Weekend in Review: Gulf Photo Plus And DSS

Dubai has officially come back to life post-Ramadan, and there are now plenty of exciting things happening in the city. This past weekend brought the start of Gulf Photo Plus’ exhibition featuring photos from this year’s Eid al Fitr and the close of the newest addition to Dubai Summer Surprises (DSS), The Big Summer Sale. Additionally, Salsali Private Museum is hosting Hazem Harb’s first solo museum exhibition.

Gulf Photo Plus: Constructing Portraits

Photo Credit: Gulf Photo Plus

Gulf Photo Plus opened its latest exhibition entitled Constructing Portraits over the weekend. The show features photos taken by Gulf Photo Plus volunteers over two days during Eid. The photographers snapped professional portraits of the labor force in Al Quoz and explored the concept of boundaries.

The photos were aimed at surpassing boundaries like nationality, career, and language to demonstrate how all people share commonalities. Gulf Photo Plus also wanted to spread the joy of sitting for professional portraits and giving the portraits as gifts to their subjects. All of the photos at the Gulf Photo Plus show have been paired with interview questions and answers from their subjects.

Photo Credit: Alserkal Avenue

The grand opening for the exhibition was on Friday, and then the exhibition opened to the public on Saturday. It runs through the end of Dubai Summer Surprises on Sept. 5, so there’s still time to get to Gulf Photo Plus and check out the photos.

DSS Summer Sale Ends

Photo Credit: Visit Dubai

Dubai Summer Surprises continues until early September, but the new shopping initiative called The Big Summer Sale wrapped up over the weekend. Some of the world’s most popular brands offered deep discounts during the 10-day shopping extravaganza, and there were plenty of prizes to go around. On Saturday, one lucky person took home a Nissan 370Z, the grand prize from The Big Summer Sale.

This year’s theme for DSS is “45 Days of Summer,” and it runs through Sept. 5. Lots of entertainment and even more shopping deals are on tap throughout DSS, there’s plenty to do.

Hazem Harb at Salsali Private Museum

Photo Credit: Alserkal Avenue

Dubai’s Salsali Private Buseum and Jeddah’s Athr Gallery have teamed up to bring together pieces by Hazem Harb for his first solo museum exhibition. Harb has been hard at work in a variety of artistic mediums, from paint on canvas to installation, collages, sculptures, and drawings. The artist focuses on bare structures and examines power hierarchies and how architecture has historically been used to display power and sometimes end up being oppressive.

The exhibition opened on March 1 and runs through the end of September.