As the new year unfolds, galleries across the region are opening their doors to exhibitions that reflect on a full range of themes, from memory and displacement to the dialogue between nature, architecture, and the human condition. January 2026 offers a rich itinerary for anyone eager to explore the region’s vibrant contemporary art scene, so here is our top 10 of notable exhibitions to view this month.
1. Marks of Return by Salma Dib
Until 7 January 2026, Aisha Alabbar Gallery is hosting Marks of Return, a solo exhibition by Palestinian artist Salma Dib. She is inspired by the expressive language of street walls in Palestine, transforming surfaces of protest and endurance into layered compositions. Her works speak of loss and resilience, where every trace becomes a vessel of collective memory and lived history.
2. The Shape of Things to Come
Featuring six established artists, this group exhibition at Efie Gallery addresses political upheaval, technological shifts, ecological anxiety, and cultural exchange. Together, the works reaffirm art’s capacity to shape how we read the present and imagine the future. The show will run through 10 January 2026.
3. Domestic Compositions by Kamrooz Aram
Green Art Gallery is holding Domestic Compositions, a solo exhibition by Iranian-American artist Kamrooz Aram, whose practice merges painting, sculpture, and architectural interventions to examine the relationship between ornament and abstraction. His work destabilises Western modernist hierarchies, re-embedding decorative traditions into the contemporary moment. One will be able to view Aram’s art pieces until 10 January 2026.
4. The Fire’s Edge by Ali Kaaf
Open until 10 January 2026, The Fire’s Edge is a solo exhibition by Germany-based artist Ali Kaaf, taking place at Ayyam Gallery. He showcases key pieces from his Rift, Helmet, and Ras Ras series. Fire operates both as a physical process and as a metaphor, quietly erasing, altering, and exposing surfaces, in a reflection on disappearance, endurance, and the shadow cast by drought, extraction, and destruction.
5. Houselessness by Mohammed Joha
Meanwhile, Zawyeh Gallery invites everyone to attend Houselessness, a solo exhibition by Palestinian artist Mohammed Joha. For him, collage becomes an architecture of rupture and repair. Employing pieces of fabric, cardboard, paper, and plastic, he constructs fragile environments that echo fractured lives: works that hold destruction and persistence in a single breath. The show will remain open until 11 January 2026.
6. The Sun Years by Matthew F Fisher
The Sun Years is USA-based painter Matthew F Fisher’s solo show, on view at Taymour Grahne Projects until 12 January 2026. The artist is known for distilling natural phenomena, such as clouds and horizons, into flattened and luminous compositions. Recurrent motifs, including shells, waves, seabirds, and celestial forms, create a contemplative language that turns nature into symbolic, almost meditative geometry.
7. Stories in Thousand Pieces by Parinaz Eleish Gharagozlou
This solo exhibition by Iranian-Egyptian artist and poet Parinaz Eleish Gharagozlou assembles fragments of memory, emotion, laughter, and loss into vivid visual mosaics, exploring how scattered narratives can be re-formed into cohesive, human stories. The show, which is being held at Leila Heller Gallery, will run through 14 January 2026.
8. The Wild Within by Ryan Koopmans & Alice Wexell
Also on display at Leila Heller Gallery until 14 January 2026, this exhibition presents an eponymous series of works by Dutch-Canadian artist Ryan Koopmans and Swedish artist Alice Wexell. In these art pieces, Koopmans and Wexell reimagine abandoned and historic buildings as living ecosystems. The Wild Within examines rebirth and renewal; it reveals how nature gently infiltrates architecture, reclaiming the built world from within.
9. The Importance of Staying Quiet: 2. Lala Rukh II
Part of The importance of staying quiet, Grey Noise’s series of exhibitions, 2. Lala Rukh II explores how acclaimed Pakistani artist Lala Rukh moved toward abstraction. The exhibition, through 17 January 2026, focuses on surface, restraint, and minimal mark-making, completing a two-part inquiry into her quietly radical photographic practice.
10. Past of a Temporal Universe by Ala Younis
Past of a Temporal Universe is a solo show by Kuwaiti artist Ala Younis that spans the last 20 years of her work. She connects political, urban, and popular imaginaries through deep archival research while her projects trace the narrative and physical developments of Arab geographies, weaving personal history into broader social frameworks. On view at NYU Abu Dhabi Art Gallery, the exhibition will welcome all visitors until 18 January 2026.
Additionally, you might be interested in Monochromes by Amy Lincoln and Woven Legacies: Uzbekistan’s Living Heritage.
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