Summer Collective: Wavering Hope

Ayyam Gallery’s summer group show celebrates and questions the current siutation in Syria with works by Kais Salman, Khaled Takreti, Tammam Azzam, Abdalla Al Omari, Othman Moussa, Safwan Dahoul, Thaier Helal, Elias Izoli, Abdul-Karim Majd Al-Beik, Mohannad Orabi, Nihad Al-Turk, and Yasmine Al Awa.

As Ayyam marks two decades of championing Syrian contemporary art, this exhibition provides a testament to a generation that has not only survived history, but shaped it – as the gallery says, “For over two decades of conflict, displacement, and resistance, Syrian artists have relied on their creative practices as a lifeline. Through these practices, they have fought against erasure, preserved memory, and expressed truths too heavy for language alone …” The fall of the Assad regime in December has led to a new chapter: “even in this long-awaited moment, a deeper question surfaced: was this truly an end, or merely the next turn in a long cycle of hope and despair?”

This year’s Summer Collective echoes that feeling and also reflects on Ayyam’s own journey. Through their individual visions, the artists in the ummer Collective map the emotional, political, and cultural aftermath of conflict, and the fragile hope that emerges in its wake. Says the gallery: “The show is a reminder that in Syria, hope is rarely straightforward. It is layered with doubt, shadowed by memory, and always vulnerable to being undone. Yet it endures. And in the hands of these artists, it is made visible – transformed into images, forms, and gestures that challenge us to remember, to reflect, and to imagine something beyond despair”.

To 5 September.

Above: Othman Moussa, The Terror Group (2013)