This week’s exhibitions explore belonging, memory, and the ways we shape the world around us. From contemporary reflections on the UAE to dialogues between art, design, and architecture, these exhibitions examine identity, movement, material culture, and the body through practices that span generations, disciplines, and geographies.
Under the Same Sky
Rizq Art Initiative
Bringing together 20 artists who call the UAE home, Under the Same Sky explores how belonging is shaped through shared experience rather than shared origin. The exhibition pairs Emirati artists with practitioners from diverse cultural backgrounds, tracing connections between memory, place, and everyday life. Working across photography, textiles, mixed media, and installation, the artists respond to the landscapes, materials, and rhythms of the UAE. Together, the works offer a layered portrait of the country as lived, observed, and continually reimagined through contemporary artistic practice.
On view until 20 July.
Monday – Sunday, 11 am – 7 pm
Cross Scripts
Lawrie Shabibi
Bringing together artists, architects, designers, and craftspeople, Cross Scripts examines the fluid boundaries between art, design, architecture, and craft. Spanning painting, sculpture, furniture, jewellery, and installation, the exhibition explores how objects accumulate meaning beyond their function.
Geometry, ornament, and traditional making techniques are reimagined through contemporary forms, revealing unexpected connections across generations and disciplines. Rather than treating creative practices as separate fields, Cross Scripts presents making as a shared language, shaped by material knowledge, cultural inheritance, and ongoing experimentation.
On view until 31 July.
Monday – Saturday 10am – 6pm
In Transit
Artbooth Gallery
Bringing together seven artists from across the Middle East, In Transit explores movement as both a physical and psychological condition. Spanning abstraction, figuration, and conceptual practice, the exhibition examines memory, identity, displacement, and perception through interconnected artistic voices. From Palestinian narratives of belonging and resilience to reflections on war, migration, cinema, and urban history, the works reveal how personal and collective experiences shape visual language. Conceived as both an introduction and continuation of the gallery’s programme, the exhibition traces shared histories across generations, geographies, and mediums.
On view until 31 August 2026.
Monday – Friday 10 – 6, Saturday 11 – 3
Laila Majid and Inaam Zafar: Body Quotidian
Sharjah Art Foundation
Bringing together recent sculptures, photographs, and paintings by Laila Majid and Inaam Zafar, Body Quotidian explores the body as a site of vulnerability, memory, and transformation. Through metaphor and material sensitivity, the artists consider how contemporary ideas of beauty, youth, and identity shape our understanding of the physical self. Domestic interiors, subtle textures, and fragmented forms create a quiet dialogue between presence and absence, inviting reflection on the fragile relationship between bodies, everyday life, and perception.
On view until 20 September.
Saturday - Thursday, 9:00 am–9:00 pm; Friday, 4:00 pm–9:00 pm
Observers of Change: Art from the UAE (1971–2025)
Etihad Museum
This incredible exhibition has been extended until the end of the year. Presented by Dubai Culture in collaboration with the Barjeel Art Foundation, this major exhibition traces the evolution of artistic practice in the UAE over the past five decades. Featuring around 60 works by pioneering and contemporary artists who have lived and worked in the country since 1971, the exhibition explores painting, photography, sculpture, and mixed media through themes of landscape, abstraction, urban change, and national identity. It also highlights a cross-generational dialogue between Emirati artists and voices from across the Arab world.
10 AM to 8 PM; Last entry 7 PM