As Art Dubai begins tomorrow, we meet two Emirati artists hoping to attract global attention for their works
As Art Dubai returns this week for its milestone 20th edition, the spotlight once again turns towards the artists shaping the future of the region’s cultural landscape. Bringing together galleries, collectors and institutions from around the world, the fair has long acted as a platform for emerging and established voices from the UAE to reach an increasingly global audience. This year, among those attracting attention are two Emirati artists whose practices reflect the country’s evolving creative identity. Here, we find out more.
Wafa Al Falahi
Hunna Art Gallery will present a solo exhibition by Emirati artist Wafa Al Falahi, showcasing a new body of work created specifically for the fair. Spanning painting, sculpture and drawing, Al Falahi’s evolving practice explores the subconscious through instinctive interactions with material, creating works that feel dreamlike, emotionally charged and deeply personal. Blurring the boundaries between human and animal, memory and imagination, her papier-mâché, pastel, and pigment compositions unfold almost like hallucinatory journals, informed by surrealism, symbolism, and her background in spatial design. Through clay, bioplastics and furniture-making techniques, she builds tactile worlds that sit somewhere between sculpture, craft and emotional landscape.
“Being a part of Art Dubai is a huge honour and a milestone for me personally because it’s my first solo show and my first time presenting work with Hunna Art,” Al Falahi explains. “After many long hours in the studio, I’m truly excited to be showcasing the works I’ve been producing.” Reflecting on the themes behind the exhibition, she describes the pieces as “meditations of the in-between”, using surrealist and hallucinatory imagery of birds and beasts to explore philosophical ideas surrounding existentialism. Together, the works offer a striking reflection on impermanence, instinct and emotional resonance within contemporary Emirati art.
Roudhah Al Mazrouei
Taymour Grahne Projects will present a solo exhibition of new works by Emirati artist Roudhah Al Mazrouei, bringing together a series of landscape paintings rooted in memory, geography and the evolving visual identity of the UAE. Born in Al Ain and based in Abu Dhabi, Al Mazrouei works across painting, public art, film, sculpture and printmaking, with her latest presentation emerging from a deeply personal reflection on the Northern Emirates; the rugged mountains, farmlands and wadis that shaped her childhood. Through quiet yet emotionally charged compositions, the artist explores places often absent from official archives, documenting landscapes whose stories are still largely unwritten within the wider regional art canon.
Reflecting on the significance of participating in the fair’s 20th edition, Al Mazrouei says: “Twenty years of Art Dubai and the conversation about what this region produces is still being written. I find that genuinely exciting, there’s no fixed canon to push against yet, which means the work gets to participate in something still open.” Speaking about the works themselves, she describes them as rooted in specific locations and memories: “A gate at the edge of a farm in Shawka. Wadi Siji after rain. A mountain that doesn’t have an English name.” She continues, “I started painting these places because the archive of them doesn’t exist yet, and twenty years into a fair built on the premise that this region has something to say, I think that absence is worth making visible.”
Art Dubai 2026 is scheduled to take place from 15–17 May 2026 (with VIP previews on 14 May) at Madinat Jumeirah, Jumeirah Beach Road, Dubai.
