Efie Gallery Announces 400-Square-Metre Dubai Space at Alserkal Avenue Opening April 2025

Efie Gallery will launch a 400-square-metre venue in Dubai's Alserkal Avenue in April 2025, coinciding with Art Dubai. Directed by co-founder Kwame Mintah, the family-run gallery aims to foster artistic dialogue between Africa, the Middle East, and the global diaspora. Architect Suhaira Yousif redesigned the space to support larger immersive installations and reinforce the gallery's focus on artists of African descent. The new premises feature a ground-floor exhibition area and an expanded Rekord Gallery, a hybrid space housing over 2,000 vinyl and shellac records from the 1940s onward, with rotating exhibitions exploring sound, culture, and history. Opening with María Magdalena Campos-Pons's exhibition I Am Soil. My Tears Are Water, curated by Faridah Folawiyo, the show presents new works examining diaspora, spirituality, and cultural interconnectedness. Inspired by botanicals like hibiscus and sugarcane from Latin America, the Middle East, and Africa, Campos-Pons collaborates with musician Kamaal Malak and reimagines her 2010 sculptural work Sugar/Bittersweet as a site-specific installation with 12 antique African spears sourced from UAE collections. The exhibition runs from 14 April to 24 May 2025. Mintah emphasized that the expansion represents a commitment to pushing boundaries and creating dynamic intersections of art and music.