Louvre Abu Dhabi Reveals the Art Here 2026 Shortlist

Six artists, one dome and a prize that now reaches India

The countdown to one of the UAE's most exciting contemporary art commissions is on. Louvre Abu Dhabi has just revealed the jury and the six shortlisted artists for Art Here 2026 and the Richard Mille Art Prize, and for the first time the line-up stretches beyond the Gulf to include artists from India.

Did you know that Art Here is now in its sixth edition? Launched in 2021 by Louvre Abu Dhabi and the Swiss watchmaker Richard Mille as part of a ten-year commitment, the exhibition invites artists to make ambitious new work for the museum, with one of them taking home the Richard Mille Art Prize, now worth USD 60,000. The first edition was open to Emirati and UAE-based artists, and the prize has since gone to Bahraini-American artist Nasser Alzayani, Iraqi artist Rand Abdul Jabbar, Dubai-based artist Nabla Yahya, Tunisian artist Nicène Kossentini and, last year, Japanese artist Ryoichi Kurokawa.

This year's theme is Confluences. Curated by Kamini Sawhney, the former founding Director of the Museum of Art and Photography (MAP) in Bengaluru, it reflects on how "intertwined histories, cultures and migrations, particularly across the Indian Ocean, continually shape identities, communities and everyday life." The open call, for nationals and residents of the GCC countries and nationals of India, drew more than 300 proposals.

So who made the cut? From the Gulf, there's Saudi artist Ahaad Alamoudi (b. 1991), who is based between Jeddah and London and whose work explores history, representation and how cultural identity is shaped within a rapidly transforming Saudi Arabia. She studied at the Royal College of Art and had a solo exhibition, Sunkissed, at Sharjah Art Foundation earlier this year. She is joined by Emirati artist Almaha Jaralla (b. 1996), a painter working with textile and pigment whose practice centres on the lived textures of the Gulf, and whose work is in the collection of the Barjeel Art Foundation. Dubai-based Malaysian artist and designer Muhammad Shamin Sahrum, an alumnus of Tashkeel's Critical Practice Programme, completes the GCC contingent with work on the visual language of everyday urban life, migration and community.

From India, there's Bengaluru-based Ravikumar Kashi (b. 1968), known for his work with handmade paper and artist's books; Mumbai-based Reena Kallat (b. 1973), whose work on political and social borders has been shown at Tate Modern, MoMA and the Sharjah Biennial; and Vivek Vilasini (b. 1964), a multidisciplinary artist from Kerala working across digital and sculptural media.

The jury is made up of H.H. Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan bin Khalifa Al Nahyan, art collector and patron; Dr Guilhem André, Director of Scientific, Curatorial and Collections Management at Louvre Abu Dhabi; Kamini Sawhney; and Maya Allison, founding Executive Director of the Art Galleries and Chief Curator at New York University Abu Dhabi.

"This year's shortlisted artists represent a remarkable range of approaches, materials and perspectives, each offering a distinctive reflection on the relationships that connect people, places and histories," says Dr Guilhem André. "We look forward to seeing these proposals develop beneath the museum's dome and to creating new opportunities for dialogue and discovery for our visitors."

"The six artists impressed the jury with their willingness to innovate, from fragile assemblage to immersive installation," adds Kamini Sawhney. "Each practice brings distinct perspectives that both stand alone and resonate together."

Interestingly, the decision to open the prize to India is a natural one for a museum on the edge of the Indian Ocean. As André put it when the open call was launched in May, "The ties between the Gulf and India are long-standing and multidimensional, rooted in centuries of exchange, movement, and coexistence across the Indian Ocean world." It also sits neatly alongside the museum's autumn exhibition, Spices and Wonders: Sailing the Indian Ocean, which opens on 14 October. That said, we do hope the wider reach doesn't come at the expense of the Gulf's own emerging artists, who have benefited enormously from the platform since 2021. With three of the six shortlisted artists living and working in the Gulf, it seems they are holding their own.

The winner of the Richard Mille Art Prize will be announced later in the season, and we're eager to see what all six artists bring to the dome.

Art Here 2026: Confluences will be on view beneath the dome at Louvre Abu Dhabi from 11 November 2026 to 28 February 2027.

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