Ithra Art Prize winning artwork ON (عن) by Iraqi-Finnish artist Adel Abidin unveiled in Ithra’s Great Hall
On 13 September, 2023 the King Abdulaziz Center for World Culture (Ithra) unveiled the winning artwork of the 5th Ithra Art Prize, ON (عن) by Iraqi-Finnish artist Adel Abidin, selected from over 10,000 submissions by an esteemed jury of international academics, gallerists, curators and artists. The repeated stamping of the word ‘ON’ in Arabic script (عن), connoting the oral tradition of storytelling that is lost from historical records, creates a large-scale wall installation of overlapping visual representations of different, even contradictory, versions of the 869AD Iraqi rebellion, to present an overall abstract work for the viewer to interpret through their own subjective lens.
The Ithra Art Prize awards the winning artist $100,000 in addition to the full funding required to bring their project to fruition, making this the largest art grant in the region. Open to submissions from all Arab countries, the Ithra Art Prize celebrates and propels the growing creative landscape of the Arab region, providing support and a global platform to artists shaping this landscape.