Kaïs Dhifi’s sculptural pieces reflect a balance between control and spontaneity, embracing imperfection, chance, and the history embedded in materials. In this interview Dhifi talks about his latest concept, an inverted Mediterranean.
My interview with Kaïs Dhifi is on Markaz Review, as a feature artist for the Mediterreneans issue.
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In the work of the young Egyptian artist Mariem Abutaleb , the Arabic language and alphabet become a symphony of signs that attempts to remove barriers. “When writing transcends readability, it’s meant to be felt,” says the artist. Her work is a visual demonstration of this idea.
From afar, her work looks as familiar as calligraphy, it’s only by coming close that one realizes she’s not referencing a specific language. And it’s precisely in this fluid approach that her artistic practice lies.
I have interviewed the artist for The Markaz Review.
Here is the link to the interview
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421 contradicts several preconceived ideas the West might hold about the UAE art scene, often associated with large institutions projecting national ambition outward, from the Louvre Abu Dhabi and the forthcoming Guggenheim to the Sharjah Biennial. Taking another approach, 421 operates on a smaller scale, with slower timing and direct relationships with artists.
I visited 421 Art Campus and reported for ArtAsiaPacific.
First, you smell it. Then you see it. The encounter with Afghan artist Malina Suliman’s work at Riga’s annual contemporary art exhibition, Survival Kit 16, is first and foremost olfactory — therefore primal. It enters the body before it enters the intellect.
Malina, who began her practice with street murals and clandestine painting, now constructs environments that behave like living organisms: smelling, staining, ageing, and transforming.
I have interview the artist for The New Arab
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The relationship between Korea and the Gulf countries is longer and more complex than it may seem. These ties have shifted from oil and construction to culture, and the exhibition “Proximities” at Sema, the contemporary art museum of Seoul testifies that.
I saw the exhibition and reviewed it (in Italian) for il Manifesto.
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I wrote a piece for ArtAsiaPacific on the Parisian art fair AsiaNow. What clearly emerges from the fair, is how the economic dynamism of the Middle East is fostering new connections between the Gulf and other thriving art scenes, from Korea to Southeast Asia.
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The art world came to Turkey in September for two high-profile events: Contemporary Istanbul and the 18th Istanbul Biennial. Against a backdrop of political crisis and growing censorship, organisers and artists found creative ways to stay relevant. I wrote the article for Qantara.
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Themes of memory, belonging, and identity are recurring motifs in Traboulsi’s work. Born in 1976, a year after the start of Lebanon’s civil war, her family fled the country in 1983 to the safety of Austria, her mother’s home country. But a longing for Lebanon remained.
“When my family left Beirut, we left by ferry. I watched the city slowly disappear, a thin stretch of buildings retreating on the horizon getting farther and farther across the sea.”
That image stayed with her for 13 years, inspiring the title of her photo series, Beirut, Recurring Dream. “Years later, I took that photo. It’s in my book,” she says. “It was exactly how I remembered it.”
I have interviewed the artist for Hadara.
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Are we watching or being watched? Ali Cherri’s new show in Marseille, on view through the 4th of January 2026, deconstructs the museum from the inside out. I wrote the article for The Markaz Review.
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There are historical characters that are no longer themselves. They become archetypes and symbols for us to project upon. Cleopatra is one such character.
The Mystery of Cleopatra, a newly opened exhibition at the Institut du Monde Arabe in Paris, investigates this very aspect of the Egyptian queen.
Drawing on historical sources that retrace who Cleopatra was, the exhibition examines what she has been made to represent — and how her story might now be told differently.
I interviewed the exhibition’s curator for The New Arab.
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In the art world, fairs often have a meteoric rise and fall in an oversaturated market of competing events. But every so often, one lands with a quiet, deliberate weight, embedding itself in the soil of its context and revitalizing it. Vima in Limassol, Cyprus, is one such project.
Unfolding in a transformed wine warehouse near the sea, VIMA resisted the sterile polish of typical fair venues. Here, the Mediterranean wind mingled with the hum of languages, from Russian to Arabic, Greek, and Turkish, to English.
The fair was founded by three Russians who have established themselves in Cyprus – Edgar Gadzhiev, Lara Kotreleva, and Nadezhda Zinovskaya – all of whom have brought a deep well of curatorial and institutional experience from Central Asia, Eurasia, and beyond.
I have interviewed the three founders for Times of Central Asia.
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Beyond its commercial ambitions, the inaugural edition of VIMA art fair carved out space to consider Cyprus’ complex geopolitical position. I wrote a report on the fair for the Observer.
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Naima Morelli is an arts writer and journalist specialized in contemporary art from Asia-Pacific and the MENA region.
She has written for the Financial Times, Al-Jazeera, The Art Newspaper, ArtAsiaPacific, Internazionale and Il Manifesto, among others, and she is a regular contributor to Plural Art Mag, Middle East Monitor and Middle East Eye as well as writing curatorial texts for galleries.
She is the author of three books on Southeast Asian contemporary art.
Reach out: contact [at] naimamorelli.com
