VENICE.- Sheikh Abdullah Al Salem Cultural Centre​ - Kuwait’s largest cultural institution - has launched its first international visual arts programme, ​Heart of Culture, at the Scuola dell’Arte dei Tiraoro e Battioro in Venice. The programme is centred around ​In my dream I was in Kuwait - an exhibition featuring six emerging Kuwaiti artists on view until 28 November 2019.

Heart of Culture provides each Kuwaiti artist featured in the exhibition with the opportunity to engage with and learn from local Venetian master craftsmen and contemporary artists through a series of curated workshops. This programme leads the way in a new institutional-led international programme to form multiple collaborations with major academic and cultural organisations around the world.

The exhibition presents the plurality of Kuwaiti artistic practice through artworks developed on the Sheikh Abdullah Al Salem Cultural Centre’s​ Artist-in-Residence programme and is part of the institution's aim to nurture young talent and facilitate cultural exchange through international collaborations.

In my dream I was in Kuwait will be presented in two stages, with works responding to a variety of themes such as socio-political injustices, cultural identity and mental health, and features a range of mediums including photography, painting and mixed media.

The first display includes the work of Amani Althuwaini (b. Ukraine, based in Kuwait) Mahmoud Shaker (b. Kuwait, based in Kuwait) and Zahra Marwan (b. Kuwait, based in New Mexico) on view until August. The second display will open in September and will include the work of Ahmed Muqeem (b. Kuwait, based in Kuwait), Khaled al Najdi (b. Kuwait, based in Kuwait) and Naseer Behbehani (b. Washington DC, USA, based in Kuwait).

The Venetian artists included in the ​Heart of Culture exchange programme and workshops are Tessitura Bevilacqua, who works with old weaving techniques using traditional looms from the 18th Century; Leonardo Cimolin, an artist and glass maker who creates his work using a ‘lamp working’ technique; Silvano Rubino, a conceptual artist working with photography and sculpture to create single works and installations; and Veronica Green, a young New Zealand born painter who has been living and working in Venice in the past fifteen years. The Kuwaiti artists will also collaborate directly with artisan and modern style school workshops including the Simone Cenedese glass factory and the Doppio Fondo printmaking studio.