Standing in the centre of a manure-filled roundabout, a lone gardener irrigates the soil.
It may not look much, but the space is one of the most interesting commissions from the 13th edition of the Sharjah Biennial (SB13), which opened earlier this month.
Titled Beej, the Urdu word for seed, the project began as an idea two years ago when Dubai-based artist Vikram Divecha was working with the municipal gardeners of Sharjah on another project where they shared their experiences.
“Almost every gardener working in Sharjah is a farmer from Pakistan,” he says.
“I was speaking to them about their skills and their potential to grow crops. They already work on sites where there is water, soil and facilities, so the only question was how could I open up a relationship between the land they cultivate over here and the land they left behind?” With this in mind, he conceived the Beej Project, which was commissioned by the Sharjah Art Foundation (SAF). He sent two farmers back to their homes in Pakistan and asked them to bring back seeds their families had saved for the next harvest.
Once the designated roundabout in Al Nabaah, Sharjah, is ready, these farmers will plant the seeds and tend to their crops. Eventually, Divecha hopes, they will create a kind of pick-your-own farm.
“I want the gardeners to feel ownership of this project as much as I do or SAF does,” he says, explaining he had no control over what kinds of seeds the farmers brought back.
“The most important thing about this is what this action and gesture means to the gardeners and how much they will take claim of the site in the future. Most of us won’t even be privy to that, but this is where the work will sit.”
Divecha makes use of existing spaces. In the past he rented a warehouse in Alserkal Avenue, Dubai, for use as an import and export hub for commercial businesses. In another project, he persuaded the Roads and Transport Authority in Dubai to uproot bricks from a bus stop and then have workers relay them in whatever fashion they saw fit. With Beej, the metaphors are rich: the seeds represent the farmers themselves who migrated here, settled and grew roots.
It is a theme relevant to most expatriates in the UAE. “There are many metaphorical interpretations, but there are also many actions happening in the real world,” says Divecha. “If you think about it, the roundabout is a site of convening and dispersal, and that is another important part of this. I want to know how the neighbourhood will react over time and also how much validation the people have, who owns the produce and to how the produce and seeds will seep into Sharjah. That is another invisible layer of the work.”
The work is also partly a study of informal economies, he says. “At the moment it is possible to find gaps out here and intervene at those points. Over time, the UAE will become more regulated and this kind of thing may not be possible. I am also interested in that aspect.”
• Tamawuj: Sharjah Biennial 13 runs until June 12. To find out more see www.sharjahart.org
aseaman@thenational.ae
Another way to earn air miles
In addition to the Emirates and Etihad programmes, there is the Air Miles Middle East card, which offers members the ability to choose any airline, has no black-out dates and no restrictions on seat availability. Air Miles is linked up to HSBC credit cards and can also be earned through retail partners such as Spinneys, Sharaf DG and The Toy Store.
An Emirates Dubai-London round-trip ticket costs 180,000 miles on the Air Miles website. But customers earn these ‘miles’ at a much faster rate than airline miles. Adidas offers two air miles per Dh1 spent. Air Miles has partnerships with websites as well, so booking.com and agoda.com offer three miles per Dh1 spent.
“If you use your HSBC credit card when shopping at our partners, you are able to earn Air Miles twice which will mean you can get that flight reward faster and for less spend,” says Paul Lacey, the managing director for Europe, Middle East and India for Aimia, which owns and operates Air Miles Middle East.
The White Lotus: Season three
Creator: Mike White
Starring: Walton Goggins, Jason Isaacs, Natasha Rothwell
Rating: 4.5/5
A MINECRAFT MOVIE
Director: Jared Hess
Starring: Jack Black, Jennifer Coolidge, Jason Momoa
Rating: 3/5
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
In numbers: PKK’s money network in Europe
Germany: PKK collectors typically bring in $18 million in cash a year – amount has trebled since 2010
Revolutionary tax: Investigators say about $2 million a year raised from ‘tax collection’ around Marseille
Extortion: Gunman convicted in 2023 of demanding $10,000 from Kurdish businessman in Stockholm
Drug trade: PKK income claimed by Turkish anti-drugs force in 2024 to be as high as $500 million a year
Denmark: PKK one of two terrorist groups along with Iranian separatists ASMLA to raise “two-digit million amounts”
Contributions: Hundreds of euros expected from typical Kurdish families and thousands from business owners
TV channel: Kurdish Roj TV accounts frozen and went bankrupt after Denmark fined it more than $1 million over PKK links in 2013
The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
Company%20profile
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match info
Southampton 2 (Ings 32' & pen 89') Tottenham Hotspur 5 (Son 45', 47', 64', & 73', Kane 82')
Man of the match Son Heung-min (Tottenham)
MATCH DETAILS
Juventus 2 (Bonucci 36, Ronaldo 90 6)
Genoa 1 (Kouame 40)
Test
Director: S Sashikanth
Cast: Nayanthara, Siddharth, Meera Jasmine, R Madhavan
Star rating: 2/5
Our family matters legal consultant
Name: Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
COMPANY%20PROFILE%20
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yallacompare profile
Date of launch: 2014
Founder: Jon Richards, founder and chief executive; Samer Chebab, co-founder and chief operating officer, and Jonathan Rawlings, co-founder and chief financial officer
Based: Media City, Dubai
Sector: Financial services
Size: 120 employees
Investors: 2014: $500,000 in a seed round led by Mulverhill Associates; 2015: $3m in Series A funding led by STC Ventures (managed by Iris Capital), Wamda and Dubai Silicon Oasis Authority; 2019: $8m in Series B funding with the same investors as Series A along with Precinct Partners, Saned and Argo Ventures (the VC arm of multinational insurer Argo Group)
Formula Middle East Calendar (Formula Regional and Formula 4)
Round 1: January 17-19, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 2: January 22-23, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 3: February 7-9, Dubai Autodrome – Dubai
Round 4: February 14-16, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 5: February 25-27, Jeddah Corniche Circuit – Saudi Arabia
About Seez
Company name/date started: Seez, set up in September 2015 and the app was released in August 2017
Founder/CEO name(s): Tarek Kabrit, co-founder and chief executive, and Andrew Kabrit, co-founder and chief operating officer
Based in: Dubai, with operations also in Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Lebanon
Sector: Search engine for car buying, selling and leasing
Size: (employees/revenue): 11; undisclosed
Stage of funding: $1.8 million in seed funding; followed by another $1.5m bridge round - in the process of closing Series A
Investors: Wamda Capital, B&Y and Phoenician Funds
