'I AM' exhibition, installation shot of Mother by Maitha Demithan, 2017, scanography, 100 x 80 cm
Janet Rady

Are you one of those who utter a sigh of relief to see January passing or perhaps you are secretly congratulating yourself for keeping your New Year's Resolutions? Whatever your mood and wherever you are, there is likely to be a Contemporary Middle Eastern art event happening somewhere not too far away from you.   
       
Thinking digitally, why not visit the 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair's inaugural edition in Marrakech or 21,39 in Jeddah, both taking place in February.  Continuing to focus on the digital world, this month's Art Matters covers the Art App .  Scroll down to see how the global art world is benefitting from this rapid advancement of technology.  We finish with a video piece on the inspiring work of Lebanese architect Lina Gotmeh , whose creations are refreshingly ecology conscious and infused with energy and light.
       
Lastly, we want thank everyone who so donated so generously to the production of our newsletters and hope you will enjoy this month's edition.  If you have not yet donated and would like to do so, please click on the button at the bottom of the email.

Best wishes from the JRFA Team
EXHIBITIONS
Juan delGado_ Altered Landscapes
JUAN DELGADO: ALTERED LANDSCAPES
6 January to 25 February, 2018
Attenborough Arts Centre, Leicester, UK

Altered Landscapes asks you to navigate, reflect and absorb the experiences and stories of refugees. For this exhibition, delGado travelled to Greece, Macedonia and Calais to film, photograph and record the journeys taken by Syrian refugees. delGado has not filmed these 'invisible' people who proliferate our media, but the places they have passed through. There are traces of their existence, fragmented experiences, fleeting moments and marks left on the land as they pass through to find safety.
Kamrooz Aram
KAMROOZ ARAM
ANCIENT BLUE ORNAMENT
11 January to 1 April, 2018
Atlanta Contemporary, Atlanta, GA, US 

Kamrooz Aram utilizes painting, sculpture, and photography to examine the intersections between ornamental art, which has often been deemed "minor" throughout Western art history, and Modernism with its great phobia of the ornamental. His painterly works transcend the specter of the decorative, blending patterns derived from Persian carpets with geometric patterns common in vernacular modern European architecture.
Traversing the Past_ Adam Golfer_ Diana Matar_ Hrvoje Slovenc
TRAVERSING THE PAST: ADAM GOLFER, DIANA MATAR, HRVOJE SLOVENC
18 January to 1 April, 2018
Museum of Contemporary Photography, Columbia College Chicago, IL, UK

Traversing the Past: Adam Golfer, Diana Matar, Hrvoje Slovenc presents the work of three artists, all of whom trace their family stories to histories of political turmoil, violence, and displacement. In using personal experiences as starting points, the artists transform the autobiographical into a multivalent lens through which to view a subject that cannot be pinned to a single narrative.  Examining family stories originating during World War II, the Qaddafi regime in Libya, and the Croatian War of Independence,  Traversing the Past: Adam Golfer, Diana Matar, Hrvoje Slovenc  is a visual meditation on the complex relationship between personal and political histories.
Dessinez vos desseins
LE 1ER SALON DU DESSIN D'ALGER
DESSINEZ VOS DESSEINS
27 January to 5 March, 2018
MAMA (Musée Public National d'Art Moderne et Contemporain), Algiers, Algeria 

Oublié à l'ombre de la peinture et moins en vogue que la photo, le dessin reste aujourd'hui encore très peu représenté sur la scène de l'art en Algérie en comparaison avec ces médiums. Alors qu'il occupe une place importante dans les programmes des écoles d'art, sur la scène artistique algérienne, il n'apparaît que rarement dans les expositions ; il nous a paru opportun d'organiser un événement qui lui consacre la place qui lui revient dans le paysage artistique et sur la scène locale de l'art d'autant plus que les talents ne manquent pas.
Ali Akbar Sadeghi
ALI AKBAR SADEGHI
A RETROSPECTIVE
28 January to 14 April, 2018
Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art (TMOCA), Tehran, Iran

Celebrating Art and Life of Ali Akbar Sadeghi in occasion of his 80th Birthday.
In the presence of the artist, this exhibition reasserts Sadeghi's art and his immeasurable contribution to the modern and contemporary art & visual culture of Iran encompassing 70 years of his practice as a painter, animator, sculptor and poet.
Sadeghi has created an abundant body of work since 1950s originating from the traditional book illustrations and  Ghahveh-Khaneh  paintings moving towards a modern approach to Iranian art.
Francis Al_s
FRANCIS ALYS · KNOTS'N DUST
31 January to 3 May, 2018
Beirut Art Center, Beirut, Lebanon

Francis Alÿs ' show gathers works, both early and recent, that explore zones of turbulence, the motions at the core and the spread out effects, ranging from the miniscule to the monumental. the show reflects on the notion of turbulence, from instability to total chaos, from meteorological phenomena to geopolitical manifestations, from a simple knot in the hair to an ascending spiral. knots represent links and bonds, as well as resistance and binding. they are the smallest unit in the making of a fabric yet they are its sine qua non mechanic condition: a continuous surface that can bring some opacity, some support for projection, inscription, hiding, drawing and building.
Sa_dane Afif
SAÂDANE AFIF: PAROLES
1 February to 22 April, 2018
WIELS, Contemporary Art Centre, Brussels, Belgium 

Saâdane Afif creates artworks that enable him to involve other people in his artistic practice. He explores the processes of translation and interpretation that are inherent in any encounter with a work of art, as - according to Marcel Duchamp - "it is the beholder who makes the work of art."
Afif employs popular forms of culture, such as music, as a tool to bring people together in a moment of shared creativity. His work takes many forms (performance, objects, sculptures, text, posters...), often using the moment of exhibition as an occasion for production.
The exhibition  Paroles  presents an overview of his work of the past 15 years.
From Barcelona to Abu Dhabi
FROM BARCELONA TO ABU DHABI: WORKS FROM THE MACBA ART COLLECTION IN DIALOGUE WITH THE EMIRATES
2 February to 17 March, 2018
Manarat Al Saadiyat, Abu Dhabi, UAE

An exhibition showcasing highlights from the MACBA collection, one of the most significant in Southern Europe, in dialogue with artworks by 20 Emirati artists. Lead by MACBA's Director, Ferran Barenblit, and in partnership with co-curator Nasser Abdullah, Chairman of the Emirates Fine Arts Society, the exhibition proposes a journey that allows us to think about the role of art in contemporaneity. A place for ideas and emotions, a place to be and to share, where life could be more livable.
Photo _ Design Exposition
PHOTO & DESIGN EXPOSITION |  Part of  MAWAEF MULTIMEDIA ARTS FESTIVAL: ALGERIA EDITION
6 to 25 February, 2018
Rich Mix, London, UK

A photography and design showcase highlighting the visual and thematic influences of identity and belonging that shape the work of three exciting emerging Algerian artists.
Through photography and design, this exposition aims to engage the Algerian diaspora in the UK, as well London's diverse audiences, to explore alternative narratives of Algeria's history and identity. The work has been curated not only to celebrate belonging, but also to confront the burning issues of rising xenophobia towards Subsaharan Africa, racial controversies and lack of ties south of the Sahara.
Exhibition 2_ Huguette Caland
EXHIBITION 2: HUGUETTE CALAND
On view until 18 March, 2018
Institute of Arab and Islamic Art (IAIA), New York, NY, US 

IAIA announces the first institutional survey of Lebanese artist Huguette Caland in New York City. Exhibition 2: Huguette Caland features four decades of her paintings, drawings, caftans, and smocks, including a selection of never-before exhibited drawings and the first caftan Caland created. Born into a cosmopolitan and political family in Beirut in 1931, Caland was the daughter of the first President of the independent Republic of Lebanon, but defied social expectations and moved to Paris in the 1970s to become an artist. This exhibition explores Caland's sustained engagement with lines over the course of her remarkable and diverse career.
Edinburgh Iranian Festival
2018 EDINBURGH IRANIAN FESTIVAL
17 February to 1  March, 2018
Filmhouse Cinema, Edinburgh, Scotland

This year the Edinburgh Iranian Festival has 8 feature films, 1 documentary and for the first time ever a showcase of 14 animations by Iranian directors. 2 film directors have been invited to come and attend post screening Q&As, Ida Panahandeh & Tahmineh Milani. All films will be shown at the Filmhouse Cinema in Edinburgh.
Tony Chakar
AS IN A BEGINNING
TONY CHAKAR
17 February to 22 April, 2018
Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven, The Netherlands

The exhibition includes two major works that have been developed over the past three years and will be shown in Europe for the first time. The first is the installation Of Other Worlds that Are in this One (2014-17) that the museum has recently acquired for its collection. The second work is The Discourse of the Last Things Before the First, 2017.
Tony Chakar lives and works in Beirut. Since 1999 he has developed projects that address the complex social and political histories of his hometown and region.
A Lost Future
A LOST FUTURE
SHEZAD DAWOOD/THE OTOLITH GROUP/MATTI BRAUN
Opening 23 February, 2018
The Rubin Museum of Art, New York, NY, US

In the Otolith Group's transtemporal consideration of modernity in urban India, the narrator questions, "Why do Indian artists produce so little science fiction?" The reply: "Satyajit Ray's film  The Alien would have rendered this question void. It is this emptiness that allows a nostalgia for a lost future."
The three-part exhibition  A Lost Future challenges existing histories and speculative futures across cultures and in Bengal-a culturally rich region divided between present-day India and Bangladesh.
ART MATTERS
WHAT'S INSPIRING THIS MONTH

French-Lebanese architect Lina Ghotmeh interviewed by Sylvie Adigard for French television news show Télématin (French version -  4':54'' )

Tendances - Lina Gotmeh : bâtisseuse du futur

Elle envisage ses projets comme « un dialogue entre l'ancien et l'existant, pour créer quelque chose de nouveau ». C'est ainsi que Lina Gothmeh pense ses projets, et qu'elle a notamment pensé les grands verres du palais de Tokyo, disposé en gradins et propice à un café, comme à des performances.
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