Perrotin Dubai is to present a debut solo exhibition What Remains by American artist Daniel Arsham. Opening October 30, 2025 and on view through January 10, 2026, this exhibition marks the first solo show since the opening of the Perrotin Dubai gallery. What Remains features several new series from Arsham’s extensive practice, including sculpture, painting and drawing and a new sound installation, focusing on themes of cultural memory and the passage of time.
Arsham will transform the gallery into a sonic installation with his latest sculptural series of copper wrapped bonsai tree sculptures. Doubling as functional stereo speakers, these works will play ambient music throughout the exhibition. This new series pays homage to Japanese Zen Buddhist culture and Arsham’s past presentations of sand zen gardens, which he has exhibited around the world at the Lotte Museum, South Korea and the Musée Guimet, France, among others.
Arsham also unveils a new suite of works relating to his recent Labyrinth series. Composed in cast sand, Arsham’s Stairs in a Labyrinth draws influence from artists like M.C. Escher and Renee Magritte’s maze-like works to create a sculptural double portrait. From head-on the work appears as a portrait bust of a sitter, transforming in the profile view into a maze of architectural levels and stairwells. Alongside the sculpture, Arsham presents a still-life painting of another labyrinth bust and a selection of charcoal prepatory drawings. In this series, Arsham beckons viewers to navigate intricate compositions, suggesting an interplay of layers and pathways reminiscent of archeological sites where the past reveals itself in unexpected ways.
Alongside these new series, Arsham expands his decades-long project of “Fictional Archaeology,” where the artist examines objects from the twentieth century that are containers for collective cultural memory. Cast in his signature materials of geologic crystals and pigmented hydrostone, patinated bronze and fiberglass, Arsham presents objects like a Rolling Stone magazine eroded with pink quartz crystals, a NY Yankees hat that appears to be emerging out of the architecture of the wall, and a bronze scaled replica of a 1985 DMC Delorean car – immortalised in the film Back to the Future.
Daniel Arsham has spent over twenty years cultivating an artistic universe that challenges conventional perceptions of time and reality. His works often evoke a sense of nostalgia and imaginative exploration, encouraging viewers to reflect on our collective history and the artifacts that shape our cultural identity. Arsham is pleased to bring these works to Dubai for his first solo show in the UAE.
Press release from Perrotin Dubai
Image: Daniel Arhsam. Members of the Future, Cenote Exploration. 2024. Acrylic on canvas panel. Unframed: 121.9 x 147.3 x 5.7 cm. Framed: 110.5 x 134.6 x 5.7 cm. Photography by Guillaume Ziccarelli. Image courtesy of the artist and Perrotin
