The NYU Abu Dhabi (NYUAD) Art Gallery presents All Manner of Experiments: Legacies of the Baghdad Modern Art Group, will open to the public tomorrow, February 12, and will be on view through June 7. The exhibition is curated by renowned art historian, Senior Investigator at al Mawrid Arab Center for the Study of Art, and faculty at NYU Abu Dhabi, Nada Shabout. This landmark exhibition traces how Iraqi artists forged a modern visual language from Baghdad during a pivotal era of nation building and decolonisation.
Founded in 1951 by artists Jewad Selim (1919–1961) and Shakir Hassan Al Said (1925–2004), the Baghdad Modern Art Group emerged as Iraq grappled with the cultural and political aftermath of colonial rule. Rejecting narrow definitions of “Islamic art,” the Group sought new ways to reflect contemporary life, drawing on abstraction, calligraphy, figuration, and references to Iraq’s ancient civilizations to articulate a distinctly modern and local aesthetic.
Shabout, curator of the exhibition, said: “The Baghdad Modern Art Group understood modernism as a global conversation rather than a Western inheritance. Their work reflects a conscious effort to negotiate heritage, nationhood, and artistic freedom at a critical historical moment. This exhibition brings that story into focus, while also showing how its questions continue to shape artistic practice today.”
Executive Director of the Art Gallery and Chief Curator at NYU Abu Dhabi Maya Allison added: “This exhibition speaks to the core mission of the NYU Abu Dhabi Art Gallery as a university museum: to develop and map crucial moments in art history that have yet to be fully studied. Nada Shabout’s curatorial approach treats the exhibition as a form of investigation and knowledge-production, bringing archives to life and laying the groundwork for future scholarship.”
Bringing together painting, sculpture, works on paper, and extensive archival materials, many previously undocumented, the exhibition spans from the 1950s to the present. It traces how the Baghdad Modern Art Group’s ideas continue to reverberate across generations of Iraqi artists, both within Iraq and throughout the global diaspora, including artists working today.
The exhibition takes its title from the Group’s manifesto, which framed artistic practice as an open-ended process of inquiry. At NYU Abu Dhabi, this ethos aligns with the Art Gallery’s role as a university museum, where exhibitions function as spaces for research, debate, and historical rethinking. A program of public talks and academic engagement will accompany the exhibition, drawing on NYU Abu Dhabi’s cross-disciplinary strengths.
Artists in the exhibition: Faraj Abbo, Sadik Kwaish Alfraji, Himat Mohammad Ali, Rasoul Alwan, Suad al-Attar, Qahtan Awni, Dia al-Azzawi, Bogus Bablanian, Amar Dawod, Ghassan Ghaib, Faiq (Faeq) Hassan, Mohammed Ghani Hikmat, Jabra Ibrahim Jabra, Rand Abdul Jabbar, Fouad Jihad, Saadi Al Kaabi, Ardash Kakafian, Salma Khoury, Hanaa Malallah, Mahmoud Obaidi, Widad al-Orfali, Khalid al-Rahal, Kareem Risan, Miran al-Saadi, Mahmoud Sabri, Naziha Salim, Nazar (Nizar) Salim, Shakir Hassan Al Said, Delair Shaker, Jewad Selim, Lorna Selim, Walid Siti, Ismail Fattah (al-Turk), Madiha Umar, Khalil al-Ward, and Nazar Yahya.
All Manner of Experiments: Legacies of the Baghdad Modern Art Group was originally organized by the Center for Curatorial Studies, Bard College (CCS Bard). The presentation at CCS Bard’s Hessel Museum of Art was curated by Nada Shabout with Tiffany Floyd and Lauren Cornell. Lead support for All Manner of Experiments is provided by the Barjeel Art Foundation (Sharjah, United Arab Emirates), The Ramzi and Saeda Dalloul Art Foundation (DAF) (Beirut, Lebanon), the Farjam Foundation (Dubai, United Arab Emirates), and the Ibrahimi Collection (Amman, Jordan and Baghdad, Iraq). Major support for All Manner of Experiments is provided by The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts and the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation.
Press release from NYU Abu Dhabi (NYUAD) Art Gallery
Image: Ghassan Ghaib. Eternal Return. 2021. Acrylic on canvas. 108 x 222 cm © Ghassan Ghaib
