Youth Takeover 2025

The Jameel’s annual Youth Takeover is the manifestation of the Assembly, an experimental learning programme designed to foster creative leaders aged 18 to 24 in the UAE, “inviting the creation and curation of projects reflective of their generation’s areas of interest”. The Assembly 2024-2025 cohort comprises multimedia graphic designer Abrar Kebaili, visual artist and designer Ayesha Fernandes, multimedia designer and writer Desirée Barreto, literary artist Ioanna Orphanide, poet Jared Maxilom, researcher and writer Manal Nadeem, architect and researcher Omar Darwish, exhibition designer Sanjushrree Subash, and poet Syed Haider.

This year’s theme for the Youth Takeover – a physical takeover of spaces on the Jameel’s ground floor – is titled ‘Spoon Spade Shovel’. It covers experiments in how the Assembly members dig, sift and stir through the world, “offering a network of creative experiences as tools for excavation, reflection and play … The exhibition presents a range of interdisciplinary works that use tools – literal and metaphorical – to question how we make and remake meaning”. These works sit uneasily beside one another, but their differences are invitations rather than obstacles  “whether you sift or stir, extract or excavate, your experience will be shaped by the tool you reach for: its size, scale, heft and intent. You are invited to inhabit this instability and co-compose the meanings that emerge … What you take from this exhibition depends on what you bring to it”.

The artists are:

Ayesha Fernandes with Svabhu Kohli
Desirée Barreto with Angie Pais and Mouza Al Hamrani
Ioanna Orphanide with Danae Orphanide and Ilya Akimov
Jared Maxilom with Halo-Halo Experiment, Vinyl Souk and memoryall
Manal Nadeem with Khaled Esguerra and Jed Bacason
Omar Darwish with Fatma Al Ali and Maitha Ali
Sanjushrree Subash with Danutė Vaitekūnaitė and Farheen Fatima
Syed Haider with Hessa Lootah, Souldier and Aqib Anwar

Besides the commissioned artworks, the Youth Takeover 2025 features a public programme. These are all free, but re-registration is required:

10 May 10

– Opening Preview and panel discussion with the Assembly 2024-2025 members and programme curators Abhirami Suresh and Nabeeha Sajjad
– Musical Activation: Translating Oscillations by artist Mckie Alvarez
– Musical Performance: ABRI

11 May

– Workshop: Synthesising Landscapes (Part 1) with Assembly members Ayesha Fernandes and Ioanna Orphanide

17 May

– Tour: Assembly-led exhibition tour
– Workshop: Portable Beats – DIY Music with Pocket Operators. Music production workshop by artist PHO, in collaboration with Vinyl Souk
– Gathering: Storytelling – The Journey of Design by graphic designer Poorvaja Subramanian and Assembly member Abrar Kebaili
– Musical Activation: Translating Oscillations by Madam Void

18 May

– Workshop: You may now sleep? by artist Henry Tan
– Themed activation: me.me con by artist Fatima Raza and Assembly member Desiree Barreto

24 May

– Performance Tour: And the Tools Begin to Speak – Poets in Response to Spoon Spade Shovel by poets Ahmed Gihad Hamad, Dania Dawn, Jared Maxilom, Malavika Suresh, Pankaj Kanchandani, Sarah Afaneh, Shania Laude and Syed Haider
– Performance: lorem ipsum 9-to-5 by Andres Ugartechea
– Musical activation: Translating Oscillations by Joe Najm

25 May

– Tour: Assembly-led Youth Takeover 2025 tour
– Workshop: Between the Gesture and the Ground by artists Aya Afaneh and Yoonsik Chico Park
– Workshop: Dwelling in the In-between: A Workshop of Waiting, Devotion and Movement by writer and performance artist Faraz Ali

31 May

– Tour and workshop: Family Saturdays at the Jameel by Assembly member Ayesha Fernandes
– Workshop: Monuments and Enchantment – Inhabiting Urban Space by artist-researcher Maitha Ali
– Musical activation: Translating Oscillations by PHO

1 June

– Interactive performance: Synthesising Landscapes (Part 2) by artists Aakarsh Singh and Ahmed Bilal
– Musical activation: Feedback Loops: A Sunset Sound Gathering by artists Cyrill Reaidy and Kirill Zhan of Moist Paper Party