Spring 2020 programme

Michael Rakowitz
March 11–August 8, 2020
One of the best-known and most influential artists of his generation, Michael Rakowitz draws on complex histories, politics and cultures to create highly charged, inspirational large-scale installations.

Organised by Whitechapel Gallery and Castello di Rivoli Museo d’Arte Contemporanea in collaboration with Art Jameel, this major survey exhibition features Rakowitz’s most significant projects from the past two decades; the eight multifaceted installations—in sculpture, drawing, film, sound and photography—draw on architecture, cultural artefacts, cuisine and geopolitics. The exhibition is curated by Iwona Blazwick and Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev with Habda Rashid, Marianna Vecellio and Art Jameel’s Nora Razian. 

Rakowitz’s installations involve extensive research and investigation. His works touch on a broad range of social issues, conflicts and the destruction of material heritage—from the failure of modernist architecture and the condemned dwellings of an Aboriginal community in Sydney through to the destruction of 6th-century statues by the Taliban, the collapse of Pan-Arabism, and the theft and destruction of thousands of archaeological artefacts in Iraq following the 2003 invasion.

On March 14, Michael Rakowitz will be in-conversation with writer Shumon Basar, in an edition of THE ESSENTIAL, the Jameel’s “live interview” series that highlights the cultural influences that have shaped the work of major personalities. 

Artist’s Rooms
May 4–October 3, 2020
The newest iterations of Jameel Arts Centre’s Artist’s Room series, based on works in the Art Jameel Collection, focuses on three practitioners taking a particularly nuanced approach to urgent political debates.

Larissa Sansour represented Denmark at the 58th Venice Biennale with In Vitro, an Arabic-language sci-fi film set in Bethlehem during the aftermath of an eco-disaster; her Artist’s Room includes the regional premiere of the work.

Taysir Batniji explores loss and memory in a series of inkless ‘drawings’ etched onto paper, titled To My Brother, based on family photos and commemorating his brother’s tragic death during the 1987 intifada. To My Brother was originally commissioned through the 2012 Abraaj Group Art Prize. Art Jameel recently acquired the 29 Abraaj Group Art Prize works; absorbed into the Art Jameel Collection, they will be exhibited at the Jameel and via loans to other international institutions.

One of the four co-winners of the 2019 Turner Prize, Beirut and Dubai-based artist Lawrence Abu Hamdan’s Artist’s Room includes This Whole Time There Were No Landmines; based on mobile phone-recorded footage and audio recordings from 2011, the work documents the “shouting valley” in the Golan Heights, Syria.

Site-specific installations
The new Artist’s Garden commission, IN TRANSIT: Botany of a Journey by Asunción Molinos Gordo, is grown from digested, cleaned and germinated seeds that have travelled in the intestines of Dubai’s diverse population—including tomatoes, watermelon, chillies, eggplant, muskmelon, zucchini, amaranth, mustard, citrus, sunflowers, pomegranate and pumpkin. 

Jameel Arts Centre’s Sculpture Park and other interstitial spaces feature works from the Art Jameel Collection. This month sees the debut of Conrad Shawcross’s Formation III: The Dappled Light of the Sun—a large-scale sculptural work made up of thousands of cloud-like tetrahedron forms—exhibited alongside Hassan Khan’s Composition for a Public Park. This multi-lingual, immersive musical work in English, Arabic and Urdu spreads throughout the Park and is proving highly popular with the local community and visitors alike. 

Referencing architectural ornamentation prevalent in the Middle East and South Asia, Metropolis, a site-specific installation by Lubna Chowdhary, is on display in the Lobby of the Jameel through August 1, 2020. The work, developed over a period of 28 years, is comprised of more than 1,000 brightly coloured ceramic structures, abstracting towers, monuments and other, less definable, forms.

Contact: Sareh Faraj sareh [​at​] artjameel.org