خرج ولم يعد / Sometimes You Have To Go a Long Way to Come Back A Short Distance is a monograph on the pioneering conceptual artist Abdullah Al Saadi, whose prolific body of work encompasses painting, drawing, scrollwork, found-object sculpture, performance, land art, assemblages and installations. This volume celebrates movement and travel as creative methodologies, ritual practices and a way of life for Al Saadi, tracing the reciprocal imprint of the artist on the landscape and the landscape on the artist. From his seasonal migrations and treks through the mountains of the eastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula to excursions as far afield as Brazil, Japan and Antarctica, the book tracks Al Saadi’s peripatetic impulse across a range of overlapping contexts, time-space constellations and bodies of work. Alongside previously unpublished extracts from his sketch books, artist books, daily journals, travel diaries and personal archives, it presents critical and scholarly reflections on his work as well as an interview with the artist and a translated essay about his practice. Positioning Al Saadi as a non-canonical, outsider artist of singular importance, this monograph explores the parallels between his practice and intergenerational rock and boulder art from the Arabian Peninsula. The result of Al Saadi’s unique relationship to Sharjah and longstanding collaboration with the Sharjah Art Foundation, it reflects on the affinities between his artistic approach and intergenerational wisdom as well as land-based practices of the region.
With contributions from Hoor Al Qasimi, Ahmad Makia (eds.), Meitha Al Mazrooei, and Ahmed Rashid Thani
Abdullah Al Saadi (born 1967 in Khorfakkan) is an Emirati artist. As one of the "Pioneer Five" conceptual artists, alongside Mohamed Ahmed Ibrahim, Hassan Sharif, Hussain Sharif, and Mohammed Kazem, he bolstered the UAE contemporary art scene in the 1980s and influenced a generation of artists in the region. He studied English literature at United Arab Emirates University, Al Ain, before studying Japanese painting at Kyoto Seika University in Japan from 1994 to 1996.
Al Saadi's work ranges from painting, drawing and elaborate artists' notebooks to the collection and systematic categorisation of found objects and the invention of new alphabets. A great affinity with nature and rural life informs the artist's practice, which explores local environments as well as the intersections of personal and cultural histories.
In 2021, his work was included in the permanent Public Art Programme of Expo 2020 Dubai. He has also participated in a number of group and solo exhibitions, including Sharjah Biennial 12 and 13 (2015, 2017); Here and Elsewhere, New Museum, New York (2014); Al-Toubay, Sharjah Art Foundation (2014); Emirati Expressions: Realised, Manarat Al Saadiyat, Abu Dhabi (2013); La Biennale di Venezia (2011, 2015); Languages of the Desert, Kunstmuseum Bonn (2005); Bienal de São Paulo (2004); and The Art of the Five from the United Arab Emirates, Ludwig Forum für Internationale Kunst, Aachen (2002).
Edited with Hoor Al Qasimi and Ahmad Makia.
Texts by Hoor Al Qassimi, Ahmad Makia, Ahmed Rashid Thani, Meitha Almazrooei.
Graphic design: Moez Akkari (Bao books).
Monograph
Softcover
360 pages, 180 illustrations
18.5 x 24 cm (7.3 x 9.4 in)
Arabic and English
Co-published by Sharjah Art Foundation and Kaph Books
2024
978-614-8035-67-8