Hassan Sharif

Hassan Sharif (1951–2016) was an Emirati conceptual artist, writer, and educator whose practice fundamentally shaped the development of experimental and conceptual art in the Gulf region. Based primarily in Dubai, he trained at the Byam Shaw School of Art in London and returned to build an independent artistic vision that he pursued from the late 1970s until his death on 18 September 2016. His work resists easy categorization, moving across painting, object-making, installation, and performance-adjacent modes, while remaining anchored in a rigorous, self-directed inquiry into systems, accumulation, and the nature of artistic labor itself.

Central to Sharif's practice was an engagement with everyday materials — gathered, sorted, and assembled into dense, formally inventive objects and installations. The body of work presented as Objects and Files at Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art in Doha in 2016 offered a sustained look at this dimension of his output, foregrounding the logic of accumulation that ran through decades of his making. His Political Paintings 2008/2009, later presented in a solo exhibition at Alexander Gray Associates in New York in 2022, demonstrated an equally committed engagement with socio-political themes through the medium of painting. In 2017, The Cube and Around was presented at the UAE National Pavilion during the 57th Venice Biennale, marking a significant moment of international recognition and representing his country on one of the art world's most prominent stages.

Sharif's exhibition history spans institutions across the globe. He participated in the 18th Biennale of Sydney in 2012, the 53rd Venice Biennale in 2009, and major group presentations at the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, the New Museum in New York, the Whitechapel Gallery in London, and Malmö Konsthall in Sweden, among many others. Solo exhibitions were mounted at the Sharjah Art Foundation, Sharjah Art Museum, Mathaf, and Galleria Franco Noero in Turin, with ongoing solo presentations at Gallery Isabelle in Dubai and Alexander Gray Associates in New York extending his reach posthumously. His work entered the permanent collections of the Centre Georges Pompidou, Fondation Louis Vuitton, M+ in Hong Kong, Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, Mathaf, Sharjah Art Museum, and the Barjeel Art Foundation. His estate is represented by Gallery Isabelle, Galleria Franco Noero, and gb agency in Paris.