Sharjah Art Foundation hosts the works of leading artists of MENA region

Drawing Time: Duets brings to life an expansive history of drawing through rarely seen works from the Sharjah Art Foundation Collection, which collectively explore the concept of the double or the pair.

Iran Art: 'Drawing Time: Duets' is a research project that explores the expansive range and possibilities of drawing as a historical artistic practice.

Evolving from a close examination of new and historical objects in the Sharjah Art Foundation Collection, the research-based project has assembled artworks on mediums such as paper, wood, sound and video that are examined in relation to contemporary drawing practices deeply rooted in centuries of Afro-Asian and Pacific history. Through choreographed juxtapositions, the works reflect the purpose of line, movement, performance and gesture across multiple forms of media.

^{Image: Hassan Sharif, Days - Months - Years No. 3-A, (2006). Installation view: Drawing Time: Duets, Al Mureijah Art Spaces, Sharjah, 2024. Photo: Motaz Mawid.}

Growing out of this research project, the exhibition Drawing Time: Duets delves into the concept of the double, the pair, the rejoinder. Acts of repetition accumulate through a curated scenography, in which artistic duets—duos who dance and sing together, who, through the right dissonance or imperfect resonance, find themselves in a state of harmony—guide visitors across a century in time.

^{Image 2: Amal Kenawy, Untitled/ Empty Skies - Drawing Emotions, (2004). Installation view: Al Mureijah Art Spaces, Sharjah, 2024. Photo: Motaz Mawid.}

On view are works by 15 intergenerational artists, who conjure maps of colour and texture across pigment and paper, lines and marks on skin and screen, revealed through both animated and restrained movement, gestures that present a composite picture of what drawing is and could be.

^{Image: Eduard Puterbrot, Mountain, 1988 (left) and Kamala Ibrahim Ishag, Portrait, 1969. Installation view: Drawing Time: Duets, Al Mureijah Art Spaces, Sharjah, 2024. Photo: Motaz Mawid.}

Artists: Baya, Mounir Canaan, Kimathi Donkor, Theaster Gates, Helen Khal, Amal Kenawy, Omer Khairy (George Edward), David Kolane, Kamala Ibrahim Ishag, Farideh Lashai, Ibrahim Massouda, Eduard Puterbrot, Claudette Johnson, Hassan Sharif and Ibrahim El-Salahi.

^{Image: Baya, various works, 1947. Installation view: Drawing Time: Duets, Al Mureijah Art Spaces, Sharjah, 2024. Image courtesy of Sharjah Art Foundation. Photo: Motaz Mawid}

Drawing Time: Duets is curated by Dr Omar Kholeif, Director of Collections and Senior Curator, with Souraya Kreidieh, Senior Collections Researcher and Spatial Designer, and Khalid Jauffer, Curatorial Assistant, Sharjah Art Foundation.

^{Claudette Johnson, Standing Figure 2, 2021 (left); and Standing Figure 3, 2021 (right). Sharjah Art Foundation Collection. Photo: Andy Keate}

The exhibition continues until August 4, 2024 at Gallery 4 of Al Mureijah Art Spaces.