Hightlights at Art Dubai 2025
Art Dubai
A Celebration of Identity & Innovation
From Palestinian resilience to algorithmic perception — this year's fair was less about spectacle and more about substance. Artists didn't just exhibit; they invited us into conversations around land, memory, displacement, gender, and identity in a rapidly shifting world.
Art Dubai has long stood as a cultural bridge between East and West — a stage where global narratives unfold through a distinctly regional lens. This year's edition, marked by careful curation of emerging and established voices, reaffirmed the fair's position as a vital meeting point for artistic dialogue across continents.
With 30 first-time galleries joining the roster, Art Dubai 2025 struck a resonant balance where experimental mediums met historic legacies, and the personal seamlessly converged with the political. Here are 10 standout highlights — each a testament to the power of contemporary art to shape, question, and transform our shared reality.
Art Dubai 2025 brought Palestinian voices to the forefront with two extraordinary presentations. Mirna Bamieh's fermentation-based installations — bridging grief, memory, and land — were a standout. Saj Issa's poetic ceramics at Tabari Artspace explored heritage, longing, and historical reclamation through her showcase Never Make a Wish in a Dry Well.
Created from lived experience: after a visit to her family home in Ramallah, in the occupied West Bank, Saj brought back shards of 10th-century pottery found near a former ceramics factory. As Maliha Tabari notes, she didn't just preserve them — she pulled them into her process, fusing them into glazes or sealing them in glass.
Butt's ink-jet and hand-drawn works provided a deeply layered look at masculinity in contemporary Pakistan — beautifully merging intimate portraiture with bold socio-political commentary.
Blending culinary arts with visual storytelling, Bamieh's Sour Jars were a poetic metaphor for resilience and cultural memory. Her use of brined paper and site-specific engagement captivated audiences throughout the fair.
"Artists didn't just exhibit — they invited us into conversations around land, memory, displacement, gender, and identity."
— Cynthia Gutiérrez · Art Dubai 2025
Richard Saltoun Gallery brought renewed attention to the Italian artist Greta Schödl. Her ink and gold leaf compositions — using repeated letters and symbols — transformed language into meditative abstraction. A powerful feminist statement that was decades ahead of its time.
Always a fair favorite, Rana Begum returned with vibrant minimalism and geometry. Her 2022 piece No.1132, shown by The Third Line (led by longtime regional champion Sunny Rahbar), reaffirmed her place as a master of form and color.
Saudi artist Abdullah Al Othman's LED installation interrogated the hybrid identity of cities and citizens. Fusing traditional motifs with contemporary technology, the scale and precision were unforgettable.
Peruvian artist Maria Abaddon stunned with her tactile, organic works. Created with wet and needle felt, this piece evoked the raw beauty of biological life and environmental transitions.
Combining neon, canvas, and cultural critique — a surreal narrative of consumerism, memory, and migration rendered in light.
Hilton Contemporary offered a rare treat: mixed-media works by legendary Syrian poet Adonis. Layered with calligraphy, pigment, and emotional resonance, these pieces bridged literary legacy with visual experimentation — affirming that poetry can be both seen and felt.
The visual used for our cover photo is "Untitled, 44."
Japanese composer, sound-graphic programmer, and multimedia artist Tatsuru Arai redefines the frontier between music and the metaphysical. His creative practice is rooted in the concept of Gesamtkunstwerk — a total work of art — where classical composition, cutting-edge technology, and visual structure intersect.
Dubai, UAE
Ninu Nina
