The Diriyah Biennale Foundation announces Artists for the Contemporary Biennale 2026
Over 65 artists representing more than 37 nations to participate in the third edition of Saudi Arabia’s contemporary art biennale.
The Diriyah Biennale Foundation announces the full list of artists participating in the third edition of the Diriyah Contemporary Art Biennale, opening to the public on January 30, 2026, in Diriyah, northwest of Riyadh. Led by Artistic Directors Nora Razian and Sabih Ahmed, the 2026 edition is titled “في الحِلّ والترحال” / In Interludes and Transitions.
Taking place in JAX District, a burgeoning creative district in Diriyah, close to At-Turaif—the UNESCO World Heritage Site that served as the birthplace of the First Saudi State—the Biennale takes as its starting point the movements, migrations, and transformations that continue to connect the Arab region with the wider world. More than 22 new commissions will be presented across the exhibition, featuring artists, musicians, filmmakers, architects, and writers whose work amplifies continuity, resilience, and collective imagination in times of uncertainty.
Titled “في الحِلّ والترحال” / In Interludes and Transitions, the Diriyah Contemporary Art Biennale 2026 considers the world as a multitude of processions. The Biennale’s title draws from a colloquial phrase invoking the cycles of encampments and journeys among nomadic communities in the Arabian Peninsula—evoking connection and continuity within a state of constant flux. The Biennale proposes to rethink the world in intense motion, through processions that entangle humans with planetary, multi-species, spiritual, and technological currents.
Located in the historic site of Diriyah, the third edition takes as its point of departure the movements, migrations, and transformations that continue to connect the Arab region with the world—bringing together practices committed to vibrant imaginations of world-making, forged through the social and ecological upheavals that mark the first two decades of this century. Co-Artistic Directors Nora Razian and Sabih Ahmed claim, “Processions have produced relations and forms in this region. The movement of winds and the flow of trade, migration, and exile are carriers of stories, songs, and languages, producing rhythms and poetic meters such as the rajaz (رَجَز). Thinking of the world in procession—a braiding of movements that commemorate and celebrate—allows an understanding of cultural forms through exchange and transmissions; itineraries of travel, intersections, and mutations; and retelling of fragments of exiled stories that have persisted through bodies, materials, rhythms, and cadences.”
Artists included in the exhibition are: Pacita Abad, Pio Abad, Rand Abdul Jabbar, Abdullah Miniawy Trio, Etel Adnan, Yussef Agbo-Ola [Olaniyi Studio], Leen Ajlan, Ahaad Alamoudi, Elyas Alavi, Afra Al Dhaheri, Shadia Alem, Mohammad Al-Ghamdi, Mohammed Alhamdan (7amdan), Nouf Al-Harthi, Ramy Alqthami, Abdullah Al Saadi, Ruba Al-Sweel, Lulua Alyahya, Ismaïl Bahri, Taysir Batniji, Dineo Seshee Bopape (Raisibe), Raven Chacon, Ayman Yousry Daydban, Nolan Oswald Dennis, Rohini Devasher, Merve Ertufan, Ivana Franke, Rahima Gambo, Eric Gyamfi, Samia Halaby, Petrit Halilaj, Hazem Harb, Aziz Hazara, Ho Rui An, Alana Hunt, Kamala Ibrahim Ishag, Amaka Jaji, Kayfa ta, Yazan Khalili, Moshekwa Langa, Daniel Lind-Ramos, George Mahashe, Guadalupe Maravilla, Naminapu Maymuru-White, Théo Mercier, Nour Mobarak, Mochu, Nancy Mounir, Hussein Nassereddine, Daniel Otero Torres, Thảo Nguyên Phan, Gala Porras-Kim, Sarker Protick, Abdelkarim Qassem, Raqs Media Collective, K.P. Reji, Faisal Samra, Oscar Santillán, Amina Saoudi Aït Khay, Bogosi Sekhukhuni, Karan Shrestha, Elias Sime, Trương Công Tùng, Rajesh Chaitya Vangad, Wolff Architects, Agustina Woodgate, Müge Yılmaz, and Yu Ji. The Biennale brings together practices committed to vibrant imaginations of world-making, and responds to the profound social and ecological upheavals marking the first decades of this century. With scenography by the Italian design studio Formafantasma, the Biennale is conceived as a choreography in which histories, ancestors, dreams, and premonitions move together through song, stories, dance, and wind.
Main Image: Image of the JAX District, the site of the 2026 Diriyah Contemporary Art Biennale. Courtesy of the Diriyah Biennale Foundation.