The Biennial’s opening week programme, slated from 21 to 24 January, unfolds across four cities: Sharjah, Al Dhaid, Kalba and Khorfakkan. Each day will feature exhibition tours, performances, activations and screenings.

Highlights of the opening week programme include Ângela Ferreira’s intervention into a 1970s cinema—a node upon which various postcolonial geographies, histories and aesthetics converge—asking what happens when architecture travels; Cynthia Zaven’s performance revives a lost tradition of women’s sea songs in the Arab Gulf, some sung by women as an expression of collective grief, others reaffirming the role of women left behind.

Composed of sound-generating sculptures, Christian Salablanca Díaz’s assemblage is rooted in his memories of boat trips with his father along the Sierpe mangrove forest on the Osa Peninsula in Costa Rica. Jessica Ekomane and Ntshepe Tsekere Bopape will both present sonic performances set in the diverse landscapes of Sharjah.

The opening week will conclude with Present Uneven, a film programme curated by Angela Harutyunyan and Tevž Logar, featuring video works that explore how past aspirations and political imaginaries persist, transform and resurface.

Venues

Sharjah: Arts Square, Calligraphy Square, Al Mureijah Square, Photography Gallery, The Flying Saucer, Sharjah Museum of Islamic Civilisation

Al Dhaid: Al Dhaid Art Centre, Arts Palace and Farm

Kalba: Kalba Ice Factory

Khorfakkan: Khorfakkan Hall, Khorfakkan Cinema

March Meeting: 19–21 March 2027

The 18th edition of March Meeting takes place from 19 to 21 March 2027, offering discursive sessions that expand the Biennial’s curatorial concept and artistic inquiries. The programme includes commissioned performances by Biennial participants.

Through his solo multimedia performance, Victor Gama recirculates Augusto Zita N’Gonguenho’s legacy by weaving the anthropologist’s handwritten insights with southern African polyrhythms, electronic music and contemporary compositions. Wendy Morris’s procession travels towards the breakwater at dusk, while singing a lament to the Arabian Gulf—known as the ‘bitter sea’ in some ancient civilisations. Hassan Khan performs his recent songs and hip-hop tracks written in response to our turbulent times. 

During the three-day March Meeting, tours to the Biennial are offered every evening, along with a free bus tour to the central and eastern regions on 18 March 2027.