Maktaba is 421's monthly gathering dedicated to collective reading, viewing, and discussion across disciplines. For this second iteration, multidisciplinary and performance artist Yoonsik Chico Park leads a dialogue around performance studies: together, participants will "examine, synthesise, and speculate the alternative [ ... ]
A group exhibition that reflects on continuity, resilience, and quiet optimism at a time when the world can feel uncertain. Says the gallery: "All at Once speaks to the coexistence of multiple realities – personal and shared, fleeting and enduring, [ ... ]
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: [ ... ]
A second night at the Radisson 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 [ ... ]
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 [ ... ]
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 [ ... ]
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.
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 [ ... ]
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 [ ... ]
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 [ ... ]
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 [ ... ]
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 [ ... ]
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 [ ... ]
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 [ ... ]
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.
A satirical comedy of the near future: unemployed Max (Blanche Gardin) struggles to earn a living by selling stolen robot parts on the black market. But her latest ‘acquisition’, T-0, is too old for the fence; her 10-year-old daughter Paula [ ... ]
The Dubai-born French-Indonesian singer-songwriter is fluent in several languages, writes much of her own material, has performed for heads of state and royalty, earned praise from Shania Twain at the Forbes 30/50 Summit in Abu Dhabi, and was spotted by [ ... ]
Mad Cat’s standup team at their regular stop at the Easy Tiger bar in Abu Dhabi's Al Ain Palace. The door price of AED 99 includes two drinks ...
A group show of works by emerging, mid-career and established artists priced at $3,000 and below, conceived as an accessible entry into collecting "whether you’re just starting or looking to expand your collection with thoughtful additions". The artists: Ahmad Kasha [ ... ]
The Courtyard's popular evening of elimination improv. Ten actors converge for a night of scenes, songs and games based on audience suggestions. After each round you score the players on a scale of 1 to 5, and the one with [ ... ]
The annual Faculty exhibition of the Academy of Visual Arts at the University of the Arts, Sharjah. The curator is Tor Seidel, filmmaker and lecturer in photography and video at the Academy, and his statement includes this summary of the show: [ ... ]
Lebanese-born NYC-based comic, a regular at Gotham Comedy Club and Union Hall shows in Brooklyn when she's not touring – which she does a lot. This is a new show, touring around Europe and North America as well as this [ ... ]
The second weekend for the spectacular (and spectacularly successful) Andrew Lloyd Webber musical. Look for decent songs, great choreography and staging, and a well-paced plot (not always the case with musicals ...) Friday/Saturday prices start at AED 160, Sunday it's [ ... ]
With more than four decades of music-making behind him, Lulu Santos has a catalogue of iconic Brazilian hits that continues to resonate with audiences through sincerity, melody, and timeless songwriting – songs such as Tempos Modernos, Toda Forma de Amor, and [ ... ]
Durags are stretchable fabrics worn over the head to shape and protect the hair; in Akinbola’s practice, they are both culturally loaded objects and a material he can reconfigure. For this solo show, Akinbola assembles durags into compositions that are [ ... ]
Mad Cat’s standup team at their regular stop at the Easy Tiger bar in Abu Dhabi's Al Ain Palace. The door price of AED 99 includes two drinks ...
The Courtyard's popular evening of elimination improv. Ten actors converge for a night of scenes, songs and games based on audience suggestions. After each round you score the players on a scale of 1 to 5, and the one with [ ... ]
The Comedy Kix folk take over the Radisson Blu Deira Creek's Marbles Karaoke Bar. On the bill: Amr Elassal, Emaad Siddiqui, Moncef Boumaza, Faizan Bhat, Saeed Alnahdy and Anton Galvez. It's free, but with a minimum spend of AED 75 [ ... ]
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.
How do borders and ideologies attempt to contain open stretches of land and water, and segregate those who inhabit them? What ties us to a place, and what severs us from it? Which ways of living and knowledge can move [ ... ]
Drawn from the private collection of Bassam Said Freiha plus key loans from the Ary Jan Gallery, this exhibition of Orientalist works unfolds across five thematic sections, each focusing on a central motif within Orientalist visual language and examining how [ ... ]
A landmark monographic exhibition that traces Picasso’s lifelong preoccupation with the human form. Included are more than 130 artworks from the Musée National Picasso-Paris and other institutions, as well as Louvre Abu Dhabi, DCT Abu Dhabi, and other regional collections [ ... ]
Modern and contemporary works from Syria, Lebanon, North Africa, and the UAE selected from the private collection of Fairouz and Jean-Paul Villain – a pair of collectors for whom the acquisition of works has been a way of engaging with [ ... ]
Sara Naim’s fourth solo show at the gallery is also her first public exhibition of paintings, large-scale works produced between 2023 and 2026 that move between figuration and abstraction. The exhibition is accompanied by a new video performance, Mother Practices [ ... ]
Khalaf explores the relationship between self, object, and other through a focus on 'steel' in public spaces: The Field of Dreams, or "dreams as minefields", remind us of the modern structures of unbridled capitalism and the transformative domination of life. [ ... ]
"All the lands from sunrise to sunset", a phrase attributed to the Mesopotamian king Sargon of Akkad, graphically invoked his claim to total dominion. Taking this assertion as both point of departure and provocation, this exhibition includes works by Alla [ ... ]
A two-act evening of spontaneous scenes and songs based on audience suggestions, by some of our most experienced players and guests. After warming up with some fun games and scenes, the improvisers bring the 1950’s Film Noir genre to life [ ... ]
The Courtyard's popular evening of elimination improv. Ten actors converge for a night of scenes, songs and games based on audience suggestions. After each round you score the players on a scale of 1 to 5, and the one with [ ... ]
Combining language, heritage, and expression, the world of Arabic calligraphy offers centuries of tradition for artists to draw upon. Curated by DiarBid ArtHouse and presented by Dubai Culture and Alliance Française Dubai, this exhibition features established artists, calligraphers, and instructors [ ... ]
While Jorge Tacla was only an adolescent during the 1973 coup against Chile’s democratically-elected socialist president Salvador Allende, the upheaval left an irrevocable mark on his politics and practice. Titled after a line from a TS Eliot poem, Tacla’s "most [ ... ]
Curated by Nada Shabout of NYUAD's al Mawrid Arab Center for the Study of Art, this exhibition investigates and celebrates the work and influence of one of the most important art movement of the mid-Century Middle East. Dr Shabout brings [ ... ]
New Orleans jazz – ragtime, blues, brass – in an intimate, street-style bar setting. Shows last about an hour, and there are performances at 6.30pm and 9pm. Note that there's a AED 150 minimum spend on food and/or beverages in [ ... ]
A two-act evening of spontaneous scenes and songs based on audience suggestions, by some of our most experienced players and guests. After warming up with some fun games and scenes, the improvisers bring the 1950’s Film Noir genre to life [ ... ]
The Courtyard's popular evening of elimination improv. Ten actors converge for a night of scenes, songs and games based on audience suggestions. After each round you score the players on a scale of 1 to 5, and the one with [ ... ]
A contemporary art exhibition dedicated to the Urdu language: according to Ishara, "the show explores how language provides the tools with which we create and shape our internal ‘worlds’. Words, rather than simply describing our surroundings, give rise to our [ ... ]
A music-filled dialogue-free feature-length animation about a young astronaut and her guardian robot. Based on Kid Koala’s award-winning graphic novel, it deals poignantly with love, loss, memories and the bonds that connect us ... The film has an original score [ ... ]
A two-act evening of spontaneous scenes and songs based on audience suggestions, by some of our most experienced players and guests. After warming up with some fun games and scenes, the improvisers bring the 1950’s Film Noir genre to life [ ... ]
The Courtyard's popular evening of elimination improv. Ten actors converge for a night of scenes, songs and games based on audience suggestions. After each round you score the players on a scale of 1 to 5, and the one with [ ... ]
A writers’ group intended for writers to practice their craft without the pressures of producing a final outcome, designed to provide a supportive environment for writers to write alone yet in a group. You're invited to polish your writing skills [ ... ]
For her first solo exhibition in the UAE, curated by Nadine Khoury, Samar Hejazi presents a body of work that explores how forms shift, unravel, and reassemble over time. Working across textile, printmaking, and spatial intervention, her practice suggests that [ ... ]
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