ART DUBAI 2025

In the series of four paintings on view, Agil Abdullayev explores themes of identity, gender, and the complexities of personal and collective experience — subjects they have been investigating since 2019. These works celebrate the physicality of place and its evolving meaning over time—both in subject matter and process. Rooting their practice in deeply personal experiences, Abdullayev constructs intimate narratives that challenge conventional ideas of masculinity and confront the social taboos surrounding alternative expressions of identity in conservative environments. With subjects and locations intentionally left anonymous, the paintings invite viewers to enter their own recollections and projections. Bold colour, fluid forms, and a sense of withheld clarity give space for new dialogues around multifaceted identities, visibility, and the many ways love is remembered and reimagined.

Ramina Saadatkhan’s art is also characterised by a vibrant palette, which is merged with spontaneous creative process, reflecting her passion for experimentation. Taking a dynamic and emotion-driven approach to artmaking, the artist looks at Azerbaijani traditions in a modern, globalised context, creating motifs that dialogue between past and present. Works such as Experiment (2025) and Evening in paradise (2023) blend mythology and opposing energies — feminine and masculine, order and chaos, human and animal, creation and destruction, whilst You smell like flowers (2024) is infused with uninhibited energy.

Exhibiting in Dubai for the first time, Rufana Mamedova draws inspiration from personal experiences and emotions, capturing the internal worlds of her subjects in domestic and intimate settings. Her works, defined by their narrative building and expressive use of mixed media, underpin the complexities of human behaviour and intrigue of happenstance. Her new series of more intimate works A little alarm in a small town (2025) reflect on how even the smallest disturbances can create a ripple through the collective consciousness.

Similarly, the works of Ulviyya Iman direct one’s attention to Azerbaijan’s social structures and cultural norms. In detailed and highly-skilled paintings Iman captures the seeming mundanity of domestic scenes. In her triptych Nargiz Alizade (2025) the artist hones in on a single character going through pivotal and sometimes challenging moments in her daily life, ones that have shaped her reality. The subtle questioning of the values embedded in social norms presented also carries a universal resonance.

Combining a reflection on cultural memory — a shared link to the past — and an emerging social memory shaped by evolving values and generational shifts, Abdullayev, Saadatkhan, Mamedova and Iman explore distinctive visual languages to convey the narratives of today. Drawing on both the art of the past and the new sensibilities of the present, the artists explore questions of place and belonging in a visually compelling and thought-provoking way.