The six-part audio miniseries traces the evolution of visual art in Sharjah and the UAE from the 1960s to the early 1990s.

Sharjah Art Foundation announces the launch of Radial Histories, a six-part audio miniseries exploring lesser-known histories of visual art in Sharjah and the wider UAE from the 1960s to the early 1990s, just before the inception of the Sharjah Biennial in 1993.

Weaving together oral histories, archival recordings and scholarly commentary, the series addresses vital questions: How did a fine arts scene first emerge in Sharjah? What connected artists in the UAE to cultural movements in the Gulf, the wider Arab world and beyond? And how can we rethink modernism in the region before the rise of today’s global contemporary art scene?

At a time when the UAE is a major art hub and the Sharjah Biennial draws audiences from around the world, Radial Histories looks back to an earlier period of exchange and experimentation. It traces the relationships between artists and institutions that developed in relation to broader cultural and political shifts in the mid-to-late twentieth century.

Taking Sharjah as its point of departure, the series follows movements inward and outward, mapping the flow of people and ideas across expanding geographies. What emerges is a layered, cosmopolitan art history shaped as much by local conditions and infrastructural developments as by global ideological currents.

Featuring interviews with pioneering artists, curators, critics and institution-builders, the series brings together lived experience with archival sound and historical analysis. Radial Histories offers a new way of listening to the past—one that deepens our understanding of the present.

All six episodes of Radial Histories are now available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts and other major podcast platforms.