Contemporary Middle East: Selections from the Farjam Collection
— The Arts Club Dubai 09 November 2023 — 24 February 2024

In November 2023, The Arts Club Dubai opened its eighth Stairway Exhibition, Contemporary Middle East: Selections from the Farjam Collection, featuring a selection work by contemporary Middle Eastern artists from the pre-eminent art collection of Dr. Farhad Farjam.

The Farjam collection is one of the world’s foremost privately owned collections encompassing Islamic, Middle Eastern and Western art, from pre-Islamic times to present, and embodying a fusion of cultures and traditions between East and West. This exhibition narrows in on leading contemporary Middle Eastern artists, acquired by Dr. Farjam, showcasing some of the most cutting-edge art movements from the region.

Among artists included are Emirati artist Mohamed Ahmed Ibrahim (born 1962), a pioneer of conceptual art in the Middle East since the 1980s whose brightly coloured, radical paintings are included in major museums worldwide; Tunisian-born artist Nadia Kaabi-Linke (born 1978), who draws on her personal history of migration across cultures and borders to create site-responsive conceptual works that have been the subject of major solo museums internationally; as well as world-renowned Iranian artist Farhad Moshiri (born 1960) whose Pop Art dialect is imbued with a subtle, subversive socio-political commentary.  Other artists include Lebanese Marwan Sahmarani (born 1970), Palestinian Samia Halaby (born 1936), Iranian artist Siamak Filizadeh (born 1970) and Emirati artist Abdul Qader Al Rais (born 1951).

Together these artists represent the vibrant, ever-growing contemporary art scene in the region with dynamic works that between them examine concepts of identity, consumerism, geopolitics and universal human experience through explorations of painting, found materials, photography and other diverse media.

Wedel Art is enormously grateful to Dr. Farjam and his outstanding team for their generosity and collaboration.