Cultured

Discovering an emerging or lesser-known artist at a mega-fair like Art Basel and Frieze has at times felt like searching for the proverbial needle in a haystack. Established galleries—and the bold-faced (and bankable) names they come to show off—generally take up the lion’s share of real estate, while upstart galleries are confined to the periphery. There’s a reason why DIY dealer-led invitationals have emerged in waves parallel to the global ascent of the major fair players: No one wants their booth to feel like an asterisk to the main event.   

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We spoke to each artist before the fair’s opening to VVIPs on Oct. 20 to see what led them to the Grand Palais.

Asma Belhamar

Age: 37
Based in: Dubai
Showing at: Green Art Gallery, Emergence sector  

Why They’re Worth a Look: Dubai has changed radically since Asma Belhamar was born there in 1988. The artist, who received an MFA in textile design from RISD in 2017 and is a resident at the Delfina Foundation in London, takes the rapid transformation of her hometown as the starting point for her interdisciplinary inquiry into place, progress, and architectural memory. In her solo booth with Green Art Gallery, Belhamar will present ceramic works and drawings that isolate traditional Emirati design motifs and techniques that are becoming obsolete as the city morphs into a 21st-century fever dream, surfacing both their aesthetic and emotional resonances.

When did you first see yourself as an artist?

As a child, I was always drawn to making things with my hands. I like to think of myself back then as a little craftsperson, constantly assembling, experimenting, and finding ways to make things. One of my strongest childhood memories is visiting the studio of a relative who was among the early generation of Emirati artists, working primarily with ceramics. I was around seven years old, and I remember being fascinated by this entire space dedicated to making, filled with clay, colors, and tools. It was perhaps the first time I understood that being an artist could be a way of life. I remember imagining having a studio of my own one day.

What do you make art for, and what do you make art against?

I often choose materials and processes that require slow, repetitive, and sometimes laborious work. Whether through stacking, assembling, or allowing a material to take its own time, I am interested in how time can accumulate within an object, almost as though I am trying to hold a moment still. 

Architecture has become an important language in my practice, perhaps because growing up in Dubai, it was one of the most visible expressions of change around me. Architecture is often used to communicate progress, ambition, and status through scale. But I am interested in bringing these forms back to a more intimate, human scale, where architecture can encounter the body and begin a different kind of conversation.

I don’t necessarily think of my work as being against something. If anything, it offers a gentle resistance to the speed at which we live, build, and move through the world. It is an invitation to slow down and reconnect with our surroundings and with one another.