Barjeel Art Foundation’s First Museum to Open in Sharjah

Sharjah’s Barjeel Art Foundation has broken ground on its first museum, set to launch in January 2028. Founded in 2010 by Sultan Sooud Al Qassemi, the nonprofit organization is dedicated to collecting, preserving, and promoting modern and contemporary Arab art through exhibitions, publications, and loans to international institutions. The project, led by Mohammed Essa of Architecture Corner Consultants and based on a sketch by Al Qassemi, will occupy an approximately 3,800-square-meter site on Sheikh Mohammed Bin Zayed Road, a major highway connecting Sharjah and Dubai. The forthcoming space will present a permanent, thematically-organized display, tracing 20th- and 21st-century artistic practice from the Gulf, the MENA region, and beyond.  

Morad Montazami to Lead 16th Dakar Biennale

French Iranian curator Morad Montazami has been tapped as artistic director of the 16th Dak’Art – Biennale of Contemporary African Art in Dakar, Senegal. Titled “(Anti)Fragility: Arts of Repair and Counter-Shock Strategies,” this year’s edition will explore how conditions of fragility can be reworked into sites of collective resurgence and community-oriented artistic expression. A specialist in global modernism and postcolonial art as well as the former curator of Middle Eastern and North African art at London’s Tate Modern (2014–19), Montazami is also the founder of Zamân Books & Curating, a Paris-based publishing house and research platform dedicated to modern and contemporary African, Arab, and Asian art. His curatorial practice centers on modernist narratives beyond Western canonical art history, with recent co-curated projects including “Arab Presences: Modern Art and Decolonisation, Paris 1908–1988” (2024) at the Musée d’Art Moderne de Paris; and “The Casablanca Art School” which opened in 2023 at Tate St Ives in the UK before traveling to the Sharjah Art Foundation and Frankfurt’s Schirn Kunsthalle the following year. The 16th Dakar Biennale will take place across multiple citywide venues from November 19 to December 19.

Museum for Australian Aboriginal Art to Open in the US

Crown Equipment Corporation, a global material handling company, has announced plans to open the Modern Aboriginal Art Museum in New Bremen, Ohio, in late 2026. Currently under construction, the 2,200-square-meter single-story facility will house one of North America’s largest collections of contemporary Australian Aboriginal art, featuring more than 100 paintings and sculptures in its permanent exhibition, alongside rotating presentations. The enterprise links back to Crown’s six-decade business history in Australia, reflecting the corporation’s mission to nurture cultural education and community engagement in the US. Jim Dicke II, chairman and chief executive office of Crown Equipment, said in a statement that the forthcoming institution “will be a place where visitors can learn more about global cultures and the role art has played in helping to shape our lives.” Nici Cumpston, director of Kluge-Ruhe Aboriginal Art Collection of the University of Virginia, the only other museum in the US dedicated exclusively to Australian Aboriginal art, told Ohio’sThe Daily Standard: “We’re thrilled with the possibilities [of the New Bremen project], and we’re keen to work with people like this across the country. Any connection we have is likely to enrich each of our own collections.”

MMCA Korea and SFMOMA Announce New Partnership

The National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Korea (MMCA) and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) have announced a new partnership, marked by the signing of a memorandum of understanding on April 22 by MMCA director Kim Sunghee and SFMOMA director Christopher Bedford. Framed around intercultural exchange, the agreement outlines plans for joint projects including traveling exhibitions, research, and educational programs aimed at expanding the international reach and accessibility of both institutions’ collections. Timed to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the Sister City relationship between Seoul and San Francisco—an initiative launched in 1976 to foster technology and art exchange—the partnership links the museums to a longer history of civic and cultural ties.

Hari Art Prize Reveals Winners of 2026 Hong Kong Edition

The winners of the 2026 Hong Kong edition of the Hari Art Prize were announced at a ceremony on April 16. Established by Harilela Hotels Limited in collaboration with London-based A Space for Art, the annual award was launched in London in 2022 and expanded to Hong Kong in 2023 to recognize emerging artists from each region. The first prize went to Man Mei To for her abstract sculpture, Curly Breathing I (2025), earning her a HKD 100,000 (USD 12,700) cash award. Based between Hong Kong and London, Man explores the entanglement of bodily experience, personal history, and social change through the conceptual lens of “liquidity.” In a statement, Aron Harilela, CEO and chairman of Harilela Hotels Limited and patron of the prize, remarked that Man’s piece reflects “fragility and resilience amid forces beyond our control” while “speak[ing] to the perpetual flow of life, tracing cycles of transformation, survival, and healing.” The runners-up were Katrina Leigh Mendoza Raimann, recognized for her textile installation Small Stepping (2022), and Ailsa Wong for her inkjet print Lightning (2025). A selection of works by the winners and finalists will be on view at The Hari Hong Kong through October, in an exhibition curated by A Space for Art.