Diriyah Art Futures Unveils Inaugural CONTINUUM ’25 Exhibition Featuring Global Emerging Artists

Diriyah Art Futures (DAF), the first centre for New Media Arts in the Middle East and North Africa, has revealed the lineup for CONTINUUM '25. This exhibition celebrates the creative achievements of participants in its inaugural Emerging New Media Artists Programme. Scheduled from September 13 to October 13 in Riyadh, it marks the start of an annual series highlighting innovative voices shaping new media and digital art.

The exhibition features 11 emerging artists from various countries, including Turki AlQahtani and Khaled Makshoush from Saudi Arabia, Salma Aly from Egypt, Samia Dzaïr from Algeria, Aya Abu Ghazaleh from Jordan, Dhia Dhibi from Tunisia, William Brooks from Wales, Junsoo Kim from Korea, Youssef El Idrissi from Morocco, Kyle Donald Marais from South Africa, and Mohamed Al Mubarak from Bahrain.

CONTINUUM '25 showcases significant new works developed during a year-long programme at Diriyah Art Futures. Under the guidance of renowned artists Anna Ridler and Karen Palmer, participants explored new creative expressions through immersive installations, sound and screen-based works, virtual reality, and AI-generated art.

The title CONTINUUM signifies the ever-evolving nature of creative inquiry that defines the Emerging New Media Artists Programme. It represents a space where artistic journeys intersect at themes spanning reality and artificiality, human and machine interaction, as well as organic and synthetic elements.

The exhibition presents a powerful dialogue between personal narratives and collective futures. Conceptual themes include memory, identity, displacement, climate ecologies, ethics, and algorithmic power. These works challenge audiences to consider implications of an increasingly mediated world and explore possibilities for reflection and renewal within it.

The artworks reflect dualities mirrored in their curation. They unfold as an interconnected landscape of technological imagination intertwined with human experience. This approach encourages viewers to engage deeply with both individual stories and broader societal issues.

With inputs from SPA