trespassing.” (Supplied)
Dib created a large-scale, distressed wall installation layered with paint, Arabic text and marks that resemble remnants of protest posters.
“My work comes from observing how people reclaim or protect their place, their voices and their right to self-expression, especially in places under political tension,” she explained. “The walls I create are covered in posters, graffiti and writing that demand to be seen.”
Her walls are built from worn materials, archival posters and layers of graffiti-like marks. “I always stress I’m not trying to emulate the streets, but borrowing from its energy and delivering the urgency, the messiness and the fear that comes from needing your voice to be heard amid the chaos.”
Dib’s process is driven by both improvization and political memory. “I was born in what to this day is still considered a refugee camp,” she said. “Making art became my way of holding onto those fragments, of piecing together something that felt like home.”
Ultimately, she hopes visitors leave with one message: “To understand that every mark is part of an ongoing conversation … that carries the voices of a community that insists on existing and being heard.”
