World Art Dubai is one of the most popular events during the Dubai art season, providing a platform both to established international and local artists to showcase their talent and connect with art collectors. Check out some of our favorite artists and make sure you pass by their booths on your next visit to WAD.
Dina Khataan, Egypt
Dubbed as “The Queen of Resin”; Dina Khataan is an award-winning Egyptian artist based in Dubai. She is one of the leading artists who master experimental art using fluid mediums and resin in the Middle East. The artist was featured in local and international press and media, such as CNN and others. Winner of the Global Art Award in Innovative art 2018. She sees the process of art creation as an adventurous journey. Dina’s recent work is mostly layered large-scale artworks using epoxy, inks and other mixes. She developed her trademark technique of working with fire and alcohol on metal. Moreover, the artist is creating works of art that represent a marriage of digital art and mixed fluid art using layering techniques. Along with her brother Mohamed Khalil; an interior architect, they founded Moog Studio; an artistic interior design house in Jabel Ali that infuses art in interior applications. The studio will come to life very soon and will have an open-house strategy for all artists and designers across Dubai.
Kristel Bechara, Lebanon
Kristel Bechara, an award-winning contemporary artist from Lebanon is best known for her dynamic patterns and expressive colours. Her artwork demonstrates the revolutionary creation of photographic imagery with oil, acrylic and giclée printmaking mediums to depict emotion. A wife and mother of two, Kristel Bechara is an avid traveller and explores worldwide cities to acquire her inspiration. In her leisure time, she enjoys playing tennis and spending time with her family. Kristel is often inspired by life and joyous moments, which result in the development of new collections that she paints in her Dubai studio and are exhibited regularly
Kristel Bechara is also the first Arab female artist to embrace NFTs and her NFT collections can be seen at most important local exhibitions and fairs like WOW Gallery at WOW Summit Dubai.
Petra Kaltenbach, Germany
LOVE LETTERS Petra Kaltenbach is an artist whose core theme is one of transformation, metaphorically, spiritually and physically. Her recurring motif is the pomegranate fruit, which stands as a symbol of love, wealth, health and divinity across traditions and cultures. Her latest series, NFT_LOVE LETTERS (2022) is a series of visual poems.
They begin life as physical artworks painted and partially printed on mirrored stainless steel and then they take on their digital life with overlaid corresponding videos. The videos are transliterated Arabic terms of endearment such as NUUR AIYNI_the light of my eyes, ALBI_my heart or AZIZATI_my lovely, engaging with the deep romanticism of the Arabic culture, that she places at odds with the more rational thinking of her native German culture. She uses bright colours and a rush of patterns to create these visual love poems, which are a modern day ode to the timeless language of love.
Sonu Sultania, India
Sonu Sultania is an award-winning contemporary artist who specialises in colourful ink paintings. Sonu is a visual storyteller and most of her work revolves around a tale, a moment, a dream or a journey. Having lived in several countries, the artist uses travelling as a great opportunity to explore and delve into many different cultural influences. Sonu also gets her inspiration from her photography and various philosophies which focus on nature, love & community development. Well collected and exhibited, Sonu also received a cultural visa from the Dubai Culture & Arts Authority for her contribution in the fields of art and photography.
Julia Smolenkova, Russia
Julia Smolenkova is an international artist, publisher of two art magazines, galleries owner, PhD in the field of the history of art and architecture, curator of international art projects, festivals, symposiums. In her artworks, connection between the abstract and the real create new space level.Her success has been cemented with great demand from galleries in Europe, USA, Russia, UAE, Julia’s art is regularly purchased by enthusiasts globally. Her original pieces of sculptures and paintings can also be found in public and private collections, around the world as well as in the United Nations collection. Her monumental mosaics adorn the streets of Moscow. Julia is an avid traveler and explores worldwide cities to acquire her inspiration, which result in the development of new collections that are exhibited regularly.
Florian Kriechbaumer, Germany
Florian Kriechbaumer is business executive and photographer originally from Germany, but calling the UAE his home after having lived in Dubai for over 15 years. For even longer than that he’s been lucky enough to develop photography into a passion, creating across different fields such as travel, landscape, portrait, timelapse, astro and more, and in the process seeing his work acquired and published by organizations such as CNN, eSquire, Expedia, The National and others.
Timeblend Dubai is a series of 14 images rooted in the desire to extend the beauty of the medium, sitting at the intersection of art, photography, and technology. In going beyond what a traditional photograph captures – the single fleeting split second that will never appear the same way again – Timeblend Dubai pushes the boundaries by extending this moment into hours and days. Using digital blending techniques to combine photos of the same location taken at different times of the day into a single continuous transition, the project intends to let the viewer’s eye wander through the changes in scenery as day and night flow into each other in ways that are normally not evident to the observer. The photos in this project are the outcome of many months of scouting locations, shooting, editing, re-shooting, re-editing, and finally culminating in a set of fine art limited edition signed prints.
Mohamed Essawy, Egypt
Mohamed is an artist born in Cairo, Egypt, based in Dubai. His eclectic and modern style combines disparate and even interdisciplinary elements with experimental mixed media. His creativity has no limits, which is why it is very difficult to label his work. His pieces are inspired by music, pop art, abstraction, and urban art. The goal of his art is to reach people through the feelings or reflections that his works arouse. From a very young age, Mohamed has been representing his vision of the world through drawing, inspired by his dreams and the beauty that surrounded him. But the artist temporarily hung up the paintbrush after being consumed by a world of social and cultural acceptance, until 2019 when he embraced his first passion. His most recent collection is composed of paintings made with acrylic on handmade Egyptian papyrus that bring abstraction and pop art together once again. The artist creates pieces brimming with energy that integrate the viewer into the scene through the use of bright, saturated colors. They are also imbued with a certain naivety through the cartoonish style of his drawing, accompanied by undulating brushstrokes that set the rhythm.
Deepa Gopal, India
Deepa Gopal is a visual artist-creative writer currently based in Dubai. Winner of 2021 ‘Artgram’ Award at the Orange Flower Awards, she conceptualized and curated her latest, brainchild – an online exhibition of art and poetry, ‘IGNITE-from within the confines-‘ (2020) inviting artists and poets from across the world. Author of the blog, Hues n Shades, she has done her Masters in English Language and Literature. Diversity is her forte as she loves to explore and experiment with various mediums and techniques. Most of her works are “mindscapes” as she calls them, an introspection into the emotional and psychological states. Her protagonists enjoy detachment; creating parallel worlds. Myths, dreams, visions, people and their tales, the emotions and the unbridled feelings kindle her creative juices. She sometimes couples her art with Haiku (Japanese poetic style) or micro-poems.
Fly me to the Moon 
Vast Cosmic Playground
Purva Grover, India
Purva Grover is a best-selling author, international journalist & editor, TEDx Speaker, award-winning playwright & stage director, published poetess, spoken word artist, and creative entrepreneur. She is the founder-editor of The Indian Trumpet, a quarterly digital magazine for Indian expats, and works as the assistant editor with a UAE national daily, and editor, for a magazine for young adults. She is backed with a post-graduate degree in mass communication and literature. She resides in Dubai, UAE.
She actively engages with the creative community of UAE and her book has inspired artists of the She exhibition to explore what it is like to be a woman.
This would be my second time at the show, this time with three of my books, two of which were published during the pandemic, It was the year 2020 and She; alongside my words on canvas.
Yousra Wahba, Egypt
Yousra Wahba is a visual artist born in Egypt and is currently living & working in Dubai. Her specialty is in fluid material producing exclusive artwork that tends to reflect the impression of evoke movement of artwork. Yousra uses liquid material like resin, ink & acrylic to produce vibrant, colorful & fluid artworks that is designed to both express & invoke emotion, influenced by the Ancient Egyptian art of Yousra’s homeland. Yousra has transitioned to sculpture as a new line in her practice. She is testing the limits of her materials, pushing it in a unique way to develop an organic form. Yousra is currently endeavoring a new kind of artwork, making stunning resin sculpture, capturing the eye-catching splendor of a splashing liquid.
