Salt-Kissed: Vessels Red Sea
Salt-Kissed: Of Vessels That Have Sailed The Red Sea
04.10.2024
Reading 3 min

Salt-Kissed: Of Vessels That Have Sailed The Red Sea is a collective exhibition running at Hayy Jameel until 26 October 2024. Curated by Ahmed Al-Aqra and Abed Alrahman Shabaneh, winners of the Art Jameel Curatorial Open Call, the show uncovers the untold stories of eight ships that once navigated the Red Sea, offering insight into the dynamic relationship between the sea and its environment.

Weaving together archival materials and contemporary artworks, the exhibition traces ancient and modern trade routes, coastal community life, traditional crafts, modern influence, and colonial legacies and their relationship to ecology. Focusing on ships as vessels, the show delves into themes that have shaped the Red Sea’s present and highlights its role in transforming local and global histories. The sea is presented as a living interactive entity capable of rejecting, preserving, or transforming the objects that pass through it. Each journey offers a unique portrayal of the Red Sea, revealing it as a vessel in itself: rich with vivid colours, scents, and sounds.

Shezad Dawood, Acropora Growth System 001, 2024
Shezad Dawood, Acropora Growth System 001, 2024. Composite sand print; thermochromic and fluorescent paint finishes. 220 x 75 x 75 cm. Installation view, Salt-Kissed: Of Vessels That Have Sailed The Red Sea. Hayy Jameel, Jeddah, 2024. Photo: Mohamed Alaskandrani.

The exhibition showcases a variety of works from 13 creatives. For example, on view are pieces by Kuwaiti artist Monira Al Qadiri, who explores the cultural histories of the Gulf region and its petro-culture, and Lebanese-Canadian multidisciplinary artist Nour Bishouty, whose practice examines the production of meaning and history, with a focus on familial and material narratives in relation to place. Also featured in the show is the work of Bahraini artist, composer, and researcher Hasan Hujair, which lies at the intersection of electronic music, ethnomusicology, maritime history, and historiography. Meanwhile, Swiss artist Marie Grismar contributes with her exploration of water and the underwater world, drawing inspiration from water’s complexity and poetry.

Marie Grismar, Beneath the Red Sea, a new Form of Reef
Marie Grismar, Beneath the Red Sea, a new Form of Reef (installation), 2016. Terracota clay. 150 x 80 x 70 cm. Photo: Holger Anlauf.

Other artists participating in the exhibition include multidisciplinary Middle Eastern creative Ruba Al-Sweel, Kurdish-Syrian artist Abdallah Sharw, South African architectural historian and theorist Huda Tayob, Swedish composer and visual artist Carl Michael von Hausswolff, as well as Suhaib Ayoub, Shezad Dawood, Nidhi Mahajan & Moad Musbahi, and Fatima Uzdenova.

To get more information about Salt-Kissed: Of Vessels That Have Sailed The Red Sea, please go to the official web page of the show.

In addition, you might be interested in visiting At the Edge of Land, an exhibition currently on view at Jameel Arts Centre.

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