Talk and exhibition tour with curator Anna Arutyunova

Gulf Photo Plus, Al Serkal Avenue

Gulf Photo Plus Curator, Anna Arutyunova led a tour and conversation on the exhibition, Smile, An Anthology By VII Photo.

Smile explores how a seemingly simple action manifests in our world; from the most depressing, violent, dysfunctional and poverty stricken conditions to the warmth and security of joy, affection, love and home. And between those two worlds – of fear and contentment – is the smile we give to the cameras of expression.

VII was created in 2001 by seven of the world’s leading photojournalists. Renowned for the quality of its photography, the group’s collective archive of over 100,000 images is an iconic summary of the defining landmarks of the late Twentieth Century and it continues to grow as the new Millennium develops.

Talk and exhibition tour with curator Lantian Xie

Green Art Gallery, Al Serkal Avenue

The four-number sequence that makes up the exhibition’s name refers variously to: the number of a hotel room, the street address of someone’s house and a year in history, in which Europeans first arrived by sea into two different gulfs. Images, scents, texts, and objects from the exhibition allude to a home in which history has taken place, amidst roofs on fire, a greenhouse filled with tropical plants, an orphaned balcony, scattered threads, a soup made from stone, and chapters pulled from books not yet written.

Creekside Dubai

A boat has many powers: to gather a society in its making, to distribute goods, to carry people and ideas across places that, it seems to us, are more different than ever before.

Filmed on location in Dubai and Sharjah, amongst many other littoral towns in the Western Indian Ocean, From Gulf to Gulf to Gulf is a result of four years of dialogue, friendship and exchange between CAMP and a group of sailors from the Gulf of Kutch. Their travels, and those of co-seafarers from Pakistan and Southern Iran, through the Gulfs show us a world cut into many pieces, not easily bridged by nostalgics or nationalists. Instead, we follow the physical crossings made by these groups of people who make and sail boats, enabling a vital form of sea-trade in the region.

Talk and Exhibition Tour with Rania Matar

East Wing Gallery, Limestone House

This event focused on experiencing and viewing photography. Rania based the talk and interactive tour on her exhibition, ‘Becoming: Girls, Women and Coming of Age’,The talk included an overview of the exhibition, a conversation about her photographic process, and how to understand photography as a form of art. Matar’s photographs focus mostly on women and girls, and explore the universality of how women of all ages navigate different transitional moments in life.