Louvre Abu Dhabi and luxury Swiss watchmaking brand Richard Mille have opened the fifth edition of the Louvre Abu Dhabi Art Here exhibition, featuring six contemporary artworks by seven artists shortlisted for the Richard Mille Art Prize. On view until 28 December 2025, the exhibition reaffirms the museum’s commitment to supporting contemporary artistic practice from the region and beyond.
Now in its fifth year, Art Here has become a vital platform for artists to present bold new commissions within the museum’s iconic spaces, engaging audiences from across the world. The initiative strengthens Louvre Abu Dhabi’s role as a catalyst for cultural exchange and discovery, while supporting artistic talent across diverse geographies.
Curated by guest curator Sophie Mayuko Arni, Art Here 2025 invited artists to respond to the theme Shadows, exploring the interplay between light and absence, visibility and concealment, and the layered dimensions of memory, identity, and transformation. Reflecting the richness of regional creativity, this year’s edition welcomed proposals from artists based in the GCC and Japan, along with artists from the MENA region with a GCC connection.
Manuel Rabaté, Director of Louvre Abu Dhabi, said: “Louvre Abu Dhabi is proud to open the fifth edition of Art Here and introduce these remarkable works to the public. Art Here has grown into one of the museum’s most dynamic initiatives, celebrating the diversity of artistic voices from the region and beyond. The six shortlisted works invite visitors not only to see but to experience and interact with contemporary art in new ways. Through the thoughtful curation of Sophie Mayuko Arni, Art Here 2025 deepens our dialogue with artists locally and internationally, and for the first time, Japan, reaffirming our commitment to building bridges of creativity across cultures. Thanks to our collaboration with Richard Mille and thanks to our jury members, we continue to elevate the platform’s reach and resonance within the global art community.”
Tilly Harrison, Managing Director, Richard Mille Middle East, said: "The shortlisted works this year are not only visually striking but intellectually rigorous, engaging with the theme Shadows both visually and emotionally. This level of ambition is what makes the Richard Mille Art Prize a meaningful contribution to contemporary art in the region."
Art Here 2025 reflects a growing curatorial dialogue that spans the Gulf, Japan, and the wider region. As the shortlisted artists present their works, the exhibition pushes the boundaries of regional collaboration and artistic expression, inviting fresh interpretations of shadow, space, and cultural resonance within the universal narrative of Louvre Abu Dhabi.
Dr Guilhem André, Director of Scientific, Curatorial, and Collection Management at Louvre Abu Dhabi, said: “Over its five editions, Art Here has grown into a leading platform that nurtures diversity and cultivates emerging artistic voices, reaffirming Louvre Abu Dhabi’s role as a hub for both regional and international creativity. This year’s exhibition presents works of remarkable depth and detail that, together, capture the vitality of contemporary art today. Art Here 2025 reveals interesting connections between the region and the concepts from around the world, strengthening cross-cultural dialogue and broadening the scope of artistic engagement.”
This year features an artwork by Palestinian architect, artist, and researcher Ahmed Alaqra. Titled ‘I remember a light’, the sculpture reimagines shadows as urban traces, referencing the traditional mashrabiya, the wooden lattice screen used in Middle Eastern and North African architecture. Made of stacked acrylic cubes containing 3D-printed shapes from shadow photographs of Sharjah, the sculpture transforms fleeting encounters of light and architecture into enduring sculptural artifacts.
Also featured is Emirati artist and musician Jumairy’s ‘Echo’, which is an interactive light installation where visitors encounter a still water pond, a single flower, and ambient sound. Reimagining the myth of Echo and Narcissus, the work shifts focus from reflection to presence, using light and shadow to transform absence into intimacy and invite a deeper encounter with memory and the unconscious.
The exhibition also includes Japanese artist Ryoichi Kurokawa’s ‘skadw’, which is an immersive audiovisual installation of light, fog, and sound that transforms shadows into sculptural form. A single beam cuts through shifting mist, creating ever-changing patterns of shadow and resonance. Inspired by the Japanese concept of Ma, the beauty of negative space, intervals and emptiness, the work invites viewers into a meditative environment where absence becomes presence.
Hamra Abbas’ ‘Tree Studies’ is also on display. The installation of 31 stone inlay sculptures is inspired by trees found in Pakistan and in the UAE. These include olive, pomegranate, and cherry. Using her distinctive lapis-on-lapis technique to create shadow-like foliage, the works balance realism and abstraction. The grid installation of work under the dome will evoke the layered shadows of the Al Ain Oasis palm trees.
Japanese artist Rintaro Fuse’s ‘A Sundial for the Night Without End’, which is also on display, is a sculptural sundial conceived for a world after the sun. Formed from polished stainless steel, the work reflects its surroundings while aligning three gnomons to past, present, and future North Stars. Installed beneath the museum’s dome, it transforms cosmic time into a meditation on memory, absence, and the persistence of eternity.
Architectural duo YOKOMAE et BOUAYAD’s choreography of a cloud, dancing shadows is a pavilion of swaying stainless-steel mesh, inspired by traditional Kawachi weaving. Supported by slender columns, the structure creates shifting patterns of shadow and light. Using recycled industrial material, the duo, Takuma Yokomae from Japan and Dr. Ghali Bouayad from Morocco, have created an installation that blends Tokyo and Marrakesh design traditions, offering a poetic space where architecture moves like nature.
Sophie Mayuko Arni, Curator of Louvre Abu Dhabi Art Here 2025, said: “Tender light embraces beauty. Shadows lead to the essence of things. Through this year’s Art Here theme, shortlisted artists connected to the Gulf and Japan have re-examined shadows in thoughtful, detailed, and innovative ways. I am beyond thrilled to unveil these works at the Louvre Abu Dhabi, a museum with a universal mission, at a time when aesthetic contemplation can only remind us of unity in the present moment.”
The finalists for the Richard Mille Art Prize 2025 were selected by a distinguished five-member jury, led by Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan bin Khalifa Al Nahyan, Advisor to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Founder of UAE Unlimited, an art collector, and a board member of the British Museum and Centre Pompidou. Joining him are Dr Guilhem André, Director of the Scientific, Curatorial, and Collections Management at Louvre Abu Dhabi; Maya Allison, founding Executive Director of the Art Galleries and Chief Curator at New York University Abu Dhabi; Art Here 2025 exhibition guest curator Sophie Mayuko Arni, a Swiss Japanese curator and Founding Editor of Global Art Daily; and Yuko Hasegawa, Research Professor at the Graduate School of Management at Kyoto University and former Director of the 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa.
This year edition welcomed over 400 proposals from artists based in the GCC and Japan, along with artists from the MENA region with a GCC connection of which the six artworks were shortlisted. The winner of the Richard Mille Art Prize will be announced in December.
