The first Somali film to be featured at the Cannes Film Festival (in 2024), The Village Next to Paradise tells the story of Mamargrade who is struggling to raise his son Cigaal in their rural Somali village amidst conflict, natural [ ... more]
Award-winning contemporary dance from Aotearoa/New Zealand, one of the hits of Edinburgh 2025. Created by Oli Mathiesen with Lucy Lynch and Sharvon Mortimer and inspired by the energy and emotion of rave culture, it's a spectacle of stamina, sweat, and [ ... more]
It looks like this night of improvisational comedy has been so successful that progenitors Tall Tales Productions and The Junction will be running it regularly. As before, it's a show created on the fly from audience suggestions; it's inspired by [ ... more]
A stand-up show that delves into "life, travel, identity, and the everyday struggles we all face". Abdi is definitely an engaging storyteller, so this should be a good night ...
First of half a dozen Pepp shows where the Egyptian-American standup, actor, TV host, and former cardiothoracic surgeon tries out new material. He's been a comedy success for 15 years, so he knows how to do comedy; it will be [ ... more]
Second of three performances for this award-winning contemporary dance from Aotearoa/New Zealand. Created by Oli Mathiesen with Lucy Lynch and Sharvon Mortimer and inspired by the energy and emotion of rave culture, it's a spectacle of stamina, sweat, and sheer [ ... more]
Second of half a dozen Pepp shows where the Egyptian-American standup, actor, TV host, and former cardiothoracic surgeon tries out new material. He's on at 7 and 9pm on 12 and 13 September.
The audience for this show has been called for jury duty. As the story proceeds you hear the testimony, analyse the evidence, and ultimately decide whether the accused is guilty or not ... It's a courtroom drama where you get [ ... more]
Third of half a dozen Pepp shows where the Egyptian-American standup, actor, TV host, and former cardiothoracic surgeon tries out new material. He's on again at 9pm and at 7 and 9pm on 13 September.
The final performance of this award-winning contemporary dance from Aotearoa/New Zealand. Created by Oli Mathiesen with Lucy Lynch and Sharvon Mortimer and inspired by the energy and emotion of rave culture, it's a spectacle of stamina, sweat, and sheer willpower [ ... more]
Dubai Opera marks its 10th birthday with a black-tie gala featuring soprano Fatma Said, performing with the UAE National Orchestra under the baton of Ahmed Farag and the Festival Chorus. We're promised "a curated gala of operatic and orchestral works [ ... more]
The Egyptian-American standup, actor, TV host, and former cardiothoracic surgeon tries out new material. He's on again at 7 and 9pm on 13 September.
A group exhibition based around site-specific installations and considering ecological, feminist, philosophical, and postcolonial concerns. The core inspiration however is “philosophical reflections of time as growth rather than movement ... Time, as humans experience it, is inseparable from the vegetal. [ ... more]
A solo show featuring works that Petr Kirusha developed during his residency at Dom Art Projects. At a time of heightened geopolitical tension between the US and Iran, Kirusha documented the landscapes of Al Quoz and the rapidly changing cityscape [ ... more]
Selected works from the Farjam Collection. Through a refined language of Minimalist abstraction, the London-based artist blurs the boundaries between sculpture, painting and architecture – "bringing together works that explore light, colour, perception, and spatial experience, the exhibition reflects Rana [ ... more]
Human in the Loop is a sound-based interactive installation that takes the form of a game of hide-and-seek between visitors and an unseen algorithm. Hanging ropes are suspended from the ceiling and visitors are invited to pull on them; each [ ... more]
First of two final shows where the Egyptian-American standup, actor, TV host, and former cardiothoracic surgeon tries out new material. He's on again at 9pm.
A concert with a difference – venue is absolutely dark, and each audience member dons a light-blocking mask. The idea of course is that without visual perception your full attention is on the sound: "the most subtle musical nuances, delicate [ ... more]
Last of a run of six shows with the Egyptian-American standup, actor, TV host, and former cardiothoracic surgeon trying out new material – he'll probably have honed it by now, so this is probably the one to catch.
A Diarbid show for 35 artists "who explore identity as fluid, layered, and continuously evolving. Through fragmented, distorted, duplicated, and incomplete forms, the works examine how the self is shaped by memory, displacement, shifting environments, and the uncertainties of contemporary [ ... more]
Stephan Kaluza’s practice is fundamentally concerned with depictions of nature, either as hyper-realistic oils or near-abstract renderings. These two modes of painting should be seen as different stages of the same subject in a process of transformation: disruptions creep in, and [ ... more]
A descendant of Armenian Genocide survivors and raised in Syria, Mourad approaches his work with a profound sense of responsibility to preserve culture and history; his practice aims to give voice to places that no longer exist, offering an interpretation [ ... more]
This exhibition by the Saudi artist embraces the experimentation of jazz, commemorating its role as an audiovisual gathering for culture to flourish from and exact its designs on the world as it moved from older models of audiovisual art – [ ... more]
The Ukrainian National Ballet brings its version of The Marriage of Figaro to Dubai as a two-act comic ballet with a libretto by Yaremenko and Yuri Stanishevsky, choreography and staging by Viktor Yaremenko, and musical adaptation and additional composition by [ ... more]
Ayyam Gallery's summer collective exhibition focuses on the colour orange: "occupying a unique space between intensity and comfort, orange embodies both vitality and reflection. Associated with sunlight, fire, ripened fruit, and shifting horizons, the colour carries a rich spectrum of [ ... more]
Agatha Christie's second most successful play (The Mousetrap is probably uncatchable) is a country-house thriller-comedy with clues aplenty and a good helping of plot contrivances – including a most convenient hidden door in the study that of course leads to [ ... more]
The Ukrainian National Ballet brings its version of The Marriage of Figaro to Dubai as a two-act comic ballet with a libretto by Yaremenko and Yuri Stanishevsky, choreography and staging by Viktor Yaremenko, and musical adaptation and additional composition by [ ... more]
A second night of performances for Agatha Christie's play. It is a country-house thriller-comedy with clues aplenty and a good helping of plot contrivances – including a most convenient hidden door in the study that of course leads to a [ ... more]
A "breathtaking" show "through the heart and soul of Ireland". Created by Chris Hannon, former Lord of the Dance Star and also responsible for the global hit Murphy's Celtic Legacy, this performance brings dancers, musicians, and singers together to capture [ ... more]
The final performances for H72 Productions' treatment of the Agatha Christie play – a country-house thriller-comedy with clues aplenty and a good helping of plot contrivances (including a most convenient hidden door in the study that of course leads to [ ... more]
The final performances of the Ukrainian National Ballet's danced version of The Marriage of Figaro. The story is broadly retained, the major dances and duets deploy the classical ballet vocabulary, and the production uses lavish eighteenth-century costumes and palace settings; [ ... more]
Shezad Dawood’s 25-year career spans painting, textiles, sculpture, ceramics, film, performance and digital media. Fascinated by ecologies and architecture, his work connects art, science, music, environmentalism and technology to explore both alternative histories and futures, through a process of continuous [ ... more]
Recent works by Laila Majid and Inaam Zafar that explore the human body and its presence in contemporary life through metaphor and symbolism. In Majid’s practice, sculptural and photographic works unfold through slow revelation; Zafar’s practice explores themes of death and [ ... more]
A second and final chance to catch this "breathtaking" show that brings dancers, musicians, and singers together to capture "the magic of Ireland ... Prepare to be enchanted".
A solo exhibition by the Syrian artist that includes large-scale portraits, a tile installation, sculptures, artist books, and works on paper. At the centre of Tallaa's practice is the face, not as portrait or likeness, but as witness; this exhibition, curated [ ... more]
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]
Built from layers of sand collected in the UAE, chalk powder, pigments, and acrylic, the surfaces of Ahmad Tallaa's large-scale portraits at the centre of this show are dense and almost sculptural – as the gallery puts it, "Faces do [ ... more]
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 [ ... more]
Amir Khojasteh's third solo exhibition with the gallery presents the first body of work her has developed after leaving his home country, Iran. To 5 November. Above: Amir Khojasteh, Garden Landscape #2 (2026)
Sharif’s first solo exhibition in the UAE presents an autobiographical and very personal series of works about the struggles of private and artist life in a closed society – "a vulnerable, nuanced presentation of life”. The Bahraini artist uses colour [ ... more]
Rana Begum brings her textile works to The Third Line for the first time. Her fifth solo exhibition at the gallery features a new body of large-scale wool tapestries presented alongside works on linen, paper and MDF, all reflecting the [ ... more]
How could this stage adaptation of the near legendary Graham Linehan / Arthur Mathews TV series not be seriously funny? Dubai Drama Group says "the show captures everything fans adore about the cult classic: razor-sharp dialogue, joyfully absurd situations, and [ ... more]
Two further performances for this stage adaptation of the near legendary Graham Linehan / Arthur Mathews TV series. Dubai Drama Group says "the show captures everything fans adore about the cult classic: razor-sharp dialogue, joyfully absurd situations, and characters who [ ... more]
Barcelona Flamenco Ballet does exactly what the name says – applies the style of flamenco in dance and music to create spectacular and passionate performances, typically by reinterpreting iconic works. This one is described as BFB's "most ambitious and revolutionary [ ... more]
An exhibition featuring more than 40 works by 16 photographers (of different nationalities, but all based in the UAE) that seek to find beauty and meaning in the small moments of everyday life, personal rituals, routines, brief encounters, simple gestures [ ... more]
In a cotton-farming village in Sudan, teenage Nafisa is raised on heroic tales of British colonisers. But when a young businessman arrives from abroad with a new development plan and genetically engineered cotton, Nafisa becomes the centre of a power [ ... more]
Two interconnected exhibitions, both curated by Mo Reda and supported by the Department of Painting and Printmaking at VCUarts Qatar. Together, The Ongoing Performance of Melancholia and Songs in Solitude mark the culmination of a two-month residency at Bayt AlMamzar; [ ... more]
An ambitious large-scale group exhibition dedicated to mapping and navigation systems, "telling stories of fast cars and donkeys, spinning globes and street barricades, cosmic highways and broken bridges ... delves into topographies, transit lines and simulated landscapes to engage critically [ ... more]
A group exhibition for six artists – Aya Afaneh, Sarah Afaneh, Sarah Brahim, Amir Hazim, Yoonsik Chico Park, and Andrew Riad – exploring how language is formed through the body, voice, gesture, and mark making practices. Each contributes a distinct [ ... more]
“What is the ultimate goal of a city?” asks architect/artist Hamad Almuzaini: “Governance and the streamlining of lived experience – an impossible task – or something more open, broken, and constantly reinvented?” The exhibition looks at placemaking within the context of [ ... more]
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