The 17th edition of Abu Dhabi Art delivers exactly what one might expect from a fair intent on defining the U.A.E.’s place in the global art ecosystem. Running through November 23, this edition of the fair is the last before Frieze takes over in 2026, crystallizing Abu Dhabi Art’s cultural positioning as a more international fair—a bridge between the West and the East of the art world. That said, all signs point to it remaining firmly rooted in the region’s rapidly developing artistic landscape while operating as a key platform spotlighting local talent, from the fast-growing contemporary scene to the foundations of Arabian modernism. The question now is whether that vision will hold once Frieze steps in and how the takeover will affect the fair’s identity.
Although sales are moving at a slower pace than other international fairs (to the point that a proper sale report is almost impossible at the end of the preview days), a broad sense of enthusiasm and excitement was palpable during the highly attended VIP preview on Tuesday (Nov. 18)—the true key moment of the fair, following a pre-preview exclusively for women the day before. By late afternoon, the aisles filled rapidly, becoming packed by evening with both local visitors and a wave of internationals: residents, business travelers and those who had flown in specifically for the fair, with French and Italian chatter particularly dominant.
The fair itself is notably international, with 142 galleries from 34 countries presenting this year at Manarat Al Saadiyat, the multidisciplinary arts center anchoring the expanding cultural district of Saadiyat Island. Two countries in particular, Nigeria and Turkey, receive special attention in this edition, with dedicated sections offering an in-depth look at their rich yet often-overlooked art scenes.
Among the galleries in “Focus: Nigeria Spotlight” in the Atrium is Lagos-based kó gallery, which is spotlighting a group of pioneering modern artists from Nigeria’s Osogbo School, including Jimoh Buraimoh, Adebisi Fabunmi, Rufus Ogundele, Muraina Oyelami and Twins Seven-Seven. Bringing together key works from the 1960s to the 1990s, the presentation highlights their ability to combine tribal aesthetics with a search for new contemporary personal languages that confront questions of identity, gender politics and the enduring power of myths and traditions. Developed in partnership with the Nigerian Department for Tourism and Culture, the section is part of the country’s Nigeria Everywhere initiative, which aims to increase the global visibility of Nigeria as one of the continent’s most vibrant cultural hubs. Other participating galleries include SOTO Gallery, AMG Projects, returning exhibitor kó, O’DA Gallery, 1897 Gallery, Windsor Gallery, Ishara Gallery and a special project with MADhouse by Tikera Africa in a shared booth.
The rich and varied history of Turkish modern and contemporary art is also foregrounded in “Modern Türkiye,” curated by Doris Benhalegua Karako, with three presentations from leading galleries in the country. Among them, DG Art Gallery and Projects is featuring the monumental abstract compositions and vibrant color fields of pioneering Turkish-Jordanian modernist Fahrelnissa Zeid (1901-1991), who found in abstraction a fluid synthesis of Middle Eastern, Byzantine and European avant-garde aesthetics. Nearby, Art On Istanbul Gallery is spotlighting postwar artist Burhan Doğançay, whose conceptual and experimental practice spans media but is best known for his research into spontaneous expression and the documentation of contemporary culture through urban surfaces. Moving between pop and abstraction, and recalling the décollages of Jacques Villeglé, the affiches of Raymond Hains or the pop-derived collages of Mimmo Rotella, Doğançay worked directly with the material language of city walls: torn posters, graffiti, political messages and accidental compositions shaped by time, weather and human intervention.
Also worth mentioning is the cross-generational booth of Istanbul-based Galerist, which includes two estates the gallery is working to revive, as well as a blown-glass, memory-encased critique of technology-driven progress illusions by contemporary artist Burcu Yağcıoğlu. Standing out with raw, unfiltered emotional power is a series of paintings by Semiha Berksoy, the celebrated Turkish opera star who painted throughout her life. Her psychologically charged paintings channel a deeply intimate yet universally resonant conflict, shaped by her strong female personality as she navigated a largely male-dominated system. Included in the past Venice Biennale, her work was recently honored with an entire exhibition at the Hamburger Bahnhof in Berlin, now traveling to Istanbul Contemporary—an overdue recognition that aligns with the roughly $100,000 price tag. Also in the booth is work by nomadic and outsider artist Hüseyin Bahri Alptekin, featuring a series of neon hotel signs that function as both evocative vintage urban relics and a critical reflection on globalization and consumer culture. Alptekin’s work is also already in the collections of international institutions, including Tate.
An international platform for the MENA art scene
Abu Dhabi Art remains firmly anchored in a genius loci, dedicating substantial space to artists and galleries in the region as it establishes itself as the premier international platform to amplify the vibrancy of its ever-growing artistic production and community.
Among the local power players, Carbon 12 is presenting a new group of playful wood-carved works by Mexican artist Edgar Orlaineta, following his introduction to local collectors with an almost sold-out solo exhibition last year, alongside a large André Butzer piece and works by Sarah Almehairi. By the end of the VIP days, the gallery already reported to Observer multiple successful placements, with Sarah Almehairi’s works selling out the first day of the fair — the artist also has a work at the inaugural NOMAD Abu Dhabi and is currently producing work for her solo presentation at Art Basel Qatar. Works from Edgar Orlaineta’s Mountain series were also placed in a significant Abu Dhabi collection. At its gallery in Dubai, Carbon 12 just opened its 100th exhibition featuring Gil Heitor Cortesao’s sixth solo show.
The Third Line, another leading Dubai gallery that’s shaping and nourishing the U.A.E.’s contemporary art ecosystem, is presenting a strong lineup of internationally acclaimed artists from or connected to the region, including iconic photographs by U.A.E.-born, Brooklyn-based artist Farah Al Qasimi. Her vivid, hyper-attentive images—most recently recognized by Tate—probe the textures of Gulf domesticity and the quiet tensions embedded in everyday life. Also on view are works by Egyptian photographer Youssef Nabil, Dubai-based artist Nima Nabavi, the vibrant gestural abstractions of Iraqi-Kentucky rising star Vivian Sora and poetic hand-embroidered works that draw from Palestinian tatreez traditions. The booth also includes diaphanous abstractions by Rana Begum and vivid painterly narratives by self-taught artist Anuar Khalifi. Abu Dhabi Art is one of the key cultural moments in the U.A.E, gallery co-founder Sunny Rahbar told Observer. “It’s exciting for us to contribute to that energy through a presentation that reflects the complexity and diversity of the region.”
Several U.A.E. galleries are, in fact, already functioning as cultural bridges between the local art scene and neighboring countries while also reflecting the multicultural identity shaped by the nation’s long history as a crossroads of trade. Among those is Rizq Art Gallery, an Abu Dhabi-based gallery active since 2023 that frequently connects Gulf and Indian art, a dialogue that resonates with the city’s extensive Indian community. One entire side of their booth is devoted to a solo presentation by U.A.E. artist Camelia Mohebi, who transforms the space into a cosmology of peace built on mythic layers of heaven and family stories, merging quantum reality, digital atmospheres and spiritual symbolism. Prices for these metaphysical and symbolic works range from $4,000 to $42,000. The gallery also presents mandala-like mystical compositions by Jagannath Panda—an Indian artist they introduced to the region—alongside works by Indian artists Anupama Alias Anil and the more established Gigi Scaria, as well as small drawings by young Emirati artist Shamsa Al Mansoori, whose distilled narratives capture personal memories as records of urban change.
Another key name in the region, ATHR Gallery, mounted a collaborative presentation with Paris-based Mennour anchored by a new installation by Mohammad Alfaraj, who is co-represented by the galleries. The immersive work—a rising grove of charcoal-drawn palm trunks inspired by the agricultural lands of his native Al-Ahsa—summons one of Saudi Arabia’s most enduring natural symbols and is surrounded by work from other local artists such as Sara Abdu, Zahrah Alghamdi, Nasser Al Salem, Asma Bahmim, Ayman Yossri Daydban and Sultan Bin Fahad, whose research on material echoes a similar tension between organic and inorganic. By the end of the preview day, ATHR had already reported several sales, driven by brisk demand for Mohammad AlFaraj’s new charcoal-on-paper series “A palm tree.” Works by the artist across all formats placed quickly, from two-part compositions at €6,000 to multiple three-part versions at €8,000, with four-part and larger eight- and ten-part drawings made this year selling for €10,000 and €18,000. Smaller single-panel pieces also moved steadily at €4,000. The gallery additionally sold Sultan bin Fahad’s 2023 beaded textile Joys–أفراح for SAR 93,750, marking a strong opening day for the Jeddah- and Riyadh-based space.
<img decoding="async" class="size-full-width wp-image-1601284" src="https://observer.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2025/11/11-.jpg?quality=80&w=970" alt="A view of an art fair booth showing several abstract and landscape paintings on white walls, a sculptural work on a pedestal, and a large tapestry-style artwork on a dark green wall." width="970" height="647" data-caption='Taymour Grahne. <span class=”media-credit”>Courtesy Taymour Grahne</span>’>
Long connected with the scene, the young gallerist Taymour Grahne—who moved from London to open in Dubai earlier this year—is presenting a booth that reflects the gallery’s ongoing commitment to championing artistic practices rooted in the MENA region while embracing global intersections. The presentation includes works by Ala Younis, Camille Zakharia, Daniele Genadry, Fayçal Baghriche, Katia Kameli, Lamia Joreige, Latifa Alajlan, Roudhah Al Mazrouei and Stelio Scamanga. “I love this fair, and it will remain a core part of our art fair calendar moving forward, including in its new iteration as Frieze Abu Dhabi,” Grahne told Observer, explaining how, having been visiting the U.A.E. for over 25 years, he has built strong relationships with clients in both Dubai and Abu Dhabi. “With the opening in Dubai, I’ve had the chance to deepen those relationships with great collectors and institutions in neighbouring Abu Dhabi.”
Dubai-based Lawrie Shabibi opted instead for a cross-geographical conversation between materials and meaning. Dominating the exterior wall is one of Mandy El-Sayegh’s large-scale works, rich in linguistic and material layering; inside, the gallery pairs other works by her with industrial relics by Peruvian-American artist Ishmael Randall Weeks. These echo nearby material assemblages by Elias Sime, drawn from technological waste, and are juxtaposed with light- and geometry-based explorations by Filipino-American artist James Clar.
<img decoding="async" class="size-full-width wp-image-1601296" src="https://observer.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2025/11/IMG_6237.jpg?quality=80&w=970" alt="A detailed figurative painting showing a stylized woman with mask-like eyes surrounded by large pastel flowers and organic decorative forms filling the composition." width="970" height="1218" data-caption="A painting by pioneering Palestinian-Lebanese artist Juliana Seraphim presented by Gallery One.”>
A true highlight of this edition is the booth of Gallery One (Ramallah), a leading cultural voice representing Palestinian artists internationally. Their presentation at Abu Dhabi Art is entirely dedicated to the articulated symbolic universe of Palestinian-born Lebanese artist Juliana Seraphim. Through sensuous detail and phantasmatic figures, Seraphim built an iconography rooted in a “woman’s world,” exploring sensuality, selfhood and spiritual longing. Her dense dreamlike worlds echo the symbolic intensity of Remedios Varo or Leonora Carrington yet emerge from a distinctively Middle Eastern sensibility and mythology. Despite the museum-grade intensity and quality of the works, prices remain accessible, with works on paper starting at $3,800 and paintings not exceeding $30,000.
Not yet physically present in the region but set to open as the first contemporary gallery in the historic city of Al Ain next year—timed with Frieze Abu Dhabi and supported by Abu Dhabi-based cultural strategist Lateefa Bin Hamoodah—AWL Gallery from Girona debuts at the fair with a three-person presentation linking overlooked Spanish postwar figure Eric Ansesa with two young Emirati artists, Sara Alehabi and Talin Hazbar. Curated by Metha Naser Alsaeedi under the title “Excavation of the Moment,” the presentation gathers artists who explore materials as sites and vessels of memory, navigating the tension between the human time of making and organic transformation and sedimentation that reposition matter within broader cycles of nature. Working in abstraction, all three artists investigate how land, silence, memory and form shape our existence in the world, connecting past and present moments. In this metaphorically powerful transitional space between fragility and resilience stand Hazbar’s sand-and-pin structures—prototypes for new refuges in the desert or models for more symbiotic coexistence (all priced under $10,000).
Abu Dhabi Art attracts an increasing number of international names.
Although it has yet to adopt the Frieze moniker, the fair attracted more international galleries this year, with many new entries at various levels. Among the heavy hitters, Opera Gallery made a strong debut at the fair, presenting a group of blue-chip names with works priced in the five- and six-digit range, including two eye-catching monumental sculptures by Yayoi Kusama and one of her highly coveted Infinity Nets. Also on view are works by George Condo and Manolo Valdez. However, the undisputed star is a radiant Picasso valued at around $25 million—arguably one of the most expensive works at the fair—fronting a romantically seductive Renoir offered at just under $1 million. While the booth’s offerings could read as museum-grade, the gallery emphasized that it was tailored to local collectors, who often move quickly when something resonates. From his experience running the Dubai gallery, director Sylvain P. Gaillard told Observer he has encountered clients who want works installed the same day, while others prefer private viewings. The Picasso, glowing under the fair’s natural light, felt like a serendipitous match for Abu Dhabi’s atmosphere. Any unsold works will go on view in their Dubai space.
Pace also has a museum-quality booth, where Marc Glimcher stood at the front every day since the press preview—proving the importance attributed to the region by the mega-gallery’s global strategy. Pace’s presentation unfolds as a carefully tuned dialogue of organic forms and material harmonies, bringing together small Calder stabiles (and one suspended mobile), the constellational dot fields of Emily Kam Kngwarreye, works by Marina Paleo Simez, Arlene Shechet, David Hockney and a striking gold sculpture by Lynda Benglis. Anchoring the booth is a large James Turrell, opening a portal of light with its immersive luminosity. Also on view is one of Alicja Kwade’s liquid-time sculptures—like those seen in her New York debut with the gallery—and a painting by Robert Nava, priced at around $150,000, which Glimcher said they deliberately kept for placement in the region despite strong global demand.
Nearby, the booth of Galleria Continua—now a regular presence at the fair—is dominated by a large mirror piece by Pistoletto from his 2023 show at the Louvre Abu Dhabi, where he installed eleven mirrors that interacted with ancient sculptures and the reflections of visitors. At the fair, the work reflects visitors along with the constellation of strong institutionally oriented works included in the booth, including suspended glass-encased clouds by Leonardo Eldrich, a desert-like yellow surface by Loris Cecchini and, doubling the mirroring effect and the Instagram trap, a curved piece by Anish Kapoor positioned opposite.
As the only international blue-chip gallery currently operating a flagship in Dubai, Perrotin tailored its Abu Dhabi presentation to artists it knows resonate with U.A.E. audiences. The booth leans toward Southeast Asian and Indian sensibilities, with Indian artist Bharti Kher’s bindi-on-map works and Rina Banerjee’s symbolic gouaches set in dialogue with the gestural materiality of Lee Bae, alongside a shining gold miniature-like Study into the past by Lauren Grasso.
Also leaning toward East and Southeast Asian perspectives is Almine Rech’s presentation, curated by Roxane Zand, another French powerhouse, featuring works by Farah Atassi, Tia-Thuy Nguyen, Tsherin Sherpa and Thu-Van Tran, among others. The gallery’s Paris director, Camille Dan,a reported a positive response for their first day, anticipating even greater energy in Abu Dhabi with the upcoming openings of museums on Manarat al Saadiyat Island. Meanwhile, Parisian dealer Mennour—alongside its joint presentation with ATHR—is also staging a focused dialogue between the meditative tonalities of Idris Khan and the conceptual material investigations of Alicja Kwade.
A significant portion of the Galleries section is occupied by Asian galleries, predominantly from Hong Kong, Seoul and Tokyo, signaling a growing interest in engaging with the region from farther east. Among them, Leesaya from Tokyo presents a captivating suite of intimate, diaristic paintings by Shusuke Tanaka that isolate fleeting fragments of everyday life and render them in fluid, watery strokes, evoking the fragile, half-formed nature of memory. His paint seems to suspend the air and silence between events, allowing minimal moments to crystallize briefly before dissolving again. The delicate works function like visual journals, all priced comfortably under $10,000.
From Hong Kong, Hanart TZ Gallery presents captivatingly intricate gel-pen-on-paper works by the Guangzhou-based transdisciplinary collective BOLOHO, where traditional Chinese landscape painting evolves into psychedelic, panoramic and cosmological worlds. Founded in 2019 by Bubu (Liu Jiawen) and Cat (Huang Wanshan) and now expanded to a broader group of permanent members, the collective grounds its practice in a ritual of conviviality and sharing, where daily life and art merge through sewing, cooking, gardening and collaborative making. BOLOHO has already appeared in major exhibitions, including documenta 15 and the 11th Asia Pacific Triennale, which justifies the already relatively high price, having recently entered the collection of M+ in Hong Kong.
Given the long-standing presence of Italian entrepreneurs in the U.A.E., it was unsurprising to see a strong Italian presence at Abu Dhabi Art 2025, both among visitors and exhibitors. Beyond Continua, galleries such as Franco Noero, Umberto Di Marino, Mazzoleni, Galleria Studio G7 and P420 × Robilant+Voena have now returned for multiple editions, expanding this distinctly transregional dialogue.
In its fourth consecutive year, Mazzoleni stood out with a double booth—one staged in collaboration with the Embassy of Italy to the U.A.E. and the Italian Cultural Institute in Abu Dhabi under the title “The Roots of 20th and 21st Century Italian Art.” The presentation highlighted Italy’s enduring ability to renew artistic languages while maintaining a distinct identity, bringing together works by Agostino Bonalumi, Enrico Castellani, Giorgio De Chirico, Lucio Fontana, Giorgio Morandi, Michelangelo Pistoletto and Salvo, several of whom have rarely, if ever, been shown in the U.A.E. A majestic de Chirico mannequin painting, Il pittore paesista (ca. 1958), anchored the historical narrative, while Salvo’s Arabian landscapes bridged Italian and regional sensibilities. A neighboring display of contemporary works by Marinella Senatore, Andrea Francolino and other emerging figures underscored the gallery’s commitment to promoting different generations of Italian art internationally. “Our continued presence reflects the gallery’s commitment to fostering dialogue with the art community in the MENA region and with an increasingly international audience,” Jose Gracis told Observer, noting that the fair aligns with a broader effort to strengthen relationships with collectors, institutions and cultural entities in a region investing deeply in its artistic heritage.
Museum-quality ambition defined Robilant+Voena’s debut at the fair, ahead of upcoming outings at Art Basel Qatar and Frieze Abu Dhabi—a strategic step for a gallery long connected to Gulf institutions, including the Louvre Abu Dhabi, and now actively testing the regional market. “We were delighted to receive the Crown Prince and the Minister of Arts and Culture on our stand, and have felt very welcomed as first participants, knowing that we have had strong institutional ties to the Louvre Abu Dhabi over the years,” Michele di Robilant, son of one of the gallery founders and now active in it, told Observer. Their booth features a mix of modern Italian pioneers alongside contemporary emerging and established artists, appealing to a diverse collecting base. Inside, Lucio Fontana’s Spatialist paintings are paired with his pioneering ceramics, Agostino Bonalumi’s shaped canvases are shown alongside bronze sculptures and a majestic Cavallo by Marino Marini anchors the modern section, counterbalanced by Giorgio de Chirico’s late Due cavalli in riva al mare. The contemporary section extends the dialogue globally, featuring Minjung Kim’s meditative burnt-paper works, Philippe Pastor’s environmentally charged abstractions, bold figurative paintings by Jordan Watson and works by Samuel Olayombo, Raghav Babbar, Murray Clarke and Richard Hudson. “We have received overwhelmingly positive feedback from visitors to our booth so far,” di Robilant confirmed.
Also debuting at Abu Dhabi Art, Ars Belga presents a refined cultural triangulation, bringing together seminal figures from movements such as Korean Dansaekhwa and Brazilian modernism. “Abu Dhabi Art has reached an impressive level of maturity and now stands as a natural bridge between the Asian, Middle Eastern, and Western art scenes,” the gallery noted, emphasizing that few international fairs so clearly embody this cross-cultural convergence.
Curation beyond the booths
Notably, Abu Dhabi Art not only presents curated focus sections but also curated exhibitions that extend beyond the booth format. Among these, curator and artist Brook Andrew’s “Gateway” explores migration not merely as movement but as a poetic and political force. Migration, in all its forms, shapes life, cultures and the universe itself, encompassing the movement of water, seeds, animals, people and their visible and invisible histories. These migrations carry profound emotional and cultural resonance, serving as metaphors for change, survival and transformation.
Andrew frames migration as a collective evolving memory that invites audiences to reflect on their place in the world through performance, storytelling and diverse cultural expressions. The exhibition celebrates the dual power of migration to preserve identity and catalyze transformation, offering moments that are simultaneously challenging, healing and celebratory.
The presentation also features Sa Tahanan Co., a Filipino collective of six artists who have been examining the complexities of diaspora through cross-disciplinary practices and rituals. In one of the installations, recipes passed down from mothers, accompanied by notes that evolved into journals of diasporic grief, form a participatory and time-based installation that combines edible and non-edible elements drawn from both Filipino and local ingredients. Their work inhabits the “in-between,” preserving memory and identity while negotiating displacement and moving between personal and collective pain, care and healing.
Another special curated section is dedicated to this year’s edition of “Beyond Emerging Artists,” the fair’s annual programme, which commissions new work by up-and-coming U.A.E.-based artists. Focusing on the intersection of ecological, historical and symbolic narratives, this year’s presentation features three artists who will subsequently exhibit at the Saatchi Gallery in London and in Hong Kong. Among them, Maktoum Al Maktoum reimagines fossils as contemporary sculptures, transforming skeletal remains into reflections on temporality, memory and human intervention in the natural world. In a similar vein, Alla Abdunabi reconstructs the Roman vivarium of Apollonia (Susa) using insulating firebricks, transforming the submerged coastal pool into a kiln for transformation. In “Water and Sprout,” she presents a fish-shaped downspout holding a human head, inside which rests a fish tail, drawing on allegories from Egypt’s New Kingdom to medieval European gargoyles to explore the persistent mediation of histories of dominance, protection and transformation.
<img decoding="async" class="size-full-width wp-image-1601304" src="https://observer.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2025/11/MA2_1352.jpg?quality=80&w=970" alt="A man in traditional Emirati dress stands alone in a dark teal exhibition room reading wall text near suspended sculptural forms draped in burlap-like material." width="970" height="647" data-caption='The Beyond Emerging Artists section was curated by internationally renowned artist Issam Kourbaj, who selected works by Alla Abdunabi, Salmah Almansoori and Maktoum Marwan Al Maktoum. <span class=”media-credit”>Abu Dhabi Art</span>’>
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