A letter from the founder, Suzy Sikorski
I would’ve never known that after four years of living in the UAE I’d be welcomed with open arms into a diverse family of Emirati artists here.
This includes a close-knit community of creatives, not one individual like the other.
An eclectic group of sculptors, painters, photographers, designers, filmmakers, actors, poets and historians.
Some include those who have sadly left us too soon, and others who are just maturing in their early artistic practice.
In the most endearing of ways, I stumbled upon this niche research in the country, that eventually turned into Mid East Art.
With a bit of timing and luck on my side, in May 2016 I finished my undergrad thesis in New York on three generations of UAE Art History.
Suddenly that September, Hassan Sharif, one of the most important contemporary artists from the UAE passed away.
This was just a few weeks before I embarked on my Fulbright Scholarship in Dubai.
It was a complete shock and blow to my personal goals to meet him — I dedicated the major themes of my thesis to Hassan and his artist collective from the 1980s.
It was a wake up call for me, and it felt almost out of an innate duty for me to record the artists there as soon as possible.
Embarking on a journey with my camera to document a small group of local Emirati artists that October, my main objective was to record and gather as much material as I could.
I amassed hundreds of hours of recordings on my Canon camera, iPhone, voice recorders and complemented this with disheveled scribbles on notepads.
Filming these artists into the hours of the night, sometimes to the early morning during the Ramadan suhoors.
I trekked across the country -- on bus, taxi, metro and foot.
Even losing my tripod on a public bus to Khorfakkan that I luckily found in Union Bus Station!
All in the hopes to try and put the missing puzzle pieces together of a patchwork quilt of creatives practicing since the late 1970s.
Emirates Fine Arts Society, Sharjah, 1984. Originally published in Al Tashkeel 17 (2004). Courtesy of Emirates Fine Art Society
My research opened up unimagined doors into a new life here in Dubai for me.
I felt as if I lived with these artists and their families in their homes.
They welcomed me as their relative.
I’d enter their homes, sometimes with my camera, other times just after work to catch a coffee, that inherently turned into a 5 hour ‘break’ from life.
Just as curious as I was to learn about their stories, the artists and their families were as interested in mine — of that American girl from New York that moved to Dubai.
It was a perfect match, and as diverse as these families were, no meeting was like the other.
Some artists were cooped up in their studio corners, painting away with their cat as their studio assistant.
While others were passing the dinner plate of chicken machdoos while trying to calm their crying grandchild.
I was given books to read, music to listen to; I sang Arabic songs alongside one of their relatives playing the oud instrument in the majlis (Arabic word for ‘gathering place’ almost like a living room).
Dr Mohamed Yousif at American University of Sharjah. Image courtesy of Suzy Sikorski.
One magical memory was on a particularly breezy winter night; I am sitting in an artist’s beautifully enclosed outdoor garden space with her family.
I look up at the stars, I close my eyes and realize where I am, halfway across the world to my home back in New York; and it all seems so natural and comforting.
To feel a sense of belonging is the closest affirmation to the level of work I have set out to do - feeling in many ways as an eternal student that has found her niche.
Now after three years pursuing these dreams with Mid East Art, I can humbly identify my unique and important role to the community: a storyteller.
Abdul Raheem Salem in his studio. Courtesy of Suzy Sikorski.
Storytelling is an integral part of the Middle Eastern culture; in Arabic, ‘Hakawati’ (or ‘Hakawatia’ for a woman) literally means ‘a storyteller’ - a person who is known to attract people with powerful narratives carrying useful anecdotes on both real life situations and folklore.
As historically before technology, people would gather in coffee shops and restaurants to listen, now the favored forum is in blogs and social media.
As a cultural storyteller, my passion involves sharing these stories on the local and regional art history via different platforms - in my engaging Instagram stories, fun blog posts and published articles in regional arts magazines.
My storytelling passion has also encompassed another special hobby I have tacked on since over one year - sunrise photography walks.
You can find me on the streets of Deira and Bur Dubai, or trekking Khorfakkan on Friday morning shoots.
This special activity has connected me to an entire new group of interesting people and historic places to explore that has complemented my art research so well.
Deira along the creek, courtesy of Suzy Sikorski.
In September 2017 I accepted my current job at Christie’s auction house in Dubai as a Junior Specialist in their Modern & Contemporary Middle Eastern Art department.
Through my exciting job, I have expanded my knowledge of modern and contemporary art from the region - researching on strong modern art centers in Baghdad, Beirut, Damascus and Marrakech.
I had the privileged to travel to Beirut, Istanbul, and across the Gulf, to Oman, Bahrain, and Saudi Arabia. All of these trips adding greater context to my overall knowledge of the regional art scene and has allowed me to identify how these techniques and practices found their way into the Gulf artistic scene.
All while learning under a very important mentor and Head of Sale and Specialist of Middle Eastern Art at Christie's--Hala Khayat, who continues to inspire and push me to further my goals in the region.
With some restrategizing in place for Mid East Art this year, the creative juices are flowing and writing gears moving! I am ready to consistently publish my blog posts once per week, that includes artist interviews and local UAE art history anecdotes along with an expansion to include artist’s stories from the greater Middle Eastern Art region.
I dedicate this celebratory moment to someone who has believed in me since first meeting him: Nasser Abdullah.
Nasser under your incredible guidance and support, along with your deep knowledge of the art scene in the UAE, I have learned so much and am continuing to develop into the researcher that I had set out to be since we first met in 2016.
The door is just opening to an incredible lifelong journey of documenting these special communities across the region - along with the most exciting part— covering the peculiarities and inspirations in the lives of these artists.
Thank you to the artists, the researchers, the curators, the filmmakers and photographers far and wide that have made this research possible to present and publish to my readers today.
Stay tuned !