Why Charles Al Sidaoui wants to share his art collection with the world

The Arts Club is showcasing more than 150 works in its latest Stairway Exhibits in Dubai

Where Gesture Meets Story – Recent Art From the Yes Collection will be on show in the DIFC until February. Photo: The Arts Club

Charles Al Sidaoui doesn’t believe he truly owns any of the art pieces from his collection. His duty, he says, is to share it with the public.

“I simply try to preserve them and expose them to as many people as possible,” the collector tells The National. “Not doing so would be, in my opinion, selfish and would defeat the objective of collecting.”

Selected pieces from his Yes Collection, which exceeds more than 150 artworks, are currently on show as part of The Arts Club’s new biannual Stairway Exhibits. The exhibition Where Gesture Meets Story – Recent Art From the Yes Collection focuses on 18 contemporary regional and international artworks, across a diverse number of styles.

When curating the show with the Cultural Programming team at The Arts Club Dubai, it was important for the Lebanese businessman to highlight that the works were by different artists from various nationalities. “That is the most important message for me. A collection of art is not the work of a single person, nor a single artist, nor a particular piece of work,” he says. “Collections are a universal language that crafts dialogues, a unique place uninhibited by space and time.”

The exhibition, featuring 17 artists from 14 countries, is spread across two levels, divided into two parts. The first part is Rethinking the Figure, which focuses on figuration within the context of socio-political narratives of today. The second section, Contemporary Abstraction, focuses on works that lean more towards the abstract where gesture, colour and feeling are the main conceptual elements of the works.

“When The Arts Club Dubai approached me to exhibit some of my collection for its Stairway Exhibits, I didn’t hesitate for a second,” says Al Sidaoui. “It was an ideal opportunity to share my collection and my love for art with the members and guests of the club. I have since opened my home to the curious minds of those members who wanted to experience the remaining part of the collection.”

The exhibition includes several pieces by renowned Arab artists who live in the region and beyond. Pioneering Emirati artist Mohamed Ahmed Ibrahim’s piece, My Garden’s Details, is emblematic of his signature abstract style. The work, painted in bold blues and orange, focuses on the unique landscapes of his homeland. Like many of his paintings, the rocky terrain between the Gulf of Oman and the Hajar Mountains is stylised into geometric shapes and simple shapes that express subconscious expressions.

There is also a piece called Are You Talking to Me by the renowned Lebanese architect and contemporary visual artist Ghazi Baker. The painting depicts fragments of a stylised face, or faces, with exaggerated features seen through flat planes. The portrait is a synthesis that takes elements of illustration, pop culture and media to create an easily accessible yet enigmatic image.

Iraqi artist Ahmed Alsoudani’s Untitled charcoal and acrylic piece is also showcased. Known for his surreal and vividly coloured paintings that portray the horrors of war, this piece is no exception. Distorted faces and bodies are morphed into and emerge out of one another among birds, cameras and guns. The work also blends influences from 17th and 18th-century European art and elements of Middle Eastern literature and contemporary poetry.

There is also a stunning portrait by Syrian artist Farah Atassi. Seated Woman with Yellow Hair is a work that blends geometric forms and abstraction with thick layers of paint. The work is composed almost like a collage, with an illustrative, flat, carefully constructed sense of space.

Others featured in the exhibition include British artist Rebecca Ackroyd, Czech artist Vojtech Kovarik, Brazilian artist Maxwell Alexandre and Chinese artist Xiyao Wang.

Al Sidaoui, who started collecting art 15 years ago, says he doesn’t believe in collecting art with a particular approach or sticking to a certain style. His collection therefore is diverse in more than one way and a means in which to share his passion for art and to hopefully ignite that same interest in viewers experiencing it. “There was no particular approach to the Yes Collection; often, it only takes a simple 'yes,'” he says. “I buy what I love, and I will never buy a painting that I would not hang on my wall."