Abu Dhabi: The second annual Manar Abu Dhabi public light art exhibition, organised by the Department of Culture and Tourism – Abu Dhabi (DCT Abu Dhabi), featured striking light installations displayed in diverse locations throughout the capital, including islands, mangroves, and natural landscapes of Abu Dhabi.

The spectacle began on November 14, and featured 15 Emirati and international artists and collectives from 10 countries, with 22 site-specific light sculptures, projections, and immersive installations placed across Abu Dhabi's diverse natural and urban landscapes.

This second edition of Manar Abu Dhabi was curated by Khai Hori, Artistic Director, and co-curated by Alia Zaal Lootah (Curator), Munira Al Sayegh (Curator), and Mariam Alshehhi (Assistant Curator).

The exhibit's main attraction is Jubail Island, the place that hosts much of the light art installations, though Al Ain city also hosts a number of other installations as well.

Under the theme of“The Light Compass,” Jubail Island, with its assemblage of light art, shimmered like a jewel set upon the water.

Artworks by Shaikha Al Mazrou, Iregular, Ezequiel Pini (a.k.a. Six N. Five), Encor Studio, DRIFT, Pamela Tan, Lachlan Turczan, Christian Brinkmann and Kirsten Berg helped transform the island into a radiant sentinel, in homage to the role light sources played in the ancestral legacy of the people of the Gulf region.

This legacy is seamlessly weaved into not only the artworks, but the trek from one installation to the other.

DRIFT, Whispers, 2025. Manar Abu Dhabi 2025. Image courtesy of Department of Culture and Tourism Abu Dhabi & Public Art Abu Dhabi

Curator Alia Zaal Lootah had pointed out that the artwork's relation to its environment and its place was something that was particularly studied in the leading up to the exhibition.

Shaikha Al Mazrou's“Contingent Object,” a pool of water, salt, and glowing light that is located a long way away from the rest of the installations, feels like coming upon a dropped celestial object after a long walk among the mangroves, accompanied on this journey only by the chirping crickets sometimes cutting through the surrounding quiet.

Zaal Lootah added that technical aspects such as the artwork's ability to withstand the elements, and the audience's ability to clearly receive the artwork visually and sonically, were also very vital in setting the standards through which they choose the art to be displayed.

Jubail Island possesses a quality of thinning out all noise from the nearby motorways, making the experience much more immersive, and the acoustic cues that accompany some of these art pieces, such as Whisper by DRIFT or Alcove Ltd by Encor Studio, much more effective.

Curator Munira Al Sayegh told The Peninsula that Manar Abu Dhabi's core purpose is to use public art to inspire visitors. She hopes the exhibition prompts a deeper inquisitiveness about the art, the viewer's place in the world, and their active relation to the artwork.

“For me personally my goal is for the viewers to leave having felt like they were a part of something,” she said.

Speaking to The Peninsula, Studio DRIFT's Lonneke Gordijn said the inspiration behind their installation“Whisper” was“a feeling that we are longing for” that resided inside all people.

“We have seen that it is a global feeling. A lot of people miss connection and feeling actually at peace, so that is the basis,” she said.

The piece consists of a group of metal rods that swing in a pendulum motion, each containing luminescent strands of fibre on top of them, planted in a formation that makes them resemble a glowing wheat field.

One of the main components of the piece is wind, as when it blows the rods sway and dance and the glowing fibres on top dim and brighten up with each movement. A minimal piano piece plays from speakers placed on both ends of the field of light.

KAWS_ HOLIDAY Abu Dhabi, 2025. Manar Abu Dhabi 2025. Photo courtesy of AllRightsReserved Ltd (1)

Outside Jubail Island

At Souq Al Mina, a gigantic installation by American artist KAWS, featuring one of his more well-known figures, COMPANION, can be seen holding the moon while reclined at the edge of the promenade. At night, COMPANION's moon glows in tandem with the real one.

AllRightsReserved, the team responsible for installing many of the American artist's works all over the globe, told The Peninsula that the presentation is currently the only active one next to the KAWS HOLIDAY: San Francisco.

The work process that goes into erecting such huge pieces“requires extensive preparation, often taking more than one year from initial planning to final execution,” AllRightsReserved told The Peninsula.

“Our team spends considerable time studying each site, observing how the artwork can best integrate with and complement its surroundings. Every technical and environmental detail is carefully refined to ensure the work resonates with both the location and its audience.”

Public art installations around Abu Dhabi are plenty, some situated along the corniche, some like Tarik Kiwanson's“Nest” are placed in a small corridor between two tall buildings, while others like Christopher Joshua Benton's collaborative“Where Lies My Carpet Is Thy Home” are located at centre of a carpet souq.

For his piece, Benton elected to weave a big carpet that with designs of apples, mountains, people, rivers, livestock, kites, and other items that paint scenes from Afghanistan, Pakistan and India.

The project was done in collaboration with the local carpet merchants in the area, who, according to curator Carmen Hassan, had also been able to produce and sell merchandise with designs similar to those on Benton's project.

Hassan explained to The Peninsula that the artist's choice of the Nintendo NES-like 8-bit video game art style for the carpet patterns was due to his belief that“carpet makers were the original programmers.”

Manar Abu Dhabi's extension is in Al Ain, where the installations share a a place with the traditional Emirati houses, blending modernity and cultural identity.

Photo by Ivan Erofeev

Inside Abu Dhabi Art Fair 2025

The annual Abu Dhabi Art fair, which takes place every November, hosts a number of local and international galleries offering a plethora of artworks shown, with over 150 participants.

It is a major cultural event that draws both local and international crowds during its run in November.

This year's edition boasted an in-focus showcasing art from the Gulf region, Nigeria, Turkiye, and collector's items. There are also modern and contemporary-dedicated sections, as well as booths for special projects.

The corridors of the Abu Dhabi Art fair are a long, stretching tapestry of paintings, sculptures, embroidery.

Michele di Robilant, representing Robilant+Voena art gallery, told The Peninsula that they were“very happy to see how well-received our debut presentation at the fair has been.”

The Robilant+Voena gallery had already however established their presence in the Gulf region, di Robilant told The Peninsula, with“strong institutional roots in the region prior to our presentation at the [Abu Dhabi] fair, through our longstanding relationships with the Louvre Abu Dhabi and the National Museum in Oman - the latter with whom we presented the very first museum exhibition dedicated to postwar Italian art.”

Di Robilant took The Peninsula on a tour of their gallery, offering looks into a late de Chirico from 1970 titled“Due cavalli in riva al mare (Two horses on the seashore),” a Marino Marini horse sculpture from 1943, and a pink oil work by Lucio Fontana.

The Abu Dhabi Art fair wrapped up on November 23, 2025, while Manar Abu Dhabi will run until January 4, 2026.

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