The Assembly invites you to the annual Jameel Arts Centre Youth Takeover starting Friday May 5 and running until Sunday May 28, 2023.

The Assembly 2022-2023 cohort members are: photographer, filmmaker and writer Auguste Nomeikaite, visual artist Bilal Bashir, artist and architect Farah Ali, artist Hala El Abora, interdisciplinary researcher and artist Karno Dasgupta, multidisciplinary artist Nathaniel Enriquez, artist Ronald Ekore and visual designer Saba Sayfaiee.

The Youth Takeover manifests as a physical takeover of the Jameel Arts Centre space, featuring multiple audiovisual and artwork interventions around the stairs, passageways and gallery spaces 9 and 10. The Takeover is complemented by a rich public programme comprising workshops, talks, performances, walks, a panel discussion and Assembly-guided tours.

This year’s theme, composite, asks “what makes us?”. With 8 original commissions of young artists, the exhibition proposes that the self holds multiple sources and components.

The artworks herein, compositions in their own right, exist in dense and relational dialogue. Their layers stack up over time, like the Earth’s stratas of rock, compressed over millions of years. In coming together, these composite voices meld and negotiate substances, placements, gain new meaning and condense into a shared form of immensity.  The commissioned artists, including Assembly members and UAE-based young artists, are:

• Alla Abdunabi
• Assi Abogado and Nathaniel Enriquez
• Auguste Nomeikaite
• Bilal Bashir and Ali Khaleel
• Dima Abou Zannad and Abdallah El Abora
• Joetto and Mariam Haddad
• Karno Dasgupta
• Raghe Farah

composite, and all the selves herein, remind us of our capacity to change—by growing slowly, inching forward, yet eroding and weathering too.

The 2023 Takeover commissions are presented in conjunction with artwork loans from the Art Jameel Collection. The Art Jameel Collection was a component of the Assembly’s in-house research process, informing the direction and amplification of the exhibition and its themes.

Besides the commissions and collection displays, the 2023 Youth Takeover features public programmes that offer visitors space to nurture and explore their own composite self.

May 5 (opening preview + sound activation): Bait and Switch by Joetto

May 7 (workshop): Theren’t: a musically-guided experiment with Joetto

May 12 (children’s workshop): Safe in a Tin Box with Hala El Abora

May 13 (tour): Assembly-led Youth Takeover 2023 tour

May 13 (potluck meal): Edible Archive with Nathaniel Enriquez and Nadin El Dib

May 14 (workshop): Geocaching in Jameel with Bilal Bashir

May 14 (workshop): Grids of Yesterday & The Shapes of Things to Come with Assi Abogado

May 19 (film screening): ‘You Matter to Me’ by Immaculata Abba

May 20 (reading group):  What’s the Subject? with Karno Dasgupta

May 20 (walk): Other Lives, Without Us – with Kiran Kannan

May 26 (film screening): ‘Glimpses of Now’ by Mohammed Alfaraj

May 27 (tour): Assembly-led Youth Takeover 2023 tour

May 27 (talk): composite Panel Discussion by the Assembly 2022-2023 and programme curator Shama Nair

All events are free and open to the public. Register your space by clicking through the links above.

The Assembly is a yearly talent development programme designed to support young artistic leadership in the UAE. Each year, eight creatives aged 18-24 are selected via a nomination, committee and interview process. The programme includes peer-to-peer information exchange along the development of collaborative projects. It focusses on curatorial practices as a learning exercise, responding to ongoing discourse while accessing Art Jameel’s network and opportunities. This year’s learning programme was designed, curated and facilitated by Shama Nair, independent curator, researcher, cultural projects manager and alumna from the Assembly 2021-22.