Alserkal Avenue Marks Opening of New Art Season

Dubai, United Arab Emirates: Alserkal Avenue has announced a rich programme of exhibitions and events to open the art season this September. The contemporary art galleries in the Avenue will show work from a strong selection of artists from across the MENASA region.

Alserkal Lates

The public are invited to view these new exhibitions at Alserkal Lates on 27 September, when the contemporary art galleries in the Avenue will extend their hours, staying open until 9pm. Guided tours of the exhibitions will depart from outside Nadi Al Quoz at 7pm and 8pm.

Project Space Art Jameel will hold an artist talk with Maha Maamoun in conversation with Shumon Basar, taking place in Nadi Al Quoz on 27 September at 6.30pm. Tharawat Family Business Forum will hold their next Tharawat Talk about the ‘Future of jobs – Automation, Artificial Intelligence, and the Workplace’ at 7.30pm on 27 September in Warehouse 19.

New opening: Sima Performing Arts

This September sees the official launch of Sima Performing Arts,

a studio and performance venue that will offer a year-round programme of dance classes and performances. Sima Performing Arts is home to Sima Dance Company, founded in Damascus, Syria in 2003 by Alaa Krimed. On 27 September, during Alserkal Lates, Sima Performing Arts will hold free, open sessions where the public can join contemporary dance classes or watch the Sima Dance Company rehearsals. Their grand opening performance will take place on 30 September at 7pm. The performance will be free and open to all, with seats available on a first-come, first-served basis.

Community programme

Alserkal Programming, the not-for-profit initiative from Alserkal Avenue, continues its community programming, with Literaturhaus at Nadi continuing throughout September with a strong line-up of authors, and poets including Mai Khaled reading from her novel The Magic of Turquoise on 9 September, a poetry reading by Zeina Hashem Beck on 13 September and Philip Kennedy discussing the first Arabic novella on 16 September. Later in the month, Aidan Walker discuss his book, The Ecology of the Soul, on 25 September, long-term UAE residents Dr. Frauke Heard-Bey and David Heard will hold a talk on 28 September, and finally Tom Fletcher will discuss Naked Diplomacy: Power and Statecraft in the Digital Age on 30 September to bring the summer programme to a close. The Bookshop by Motivate Publishing in Nadi Al Quoz stocks a variety of books to support the programme, including those from participating authors.

Saturday Tours will take place twice this month, on 16 and 30 September. The public are invited to join a one-hour guided tour that will take them into some of the creative businesses and contemporary art spaces in the Avenue, giving them a chance to meet the people behind these concepts and view their current exhibitions.

Road Trips also returns in September, with a visit to Abu Dhabi to watch PIXEL at The Arts Center at NYU Abu Dhabi on 8 September. PIXEL is a mix of virtuoso hip-hop dance with cutting-edge digital projection by CCN Créteil & Val-de-Marne / Compagnie Käfig, where bodies and images merge in a 3D landscape at the border of virtual and real, to create a world of poetry and dreams at the crossroads of the arts.

26 September will see the next 101 Talk: Art in BITs, in which the founders of ArteVue – a Dubai-based art-focused app – talk about the impact of technology and digital advancements on the art world. The talk will take place at 6.30pm inside Nadi Al Quoz.

Elsewhere on the Avenue, #NOWPLAYING continues its programme of independent cinema in Warehouse 68 throughout September. Upcoming highlights from the pop-up cinema by Cinema Akil and Alserkal Avenue include Manifesto showing from 8 - 14 September (except 13 September), My Neighbor Totoro [86'] Anime as the Wednesday special on 13 September and A Dragon Arrives!, showing from 15 – 21 September (except 20 September).

September exhibition highlights:

1x1 Gallery

14 September to 31 October 2017

M Pravat | Liquid States

Ayyam Gallery

13 September – 26 October

Mohannad Orabi | Ripples | Warehouse 11

Roshanak Aminelahi | G O R D A F A R I D | Warehouse 12

Carbon 12

From 13 September

Amir Khojasteh and Philip Mueller | Good Face and Incurable Flaws

Custot Gallery Dubai

27 September – 28 October

Group exhibition | CREATED REALITIES

ElMarsa

Opening 13 September

Thameur Mejri | Heretic Spaces

Gallery Isabelle Van Den Eynde

13 September to 3 November

Ramin Haerizadeh | To Be or Not To Be, That Is the Question. And Though, It Troubles Digestion*

Green Art Gallery

13 September to 28 October

Group exhibition | Theatre of the Absurd

GREY NOISE

23 September to 4 November

Daniel Gustav Cramer & Joana Escoval | Sand

Gulf Photo Plus

Opens 13 September

Group exhibition | Behind the Portrait

Jean-Paul Najar Foundation

13 September – 26 October 2017

Pierre Dunoyer | vers le tableau

Lawrie Shabibi

23 September – 2 November

Massoud Arabshahi | Early Works from the Azari Collection

Leila Heller

21 September – 4 November

Jacob Hashimoto | Eclipse

Enoc Perez | The Desert Bloom

Project Space Art Jameel

13 September - 12 October

Maha Maamoun | Select works in video and photography

Collaboration: Art Jameel and The Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Third Line

13 September to 21 October

Pouran Jinchi | THE LINE OF MARCH

-ENDS-

About Alserkal Avenue

Alserkal Avenue is a vibrant cultural district in the Al Quoz industrial area of Dubai, and is home to a community of over 70 contemporary art galleries, visual and performing arts organisations, designers, home-grown and entrepreneur-led businesses, and community spaces across 500,000sqft and 90 warehouses. Alserkal Avenue provides an essential platform for the development of the creative industries in the United Arab Emirates. As one of the region’s foremost destinations for contemporary art, and home to Dubai’s risk-takers, makers and wide-ranging creative communities, Alserkal Avenue provides cultural experiences for local, regional and international audiences through its extensive year-round programming. Alserkal Avenue is home to Concrete, a multi-disciplinary exhibitions space conceptualised and programmed by Alserkal, as well as the artist residency program of Alserkal’s non-profit, Alserkal Arts Foundation. Alserkal Avenue was established in 2007 by Alserkal following the visionary thinking of its founder, Emirati businessman and cultural patron Abdelmonem Bin Eisa Alserkal, who sought to cultivate a vibrant creative community and support cultural production in Dubai.