Emirati artist, Hassan Sharif (b.1951-2016) is both a visionary and pioneer of experimental practice and conceptual art in the Middle East. Living and working in Dubai, his career began in the late 1970s, after returning from his artistic studies in the UK – a formative experience that unquestionably shaped his creative and cultural output. Sharif became a central figure in the nascent artistic community in the U.A.E, working as a cultural producer and facilitator. His roles as artist, educator, critic and activist helped to shape and support both the individual and collects ive discourse of local talent. His own artistic practice was varied – his approach encompassed performance, installation, drawing, painting and ‘assemblage’.

Sharif’s most recognized body of works are his assemblages which he began in the early 1980s. WEAVE is a prime example, embodying both his philosophical underpinnings and preferred artistic practices. Produced a year before the artist’s death, this large-scale abstract wall hanging, weaves in notions of Duchampian absurdity – notions of ‘meaninglessness’ and of found objects being re-envisioned into something other. In this work, Sharif contrasts the mass-production of factory-made carpets with the irregularities and unevenness of the handmade. However, ‘weaving’ as Sharif called it, spoke to his broader practice of bundling objects and materials together: repetitive gestures that were handmade, functioning to subvert notions of both industrial production as well as learned artistic technique or ‘virtuosity’ – all to maintain a ubiquitous and utilitarian accessibility to viewers. WEAVE also carries within it a socio-political commentary rooted in the rapidly industrialized U.A.E that Sharif found himself in as a young artist, and arguably, continued to work in – with mass production and conspicuous consumption still ever present in a region continuing to experience rapid growth.

Sharif’s entire oeuvre is not only a poignant insight and commentary into a pivotal moment in the growth of the wider GCC region, his fearless ‘conceptual’ artistic practices, embodied aptly in this piece, have become a significant marker in our understanding of the development of a regional artistic narrative. Not dissimilar to Duchamp, Sharif was involved in dismantling certain habits and conventions of aesthetic reception; however, given the context of the sudden burgeoning of an almost nonexistent Emirati contemporary art ecosystem, his vision was perhaps even more boldly avant-garde.

Sharif’s work is held in major public collects ions, such as the Guggenheim, New York; Guggenheim, Abu Dhabi; Ben and Abby Grey Foundation, New York; Centre Pompidou, Paris; Tate Modern, London; Mathaf Arab Museum of Modern, Doha and Sharjah Art Foundation, Sharjah.