Déjà Vu : An exhibition by Alserkal Avenue
The exhibition is open 25 April 2026 -8 May 2026 between 10AM-10PM at the Venue Concrete, at Dubai Alserkal Avenue.
Déjà vu. A fleeting feeling that one has experienced a situation before. Even though it may last only a few seconds or minutes, the individuals’ reactions to the sensation may linger for some time.
The exhibiton Déjà Vu by Alserkal Avenue is structured around three ideas. The uncanny, which are things that seem familiar but are subtly wrong, the distortion of history and the semantic drift or the loss of meaning in language. Overall, the concept examines the gap between reality and perception, suggesting that what feels known is often fragmented, unreliable, and shaped by shifting memory, media, and context.
A selection of sculptures, paintings, photographic prints, video and mixed media work are carefully curated by Kevin Jones, Nada Raza and Zaina Zaarour in consultation with participating galleries.
Each group of artworks are separated through 2 big walls through the space. In each group the artworks communicate with each other through their placement, color and their content.
As I am passing through the hallway my eyes fixate on the black figures over me. The heads of two dark shadows seem to be stuck in place, peeking out from the realm of a nightmarish dream world. The colorful paintings by Vikram Divecha’s create a refreshing contrast to Sadik Kwaish Alfraji’s dark silhouttes, together they magnetize my eyes.
The colorful paintings of squares are vertically aligned across the wall resembling google search results that had failed to load. The result is an abstraction that hints at a presence of content framed in colorful rectangles, yet to be revealed.
The neon orange rectangle being held by two arm reaching out of the painting “DAY TO DAY” by Lantian Xie is glowing from far away. The paintings leaning against the wall in the background hint of the ongoing studio practice of the painter. Tomorrow is another day to continue of what you did yesterday and so is today.
Above. A ghostly hand is reaching into the image reaching for the bag in front of it. The damaged mirror behind it hints at the presence of people standing behind. Cairo, 1988 from the Egyptian Sequence series by Fouad Elkoury. Below. A close up of hugging hands painted on canvas. Untitled by Abdalla Al Omari.
There are signs of repetition, paintings that feel like a hazy dream, something both familiar and hard to place. Pieces of the past seem to appear, but it’s unclear what is old and what is new. Déjà vu remains like a faint presence, somewhere between the past and present, imagination and reality.