The Abu Dhabi Festival is organized annually by the Abu Dhabi Music & Arts Foundation (ADMAF), a not-for-profit organization that has been advancing arts, education, culture and creativity in Abu Dhabi since 1996. The Abu Dhabi Festival one of the UAE’s foremost celebrations of art and culture, bringing together the great musicians, performers and artists from the East and West to the capital of the United Arab Emirates. It seeks to reflect the determination of the city to take the lead in cultural understanding.
The Abu Dhabi Festival endeavors to reflect the vision for the future of Abu Dhabi as an international hub for the arts. The vision of the festival is aligned to the vision of Abu Dhabi as a thriving metropolis for creativity and excellence in arts and culture that places art, education and culture at the heart of the UAE. The Festival is a committed advocate of cross cultural understanding and plays an intrinsic role in supporting the artistic renaissance across the Middle East by further pushing the boundaries of creativity and excellence in innovation.
Since its inception, the Abu Dhabi Festival has placed education at its core, building on the vision of the Festival’s Founder and Director H. E. Mrs. Hoda Al Khamis Kanoo to invest in learning opportunities for the next generation. The Festival’s education work provides young people across the seven Emirates with the opportunity to interact with visiting artists and Festival participants. Through its education program, the Festival supports the education and development of UAE young minds as well as tomorrow’s leaders, and enhances their appreciation for the arts and music.
As part of its commitment to education, to the community and to tomorrow’s leaders, the Festival presents the Abu Dhabi Festival Award on an annual basis to participating national university students who excel in the field of performing and visual arts, music, film, literature and communications. More details on the Abu Dhabi Festival and its programming may be found on their website at www.abudhabifestival.ae
ADMAF’s main curator, Ms KARIN ADRIAN VON ROQUES
For the past twenty years, Karin Adrian von Roques’ professional focus has been modern and contemporary art from the Middle East. Upon finishing her studies of Islamic Art in Bonn, Germany, she became interested in modern and contemporary art from Arab countries and pioneered academic exploration and exposure of outstanding artists in this field. She began a series of strategic programs to bring concepts central to the works of contemporary Arab artists to the attention of a broader public by means of museum and gallery exhibitions. Aware that contemporary art from Islamic countries takes place within a wider socio-political context and dialogue, Ms. von Roques has organized and participated in seminars, interviews, publications and auctions throughout the world to generate intercultural dialogue on Arab culture.
Ms. von Roques has been an art advisor and art historian to numerous museums and has worked as a special consultant for Islamic exhibitions such as From Bagdad to Isafahan — Islamic Manuscripts and Miniatures, Musée du Petit Palais, Paris, 1994–95. In 1997 she became the Founding Director of the Hesse Museum in Lugano, Switzerland focusing on programs about ethics and intercultural dialogue. She has curated more than twenty international museum and gallery exhibitions, among them: Written Cosmos — Arabic Calligraphy and Literature throughout the Centuries, Museum of Applied Arts, Frankfurt, Germany, 2004; Languages of the Desert — Contemporary Arab Art from the Gulf States, Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art (Kunstmuseum) Bonn, Germany, 2005 (traveled to the Institut du Monde Arabe, Paris, France, 2006; the Cultural Foundation, Abu Dhabi, UAE, 2007; and Galleria Metropolitana, Barcelona, Spain, 2006); The Present Out of the Past Millennia — Contemporary Art from Egypt, Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art (Kunstmuseum) Bonn, 2007; and The Art of Writing — Contemporary Calligraphy from Three Cultures, Art Forum, Kurhauskolonnaden, Wiesbaden, May 2011.
