Etel Adnan
‘Untitled’
The late Lebanese-American artist and writer was renowned for her use of bold colors in her paintings. “(Her) vibrant compositions unfold through rich, geometric fields of color, reflecting a dynamic interplay between abstraction and her deep-rooted engagement with landscapes and environmental forms,” the show catalogue notes. This untitled ceramic mural is based on a sketch the artist made in 2020, the year before her death aged 96. “This translation from drawing to mural underscores the fluidity between painting and architecture, a dialogue at the heart of her artistic practice,” the catalogue states. “Having grown up with a formative interest in architectural design, Adnan once remarked, ‘Architecture contains everything: form, color, social concerns…’”
Taysir Batniji
‘Remnant II’
The Gaza-born, Paris-based multidisciplinary artist began his “Remnants” series of oil paintings in 2024. It was inspired by the lag he experienced when following news of his hometown on social media and messaging apps. “They first appear as blurry abstract forms,” the catalogue says, “creating a momentary delay between the perception of an event and its documentation. In an age of infinite reproduction and circulation of images, the blurred frame becomes both shield and wound, momentarily protecting the viewer from unbearable horror, yet insistent on a return to it.” By reproducing these blurred images in his paintings, “Batniji freezes the moment of anticipation of what the image might hold.”
Afra Al-Dhaheri
‘Dining East or West?’
The Emirati artist “explores spatial intimacy and time’s influence on the transformation of material” in her practice which is “rooted in her experiences growing up in the UAE, a country marked by rapid … transformation over the past two decades,” the biennale catalogue states. This installation centers around a plexiglass dining table surrounded — and supported — by cinder blocks. On the floor are casts of feet in glass and cement, “evoking the flux in traditions of sitting on the floor to dine and commune.” The installation also includes glass fragments, some abstract, some designed to resemble hands or vessels. The work “occupies an uneasy in-between state of cultural hybridity, where the building blocks of contemporary infrastructure fuse with personal histories.”
Amina Saoudi Ait Khay
‘Sufetula’
The Tunis-based Moroccan artist contributes five wool tapestries to this year’s biennale.
Her weaving is “informed by Amazigh traditions inherited across generations” and “creates intricate, rhythmic patterns, telling stories of her people’s cultural history and evoking memories of Moroccan and Tunisian landscapes.” In the catalogue, she is quoted as saying: “It’s not me who chooses the colors; they call to me.” The patterns and colors of her creations “at times recall the geometry of Amazigh symbols and desert topographies; at others they are interrupted by subtle variations, as if the wind is tracing new shapes in sand.”
Abdullah Al-Saadi
‘The Slipper’s Journey, Rock 5’
Al-Saadi is one of the most important artists in the history of the UAE, regarded as one of the pioneers of avant-garde art in the Emirates. His work “The Slipper’s Journey” consists of dozens of stones and small rocks (one of which is pictured here) found in the rocky landscape of Khor Fakkan, Sharjah, where he grew up. Each is “inscribed with marks, symbols, and colors of acrylic paint” that chart his movements across the landscape. “The stones and rocks serve as diary pages, with the artist’s abstract musings engraved onto fragments of the environment,” the catalogue explains. “The work reflects Al-Saadi’s philosophy of travel and attentive observation — each gesture enfolding time, movement, and place.”
