Exhibitions

BRUNEI GALLERY, SOAS, LONDON

12 JANUARY–25 MARCH 2023
STUDY DAY: SAT. 14 JANUARY, 10AM–1PM

This exhibition is about three generations of artists from Iran and the Arab world, from the early pioneers of a vernacular Lettrism movement in the 1960s till now.

Barjeel Art Foundation will host an exhibition entitled Tariqah (Pathway) at Maraya Art Centre on the 21st of February. The exhibition will present a collection of modern and contemporary Arab artworks inspired by Islamic art traditions. The artworks have been selected from the private collection of Sultan Saud Al Qassimi, founder of Barjeel Art Foundation. The exhibition coincides with the celebration of Sharjah as ‘Capital of Islamic Culture 2014′, with pieces on display referencing the ‘pathway’ of translating ephemeral ideas into material forms through art-making.

The exhibition “Between Desert and Sea: A Selection from the Jordan National Gallery of Fine Arts” opened on 24 January 2013, it shows the common background in contemporary visual art between Turkey and the Arab countries that are on the shore of the Mediterranean which includes Algeria, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Palestine, Syria, and Tunisia.

Meem Gallery’s two-part exhibition, Modern Arab Art and Letters in Art, marks the first installment of the gallery’s new curatorial venture Meem Projects. Modern Arab Art will display key works, in a range of media (painting, sculpture, and drawings), by modern ‘pioneer’ artists.

“Reflections from Heaven, Meditations on Earth: Modern Calligraphic Art from the Arab World” an exhibition organized by the Jordan National Gallery of Fine Arts in cooperation with the Municipality of Rome, opened on Wednesday 21 March 2012 at the Mercati di Traiano in Rome by HRH Princess Wijdan Al Hashemi President of the Royal Society of Fine Arts, representing HM Queen Rania Al Abdullah.

Meem Gallery is pleased to announce the opening of an exhibition of the recent work of Ali Omar Ermes this December. Ali Omar, who is internationally renowned for his paintings based on Arabic literature and letterforms, exhibited his work at Meem in 2007 and we are delighted to present his second solo show at the gallery this winter.

East Wing Nine presents EXHIBITIONISM: The Art of Display at The Courtauld Institute of Art, Somerset House, London WC2R 0LR, from 23 January 2010 to July 2011. The exhibition features works by international artists in an eclectic mixture of media. The exhibition is sponsored by Talbot Underwriting Ltd and Whos Jack Ltd. Ali Omar Ermes’ ‘The Sixth Ode’ is exhibited there in the Private Collection for the public to view. 

The Dubai Mall during Ramadan will be the Mont Blanc Calligraphy Exhibition, ‘Letters’, in association with UNICEF. The exhibition supports education programmes worldwide for International Day of Literacy which falls September 8 each year. A calligraphy exhibition supporting the region’s heritage and culture will be on display at the Grand Atrium from September 10 to October 3. In addition, UNICEF will be hosting a calligraphy competition for children and students throughout Dubai.

Phillips de Pury & Company presents an important sample of works by artists from the Middle East and North Africa who are some of the most pioneering Arab and Iranian artists of the Modern era. These artists, represented in this show by early, mid-career or recent works, were all born in the Middle East or North Africa between the years 1880-1945 and are considered the forefathers of the rapidly developing contemporary art scene in the region. This exhibition marks the first time these works have been exhibited in The United Kingdom.

Now you can view Ali Omar Ermes’ art at the Dar Al-Funoon Gallery in Kuwait. This popular exhibition will be held from the 8th until the 25th of March 2008.

The exhibition at the State Hermitage Museum has been organized by the State Hermitage Museum in association with the Triumph Gallery in Moscow, supported by Alisher Usmanov’s charitable organization, Art and Sport. The exhibition presents to the public for the first time forty works by six celebrated artists and calligraphers from the Middle East: Etel Adnan (b. 1925, Beirut, Lebanon), Maliheh Afnan (b. 1935, Haifa, Palestine), Rachid Koraichi (b. 1947, Ain el Beida, Algeria), Nja (Naja) Mahdaoui (b. 1937, Tunis, Tunisia), Ali Omar Ermes (b. 1945, Tripoli, Libya), Mohammed Ehsai (b. 1939, Qazvin, Iran).

A selection of paintings by Ali Omar Ermes, one of the most prominent Arab artists, is being exhibited at the Ghaf Art Gallery in Abu Dhabi. The Spanish Ambassador to the UAE, Manuel Pineiro, who was present at the opening of the exhibition, expressed his deep admiration for the artist’s works, which are a combination of calligraphy, painting, and poetry.

The recent ‘Word into Art’ exhibition at the British Museum was a groundbreaking display of contemporary art from the Modern Middle East and we are pleased to welcome the curator of the exhibition, Dr. Venetia Porter to this week’s City Circle.

Jinass is an exhibition by the international artist Ali Omar Ermes. It is being held at Christie’s of 8 King Street, London, SW1 6QT and is being organised by Art Advisory Associates. The event is supported by The Kanoo Group and is in partnership with Rolls-Royce Motor Cars, Arab British Chamber of Commerce and Cavendish White. An auction is to be held for some of Ali Omar Ermes’s works by Christie’s on the 19th July 2005 in aid of the following charities: Barakat, Al Madad Foundation and MAIC (Medical Aid for Iraqi Children).

The exhibition includes artists from Iraq: Saadi Dawood, Maysaloun Faraj and Rashad Selim; Jordan: Rima Farah and Wijdan; Libya: Ali Omar Ermes; Pakistan: Rasheed Butt; Palestine: Fadwa Bizzari and Syria: Khairat al-Saleh, working in a range of styles and media including painting, graphics, sculpture and ceramics.

Ali Omar Ermes is a globally renowned artist, one of the most gifted contemporary Islamic artists of today and the most collected artist in the Islamic world. He is staging his first one-man-show for a decade in London in Mayfair in October during Islamic Art’s week.

This exhibition, drawn largely from the magnificent collection of the British Museum, London, includes a wide range of inscribed objects in a variety of different materials – ceramics, metalwork, stone, paper, and textiles – from the heartlands of Islam to South East Asia.

“This exhibition features the work of six contemporary African artists and explores the important histories of migration and the negotiations of artistic, cultural, personal, and group identities among African artists who make up the growing and significant diaspora of practicing artists now living in Europe and America. Whatever the reason for relocating, they are renewing and redefining traditions and understanding of African artistry. Featured artists include Kwesi Owusu-Ankomah, Ghana; Ouattara Watts, Cote d’Ivoire; Bright Bimpong, Ghana; Amir I.M. Nour, Sudan; Osi Audu, Nigeria; and Ali Omar Ermes, Libya.”

Spanning the divide between word and form, these artists celebrate the beauty of poetry, religious texts, philosophy, and even words without literal meaning, by embracing styles from the lavishly intricate to the borders of abstraction. Their works articulate distillation of thought, word, and form into the pure expression: the outward gestures of profound revelation.

The exhibition was held at The Prince’s Foundation and organised by The Edward Johnston Foundation in association with the Ditchling Museum, with Ali Omar Ermes’ artwork featuring in this exhibition. It includes “work by twenty of today’s most innovative lettering artists. It stretches the boundaries of calligraphy today in ways which are both visually stunning and immensely thought-provoking.”

This exhibition draws together six contemporary artists from six different parts of the African disapora, Osman Waquilla (Sudan), Ahmed Mustafa (Egypt), Ali Omar Ermes (Libya), Rachid Koraichi (Algeria), Nja Mahdaoui (Tunisia) and Mhdi Qotbi (Morocco); each artist uses Islamic calligraphy as a source of creative expression.