Art Dubai, which holds its 18th edition between 18-20 April, is expanding. The Art Dubai Group, which owns the fair, has announced two senior directorial appointments while hinting at further institutional and international projects.
The Australian curator Alexie Glass-Kantor will take up the newly created role of executive director, curatorial, with the aim of developing partnerships and institution building, and overseeing the general vision across the company’s platforms. Meanwhile Dunja Gottweis, a veteran of Art Basel, will be the director of Art Dubai. She will take over the running of the Dubai fair, starting from its 2026 edition.
Dunja Gottweis is the new fair director of Art Dubai
Art Dubai’s executive director, Benedetta Ghione, and its artistic director, Pablo Del Val, will remain in place and expand their roles, looking after business development and corporate strategy, and international opportunities, respectively.
“It is well known that Dubai continues to grow with new wealth entering the market, a stable economy, and it is a natural hub for the commercial art world in the region,” says Ben Floyd, the chief executive of the Art Dubai Group.
While Floyd declines to comment further on what the international projects headed by Del Val might entail, they will mark a strategic departure for the fair, which has so far pursued a strategy of year-round investment in Dubai. In addition to the flagship March fair, the Art Dubai Group runs a design fair festival in November, Downtown Design and Dubai Design Week, several educational initiatives, and civic projects such as Dubai Public Art and the Dubai Collection.
“Ultimately we are looking to grow and through Alexie’s past experience and work with global institutions we will be looking for opportunities to meet the needs of Dubai,” Floyd says. “Alexie will also work closely with our partners here in Dubai, including the Dubai government, to support the growth of the growing art scene.”
Glass-Kantor was formerly the executive director of Artspace, where she led a major redevelopment of the Sydney exhibition site, and was also the longtime curator of Encounters, the presentation of large-scale works at Art Basel Hong Kong.
Gottweis, comes from 12 years at Art Basel, where she was most recently global head of gallery relations. Prior to that she worked at the Museum of Applied Arts in Vienna.
Notably, both Gottweis and Glass-Kantor are former Art Basel hires. The Swiss fair giant has been in the UAE news recently as rumours continue to spread about its merger with Abu Dhabi Art, in which it is understood that Abu Dhabi’s Department of Culture and Tourism, which runs the fair, will buy a stake in the Basel company. While this was expected to be made public during Abu Dhabi Art in November, sources say that the partnership, though still not announced, very much remains on the cards.
