Sharjah Biennial 16

Surafel Wondimu Abebe uses academia, performance and media as sites of cultural politics from which to interrogate representational practices.

Abed Al Ju’beh was born and educated in the old city of Jerusalem.

Huda Smitshuijzen AbiFarès is the Founding Creative Director of the Khatt Foundation.

Historian, architect and curator Nadi Abusaada studies the foundations of the architectural profession in West Asia, the history of national exhibitions in the modern Arab world, and the intersection between photographic practice and representations of the natural landscape in Palestine.

Mahvish Ahmad is Assistant Professor in Human Rights and Politics at the Department of Sociology, London School of Economics.

Dr Yousef Aidabi is currently the Advisor at the Dr Sultan Al Qasimi Centre for Gulf Studies.

The research of Esra Akcan, professor of architectural theory at Cornell University, foregrounds the intertwined histories of Europe, West Asia and East Africa, offering new ways to understand architecture’s role in global, social and environmental justice.

Hisham Al Madhloum is a founding member of the Emirates Fine Arts Society, Emirates Photography Society and Al Marsam Al Hor studio at the UAE University.

Shaikha Al Mazrou's sculptural experimentations and investigations are expressions of materiality - articulations of tension, the interplay between form and content, as well as an intuitive, keenly felt understanding of materials and their physical properties.

His Excellency the Minister of Culture, Youth and Community Development Abdul Rahman Mohammed bin Nasser Al Owais holds a Bachelor’s degree in Accounting and Information Systems

Abdullah Al Owais is the Chairman of the Department of Culture and Information, Sharjah, and member of the Executive Council of the Emirate of Sharjah.

Sultan Sooud Al Qassemi is the Chairman and Partner of Meem Gallery, as well as the founder of the Barjeel Art Foundation.

Abdullah Al Saadi’s work ranges from painting, drawing and the creation of lengthy artists’ notebooks to the collection and systematic categorisation of found objects and the invention of new alphabets.

Noura Al-Sayeh is an architect currently working at the Ministry of Culture of the Kingdom of Bahrain as Head of Architectural Affairs.

The research interests of Kamran Asdar Ali, professor of anthropology at the University of Texas at Austin, range from gender, sexuality, health and political economy to postcolonialism, labour history, urban studies and popular culture. His work focuses mainly on South Asia and the Middle East, particularly Pakistan and Egypt.