All Day

Art Seeding Festival: Al Khayat Chapter

Al Khayat Avenue 10 19 Street, Al Quoz, Dubai

An interesting concept: "art can be 'seeded' into the urban environment, where it evolves over time through interaction with people, space, and context ... Rather than presenting finished works within gallery walls, the festival invites artists to engage directly with [ ... ]

Free

Cats

Etihad Arena Yas Island, Abu Dhabi

The spectacular (and spectacularly successful) Andrew Lloyd Webber musical settles into Etihad Arena for two consecutive long weekends. Look for decent songs, great choreography and staging, and a well-paced plot (not always the case with musicals ...) Friday/Saturday prices start [ ... ]

From AED 90

Art Dubai Special Edition

Madinat Jumeirah Dubai

Art Dubai’s rescheduled 2026 incarnation has a basic shape as before – a fair with Contemporary, Modern and Digital gallery sections – but there are some significant changes. For a start, of course, there are many fewer commercial galleries involved: [ ... ]

Free, but pre-register

Short+Sweet Dubai: People’s Choice Semi-Finals

New Covent Garden Theatre Mall of the Emirates, Dubai

The semi finals weekend of the festival of 10-minute plays, today being for the People's Choices. The best playlets will return to compete for the top prizes on the Gala Weekend, 23-24 May. Times, dates, prices: 3.00-5.00pm 16 May AED [ ... ]

AED 150

Short+Sweet Dubai: Judge’s Choice Semi-Finals

New Covent Garden Theatre Mall of the Emirates, Dubai

The semi finals weekend of the festival of 10-minute plays, today being for the Judge's Choices. The best playlets will return to compete for the top prizes on the Gala Weekend, 23-24 May. Times, dates, prices: 3.00-5.00pm 17 May AED 150 [ ... ]

AED 150

LAST CHANCE Maggie Otieno: Sojourner – The Difference Is the Same

Efiɛ Gallery 2 Al Khayat Art Avenue, First Al Khail Street, Dubai

Otieno’s first solo presentation with Efie centres on her signature transformation of reclaimed and distressed materials. Working across wood, metal, and mixed media, her semi-abstract forms explore layered narratives of history, memory, human interaction, and environmental survival.

Free

Safwan Dahoul – The Eye: An Aperture Into the Soul

Ayyam Gallery B11, Alserkal Avenue, Dubai

Safwan Dahoul’s most recent body of work continues his Dream series – an ongoing body of work investigating the dream state that he began back in the late 1980s, exploring "the physical and psychological effects of alienation, solitude, and longing [ ... ]

Free

In Abstracto, In Concreto: On Memory and Presence

Efiɛ Gallery 2 Al Khayat Art Avenue, First Al Khail Street, Dubai

A summer-long group show for Luke Agada, Tunji Adeniyi-Jones, Ludovic Nkoth, and Naila Opiangah, curated by Brice Arsène Yonkeu – whose curatorial statement defines the show as "an encounter with works on paper and paintings that move between visibility and [ ... ]

Free

Collage Art Exhibition

Kutubna Cultural Center Madina Avenues 17, Nadd Al Hamar, Dubai

More than 70 artworks for 43 artists, included those who responded to an open call – "a bold exploration of contemporary collage art" says Kutubna, promising "work with paint, paper, textiles, photography, digital collage, and found materials to build layered [ ... ]

Free

Postcard Poems with Balqees Alhawamdeh

421 Arts Campus Mina Zayed, Abu Dhabi

Writer and poet Balqees Alhawamdeh invites participants to explore poetry in an approachable and creative way by crafting a short poem as a visual composition using colour, collage, and form. It starts with a line from a poem or a [ ... ]

Free, but pre-register

Flow: dir Gints Zilbalodis (2024)

Louvre Abu Dhabi Saadiyat Island, Abu Dhabi

An absolutely stunning low-budget (and largely handmade) antidote to Disneyfication – a wordless animated fable about a cat reluctantly making friends with a dog, a ring-tailed lemur, a capybara and a secretary bird in a post-apocalyptic world. There's a strong [ ... ]

AED 30

Human After All: AI, Creativity & the Future of Connection

Warehouse 34 Alserkal Avenue, Dubai

Mo Gawdat – entrepreneur, author, podcaster, software engineer, and one-time Google X exec – talks with former Sky News presenter Sally Lockwood. Expect a conversation exploring creativity, technology, optimism, and what it means to stay human in an increasingly artificial [ ... ]

Free

X Fest DXB: weekend 4

The Junction Unit H72, Alserkal Avenue, Dubai

The penultimate weekend for the Junction's short play festival: if you've been attending all performances, you could have seen something like 70 original 10-minute plays by now ... The strongest return to the stage to compete for the top honours [ ... ]

AED 150

X Fest DXB: weekend 4

The Junction Unit H72, Alserkal Avenue, Dubai

The penultimate weekend for the Junction's short play festival: if you've been attending all performances, you could have seen something like 70 original 10-minute plays by now ... The strongest return to the stage to compete for the top honours [ ... ]

AED 150

The Laughter Factory Premium Comedy Club

Dukes The Palm Palm Dubai, Dubai

The final gig for the Laughter Factory's May tour: Rory O'Hanlon as Irish as his name suggest: described by Chortle as having “presence, poise and timing”, he's famous for his rapid-fire delivery and the sheer quantity of jokes in his [ ... ]

AED 140

Joke Hub

Canopy by Hilton Dubai Al Seef Al Seef Street, Umm Hurair 1, Dubai

A regular Mad Cat Comedy night – "Dubai's wildest comedy show on Saturday" at "the first purpose built comedy room in the country". The cover charge of AED 99 includes two F&B coupons.

AED 99