Your guide to the UAE’s art season 2015

Courtesy Mawaheb for Beautiful People

Courtesy Lawrie Shabibi and the artist

Courtesy Carbon 12

Courtesy Liz Ramos-Prado

Courtesy of Haleh Redjaian.

Courtesy Green Art Gallery

Courtesy Mathilde Gattoni / GPP Gallery

Courtesy Alserkal Avenue

Courtesy Meem Gallery

Courtesy Ayyam Gallery

Courtesy The Empty Quarter

Courtesy Ivana Flores / The Mine

The summer is over and a new art season is under way. As the galleries across the UAE reopen this week, we round up the exhibitions that are set to entice you.

Searching for Optical Wonder, Colleen Quigley

Dubai-based artist Quigley experiments with techniques using wax, reflective materials, ceramic, collage and laser-cut acrylic to create pieces based on Islamic design for this solo show. With experiments in colour palettes and materials, the pieces are arresting in their simplicity and strength.

• Until October 21, XVA Gallery, Al Fahidi Historical Neighbourhood, Dubai, www.xvagallery.com

Blossom, Mawaheb

This centre for adults with special needs has teamed up with Dubai’s community arts centre for an exhibition to celebrate the new season.

• Until September 21, Dubai International Arts Centre, Dubai• www.mawaheb-dubai.com or www.artdubai.com

Immortals, Adel Abidin

Known for his arresting video installations, Abidin has embarked on a radical shift for this show by returning to painting. Taking his cue from content and images from Arab news channels, Abidin discusses the nature of the information we receive.

• Until November 5, Lawrie Shabibi, Alserkal Avenue, www.lawrieshabibi.com

Double Rainbow All the Way, James Clar

Named after a viral video from 2010 about a double rainbow that appeared in the early hours of the morning, this exhibition addresses our contemporary fascination and fear of technology through deep observations on the eroded sense of reality brought on by social media and the internet.

• Until November 7, Carbon 12, Alserkal Avenue www.carbon12dubai.com

Deep, Liz Ramos Prado

Graphic designer and illustrator Ramos Prado has created beautiful works inspired by her surroundings, people, nature and life itself. All the pieces depict women who inhabit ethereal spaces that are sometimes shared with other creatures and are often suffused with a touch of surrealism.

• Until November 5, FN Designs, Alserkal Avenue, www.fanndesigns.com

In-Between Spaces, Haleh Redjaian

This is the first solo show in the Middle East for German-Iranian artist Haleh Redjaian. She uses the universal language of abstraction in her drawings, based on geometric patterns, and deliberately includes irregularities and deviations within this strict order, thus acknowledging the ever-present and unforeseen surprises that make up our incomprehensible lives.

• Until November 5, Gallery Isabelle Van Den Eynde, Alserkal Avenue, www.ivde.net

After the Deluge, Elias Zayat

One of the most significant Syrian artists of the 20th century, Zayat’s oeuvre remains intimately concerned with the history, terrain and psyche of his homeland. In this highly topical exhibition, Zayat returns to the ancient city of Palmyra and draws on Biblical metaphors about the flood for rebuilding a decaying world after its total devastation.

• Until November 4, Green Art Gallery, Alserkal Avenue www.gagallery.com

Her, Matilde Gattoni

French-Italian photographer Matilde Gattoni shares the story of women across 35 countries and over 15 years with this powerful collection of photographic images. As disparate as their stories might seem, all of the women in this show share an innate capacity for resilience and courage, no matter what difficulties they have had to face.

• Until October 31, Gulf Photo Plus, Alserkal Avenue, www.gulfphotoplus.com

Portraits of the Middle-Way, Olivia Pendergast

Most of the works in this show are portraits of people from the Kawangware Slum in Kenya or from a rural village in Malawi. The portraits are striking in their depictions but also because of the heavy use of negative space, which Pendergast describes as an emptiness that holds the figures and says “is not different than, or less important than the figure itself”.

• Until October 14, Showcase Gallery, Alserkal Avenue, www.showcaseuae.com

Uninhibited, Jeffar Khaldi

This striking exhibition explores notions of power. Khaldi, a Dubai-based Palestinian, addresses these concepts in an introspective manner, presenting photographic-like stills of memories and compositions that juxtapose the real with the imagined.

• Tomorrow until October 17, Meem Gallery, Al Quoz, Dubai, www.meemartgallery.com

Family Portrait, Mohannad Orabi

The Syrian painter explores the psychology of memory and how this mental process shapes one’s perceptions. His works show haunting images of nameless figures who depict an experience, as well as the reality of the horrors of war in Orabi’s homeland.

• Tomorrow until October 30, Ayyam Gallery, DIFC, www.ayyamgallery.com

Middle Eastern Talks

The Empty Quarter Gallery unveils its latest collection of photographs from roads less travelled in the Middle East, featuring stories from Socotra in Yemen, the mountains of Oman, landscapes of rural Dubai and the production of rose water in Oman.

• Tomorrow until November 5, Empty Quarter Gallery, DIFC, www.theemptyquarter.com

Meeting Point

This group show is part of Cuadro gallery’s collaboration with Yay Gallery from Baku. Rashad Alakbarov, Orkhan Huseynov, Aida Mahmudova, Nazrin Mammadova and Farid Rasulov will exhibit new work exploring themes of memory, home and tradition during an era of rapid modernisation and globalisation in Azerbaijan.

• Tomorrow until October 15, Cuadro Fine Art Gallery, DIFC, www.cuadroart.com

The Milky Way of the Mice, Ivana Flores

Through her imagined world, Spanish painter Flores explores the inner reality of things. She paints whimsical forms that combine solid representation and more primary aspects of the human experience.

• Until October 9, The Mine, Al Quoz, Dubai, www.themine.ae