Jameel Arts Centre, Dubai’s contemporary art institution, has reopened its doors to visitors. Following its temporary closure on March 16, in support of the UAE’s efforts to contain the spread of COVID-19, this decision comes in line with the announcement of Dubai Culture and Arts Authority of reopening museums in Dubai on June 1 in a phased manner.
While Jameel Arts Centre still offers ticketless, free access, under new guidelines visitors are asked to book a two-hour slot in advance of their visit, so as to monitor capacity and ensure a comfortable visit that keeps social distancing and hygiene a top priority. In accordance with the UAE regulations, visitors and staff are required to wear a face mask and have their temperatures checked before entering the center.
Jameel Arts Centre has set new gallery capacities, delineating the maximum number of visitors per room, monitored by security staff. All Jameel Arts Centre spaces are open to the public with the exception of the Jameel Library and the prayer rooms.
Where possible, the center’s current exhibitions have been extended, to allow audiences to experience the works through multiple visits over the coming months.
Art Jameel has launched precise, new exhibitions at this time, offering visitors fresh perspectives and points of discussion.
The newest iterations of the Artist’s Rooms series, from June 10 to Jan. 3, 2021, based on works in the Art Jameel Collection, focuses on three practitioners — Larissa Sansour, Taysir Batniji and Abu Hamdan — taking a particularly innovative and nuanced approach to urgent political debates.
Larissa Sansour represented Denmark at the 58th Venice Biennale with the highly acclaimed In Vitro, an Arabic-language sci-fi film set in Bethlehem during the aftermath of an eco-disaster; her show at Jameel Arts Centre includes the regional premiere of the film — an otherworldly reflection on memory, history, place and identity.
Taysir Batniji explores loss and memory in a series of inkless “drawings” etched onto paper, titled “To My Brother.” The profoundly moving and sensitive work is based on family photos of the Palestinian artist’s brother’s wedding and commemorates his tragic death during the 1987 intifada.
One of the four co-winners of the 2019 Turner Prize, Beirut- and Dubai-based artist Lawrence Abu Hamdan’s Artist’s Room includes an audio-video installation titled “This Whole Time There Were No Landmines.” Comprising mobile phone-recorded footage and audio recordings from 2011, the work documents the “shouting valley” in the Golan Heights, Syria.
