Next Wave - Berlin Art week

Artworks united by an interest in the human experience.

Nine emerging Saudi creatives, eight artists and a writer converge and embrace ways in which they both challenge and defy molds during the 11th edition of Berlin Art Week. “Next Wave,” done in collaboration with Berlin Art Institute, celebrates the long tradition of cultural bridging by providing a framework for research and experiential learning, cooperation, and creation. 

The exhibition describes the convergence of the creatives within the exhibition space. Drawing on the meaning of the new wave, and its associations with the avant-garde and the frontier, the exhibition embraces ways in which artists both challenge and defy molds that are explored within the format of the showcase. The show calls for reflection on the ways in which these two dimensions are inherent to and intertwined with their art practices. 

The work selected is the culmination of each creative’s intensive artistic development, showcasing the results of Misk Art Institute’s dynamic studio-based residency programs the Masaha Residency, a Misk Art Institute in-house program and the BAI Residency Program by the Berlin Art Institute that stress the significance of critical practice and research. Bringing together contemporary art projects from a new generation of Saudi artists, these works highlight new forms, material, and artistic languages while tackling themes around environmentalism, domestic labor, technological cynicism, determinism, navigating memory, and confronting urban spaces. 

While working in a variety of mediums, their artworks are all united by an interest in the human experience, interrogating and challenging its limits and definitions. Individual projects are placed within a larger context of contemporary ideas and discourses joining them together as a unified cohort at a moment of transformation. 

The exhibition will be accompanied by two days of programing.

Programing:

Panel Discussion 
September 15, 2022 
6:00 – 8:00 p.m. 

Residents will share and discuss their different experiences of being a part of Misk Art Institute’s residency programs and the Berlin Art Institute’s BAI Residency Program. They will discuss the role of art as a cultural bridge. 

Majlis – Networking Session 
September 16, 2022 
6:00 – 8:00 p.m. 

Misk Art Institute invites audiences for networking opportunities with the exhibiting artists featuring oud music and Saudi coffee.