The curatorial programme for the first Frieze Abu Dhabi is the subject here, led by the fair's new Artist Award. Commissions, exhibitions, talks and ticketing are covered rather than the exhibitor list, and the Tabari link runs through Frieze Sculpture, where Zeinab AlHashemi is one of four artists sited along the coast.
Dala Nasser, born in Tyre in 1990 and working between Beirut and London, takes the inaugural Frieze Abu Dhabi Artist Award, selected by the curator and art historian Nabila Abdel Nabi. Her commission Qubbat Duris borrows its name from a thirteenth-century monument in the Bekaa Valley and occupies the fair's atrium: a timber framework hung with paintings on textile and charcoal rubbings worked with ash, raw clay and terracotta. In Dialogue, a new annual exhibition curated by Dirwaza Curatorial Lab with Hessa Al Nuaimi and Dania Al Tamimi, pairs Mohammed Kazem with Alia Zaal under the title At Another Meeting Point. Frieze Sculpture Abu Dhabi runs at Mamsha Beach from 16 November to 16 December with Aldar as partner, showing AlHashemi's The Nut and Bolt beside works by Mohamed Ahmed Ibrahim, Imran Qureshi and Kamran Samimi. An invitation-only preview opens the fair on 19 November, with public days from 20 to 22 November.
Mamsha Beach gives Zeinab AlHashemi, who shows with Tabari in Dubai, a month-long public commission that opens before the fair and stays up long after its four days.
