Atteqa Ali

Biography

Atteqa Ali is an educator, curator and art historian whose work focuses on the use of historical references in art to reflect on current social and political events. She is also interested in collaborative and socially engaged art in the exten
ded Middle East.

Ali has organised several exhibitions, including Back to the Future: History and Contemporary Art in the Middle East, North Africa, and South Asia, Twelve Gates Gallery, Philadelphia, US (2017). Among her essays are ‘A Room for All: Communal Experiences as Art in the Middle East and North Africa’, Third Text (2019) and ‘The Rise of Art Institutions in the United Arab Emirates and Its Impact on Contemporary Art in the Extended MENASA Region’ in Karen Exell and Sarina Wakefield, eds, Museums in Arabia: Transnational Practices and Regional Processes (Routledge, 2016). She was editor of Sohbet: The Journal of Contemporary Arts and Culture, Lahore: National College of the Arts (2010–2011), and she has two books in press: Collaborative Art Praxes and Contemporary Art Experiments in the Middle East, North Africa, and South Asia (Palgrave Macmillan) and Play: A Critical Document on Contemporary Pakistani Art (Oxford University Press).

Ali is Assistant Dean of Students and Associate Professor of Art History and Curatorial Practices at Zayed University, Dubai. She received her PhD from the University of Texas at Austin, US (2008).

Born in 1971 in Rawalpindi, Ali currently lives and works in Dubai.

SAF participation:
Artistic Innovation and Collective Practice: Karachi in the 1990s and Beyond (2019