brief
ICD Brookfield Place is a luxury property in the heart of Dubai that offers a robust combination of lifestyle and business amenities. Since its inception the property has positioned itself as a premier destination within the city catering to the private and commercial residents of Dubai’s financial district. While its popularity grew, ICD Brookfield Place had the desire to amplify its footprint within the cultural sector with a specific focus on culture within the UAE.
RESPONSE
Curating a UAE-specific exhibition
The project began with conceptualising an exhibition that connected ICD Brookfield Place to the UAE. Deeply rooted within Islamic culture, cartography was chosen as the heart of the exhibition’s curatorial statement. Considering the core of mapping to be associating elements to space, the exhibition sought to build a connection between the body and the land. Titled HAIR MAPPING BODY; BODY MAPPING LAND, the exhibition proposed a map that decodes and reintroduces land through the body, and the body through land.
Connecting intergenerational local artists
Collaborating with Emirati curator Munira Al Sayegh, the project brought together three distinct voices in the UAE’s art scene: Afra Al Dhaheri whose work with mixed media reflects the rapid change taking place in her native Abu Dhabi; Mohamed Ahmed Ibrahim who is an instrumental figure in the growth of the UAE’s cultural heritage spanning back as far as the 1980s; Mohamed Khalid, a Dubai-born artist, whose practice examines the materiality of everyday objects and coaxes out their metaphoric potential.