Dubai exhibition reimagines identity through African contemporary art
Four artists explore memory, belonging and diaspora in an exhibition blending abstraction and figurative painting at Efie Gallery
DUBAI, UAE (MNTV) — A new exhibition at Dubai’s Efie Gallery is bringing together four contemporary artists of African descent whose works examine identity, memory and belonging through a fusion of abstraction and figurative art.
Titled In Abstracto, In Concreto: On Memory and Presence, the exhibition features paintings and works on paper by Nigerian-American artist Luke Agada, Cameroonian artist Ludovic Nkoth, Gabonese artist Naïla Opiangah and British-Nigerian artist Tunji Adeniyi-Jones.
Curated by Brice Arsène Yonkeu, the exhibition runs until September 17 at the gallery in Alserkal Avenue, reported The National News.
The collection explores how personal history, cultural inheritance and the experience of diaspora shape artistic expression.
Rather than presenting clear distinctions between abstraction and realism, the featured works invite viewers to interpret fragmented figures, layered compositions and symbolic imagery through their own perspectives.
Agada’s paintings draw on the idea of a “third space” — where identities and histories overlap — reflecting the complexities of living between cultures.
Nkoth’s figurative scenes, meanwhile, use subtle visual ambiguity to highlight shared human experiences that transcend social and economic differences.
Opiangah presents faceless, interconnected human forms arranged in architectural compositions that examine memory, resilience and transformation, while Adeniyi-Jones incorporates vivid colours and imagery inspired by Yoruba mythology to create dreamlike scenes that gradually reveal human figures.
Curator Brice Arsène Yonkeu said the exhibition encourages audiences to look beyond conventional representations of the human body and consider how history, imagination and inherited experiences shape identity.
The artworks, he said, challenge viewers to move past simplistic interpretations and engage with the complexity of contemporary African artistic expression.
Efie Gallery said the exhibition examines three interconnected themes — memory and inheritance, myth and imagination, and presence and care — using painting as a medium to explore how personal and collective histories continue to influence the present.
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