Palestinian Saudi artist Dana Awartani will represent Saudi Arabia at the 2026 Venice Biennale. Her pavilion will be curated by Art Jameel Director Antonia Carver with assistance from Hafsa Alkhudairi.
Avatani has been a regular at international biennials in recent years, winning praise for her substantive interpretations of the Middle East conflict. Her practice draws on Saudi Arabia’s craftsmanship and cultural heritage, and she regularly collaborates with local artisans or displaced craftspeople.
She was born and raised in Jeddah to a Saudi mother and a Palestinian father, and received a BA from Central Saint Martins in London. She subsequently trained in Islamic geometry at the Prince’s School of Traditional Arts and in illuminators in Turkey, where she completed a formal apprenticeship in this centuries-old discipline, which formed the basis for her work.
She has won praise for her substantive interpretations of Middle Eastern conflicts. Her practice draws on Saudi Arabia’s craftsmanship and cultural heritage, often working with local or displaced artisans. Although she received her BA from Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design in London, her work was further influenced by her subsequent training in Islamic geometry and illumination at Prince’s College of Traditional Arts, a discipline that has been passed down for centuries through formal apprenticeships.
The result is an elegant and often elegiac reflection on the material and intangible memories that persist throughout the Middle East and its diaspora, despite the worst intentions of the wider world.
Her recent work responds to the destruction and destruction of heritage sites. At the 2024 Diriyah Contemporary Art Biennale in Saudi Arabia, she presented transparent dyed silks that were delicately torn and then mended. Rewoven seams resemble scarred gunshot wounds, or the terrain of survival.
Her work at the 15th Sharjah Biennale takes a different form: an archive of reconstructed stone sculptures, the originals of which once adorned monuments to those who suffered during the Arab Spring across Syria. This project, When the conflict is settled (2023) was produced in collaboration with Turquoise Mountain, a traditional crafts project based in Jordan that employs and trains Syrian refugees. In this spirit, the recent Biennale of Islamic Art in Diriyah featured standing next to the ruins (2025), Awatani worked with traditional mud brick makers in Saudi Arabia to reconstruct the tile patterns of the Great Mosque of Aleppo, which was damaged during the Syrian Civil War.
The museum’s curatorial team has significant influence in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf region. Carver leads Art Jameel, a philanthropic foundation that manages the Hayy Jameel in Jeddah and the Jameel Art Center in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, two contemporary art institutions that have played an important role in connecting regional artists with international audiences. Alkhudairi promotes contemporary art commissions in AlUla, a desert region in northwest Saudi Arabia that is also the focus of the country’s cultural initiatives, while also working on curatorial and research projects.
“Dana’s work exposes all the textures, meanings and fragility of the organic materials she uses, and then moves from these to the macro of our shared cultural heritage,” Carver told The Art Newspaper”, adding, “In the art world, the creation of contemporary art coincides with the destruction of culture. It was important to represent the sense of collapse between antiquity and the contemporary at the Venice Biennale. “
The Saudi Pavilion is organized by the Visual Arts Council, a department of the Saudi Ministry of Culture. This is the fourth art gallery in Saudi Arabia to be housed in the Armory’s new permanent space.
