An independent art exhibition exploring the raw and primitive sensations surrounding Halloween opens in the Gallery of Light at Dubai Community Theatre & Art Centre (Ductac) tonight.
The exhibition has been put together by The Gallery of Light’s in-house curator Simon Coates and the locally based artist and curator Ram Nath, and features the work of 12 artists from various backgrounds.
The concept
Titled Hunger, the show explores the base, inner emotion of fear. “With this exhibition, we aim to pose questions concerning existence, morality and being,” explains Nath. “The exhibition will investigate portrayals of fear and psychotic behaviour – whether encouraging viewers to explore their inner psychosis or exposing the normality of psychotic behaviour.”
The artists
From the painted animal skulls that Angie Abbas has called Remains of a Lunatic to the Emirati Jalal Luqman’s somewhat dark and sinister digital paintings, the collection of art in the Gallery of Light is fitting with the season. In one image, Schandmaske by Sasan Saidi, a German-Iranian artist who grew up in Africa and Europe, a thin and wiry figure has an oversized animal head and is almost being weighed down by his apparent mental distress.
Nath says that when selecting the works, quality was the highest priority.
“Addressing psychopathic disorder is not an easy ride,” he says. “It is a very conceptual theme and what you may consider a psychological oddity can be a very much acceptable and common behaviour to others. So we kept it pretty loose and kept the art as long as it reflected an aspect of the overall concept.”
Other artists include Ufuk Kobas, a Turkish artist who often paints portraits and Sumayyah Al Suwaidi, an Emirati digital painter from Abu Dhabi whose works are usually phantasmagorical.
Different media
Coates says that they deliberately chose different media to convey their message and have concentrated on video art with six pieces in this genre featuring in the show.
“I think, with an exhibition like this, video was always going to win through as a medium, largely as it’s very immediate,” he says. “However, we really didn’t want to use work that addressed the exhibition themes in an obvious way, so the video works all contain psychological elements that are drawn down from the overall theme.”
However, they haven’t intentionally tried to scare people. “We’ve tried to avoid clichés so the works on show all contribute in some way or another to a slight feeling of unease.”
Related events
On Friday afternoon, the Dubai-based jewellery designer Lady Mauve will be conducting arm-sweets jewellery workshops in the gallery, among the artwork. The gallery will also host a candlelit yoga session and plans to screen classic thriller and horror films.
A week-long affair
Although the exhibition was initially supposed to be a pop-up only for Halloween, it has now been extended until Tuesday. “The feedback and interest we had has been so strong that we’re going to keep it open for longer,” says Coates. “Also, there’s work in the exhibition that deserves to be on show for longer.”
• Hunger opens tonight at Ductac’s Gallery of Light and runs until Tuesday. For information on the show or workshops call 04 341 4777
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