Desert X AlUla 2026 returns to northwest Saudi Arabia with a fourth edition that scatters contemporary art across within the valleys, canyons, and oases of AlUla. Presented by Arts AlUla in collaboration with Desert X, the exhibition runs from January 16th to February 28th, 2026 as part of the AlUla Arts Festival. It brings new site-responsive sculptural commissions into conversation with the scenic desert.

The curatorial theme, Space Without Measure, shapes an edition that attends closely to scale, distance, and perception across a vast landscape. Works are positioned across Wadi AlFann and the surrounding oasis zones, where shifts in light and wind are a part of the experience. Desert X AlUla 2026 approaches the site as an active participant, asking visitors to move slowly and read materials in relation to desert and sky.

Agnes Denes, The Living Pyramid, Desert X AlUla 2026, image courtesy Lance Gerber

site-responsive artworks scatter across the desert

Sustainable production methods inform Desert X AlUla 2026 at every level. Rammed earth, carved stone, and locally sourced wood appear across multiple projects, produced in Saudi Arabia through collaborations with regional artisans and cultural centers.

Partnerships with the locally-based arts and design center Madrasat Addeera and the AlUla Music Hub extend this emphasis on local knowledge, while consultation with the AlUla Native Plant Nursery guides the integration of plantlife into the ‘oasis’ environment.

The exhibition is co-curated by Wejdan Reda and Zoé Whitley, with artistic direction led by Neville Wakefield and Raneem Farsi. Their approach favors works that respond to specific conditions of AlUla, from ancient water routes to cultivated palm groves.

Bahraini-Danish, Desert X AlUla 2026, image courtesy Lance Gerber

eleven participating artists for 2026

Among the Saudi artists participating in Desert X AlUla 2026, Budapest-born artist Agnes Denes contributes The Living Pyramid, a planted structure situated within the oasis. Continuing a project developed across multiple geographies, the work emphasizes cycles of growth and regeneration through its changing surface. 

Sound plays a central role in several commissions. The collective practice Bahraini-Danish introduces Bloom, a kinetic sculpture animated by sunlight and shadow. Its rotating elements register the passage of time across the day, producing a shifting visual rhythm that aligns with the desert’s cycles. Participation remains gentle and open-ended, inviting viewers to linger rather than perform.

Basmah Felemban’s Murmur of Pebbles enlarges geological fragments into carved limestone forms. Installed along pathways shaped by ancient rivers, the work draws attention to sediment, erosion, and time embedded within stone. Originally commissioned for a previous edition, the installation returns with renewed emphasis on scale and spacing under the current curatorial framework.

Basmah Felemban, Desert X AlUla 2026, image courtesy Lance Gerber

In a nearby valley, Héctor Zamora’s Tar HyPar introduces percussion-inspired forms that respond to collective movement. Visitors activate the installation through sound, producing a low, resonant energy that travels across open ground.

Ibrahim El-Salahi’s Haraza Tree responds to acacia species found across the region, translating their resilience into sculptural forms that gather individually while standing as a unified artwork.

Mohammad Alfaraj contributes What was the Question Again?, a living installation centered on a palm structure assembled from grafted trunks. Referencing the agricultural landscapes of Al Ahsa, the piece reflects long-standing relationships between cultivation, storytelling, and renewal.

Héctor Zamora, Tar HyPar, Desert X AlUla 2026, image courtesy Lance Gerber

Sara Abdu presents A Kingdom Where No One Dies: Contours of Resonance, a sculptural installation formed through layered rammed earth walls. Poetry and geology intersect within its surfaces, drawing attention to construction techniques shared across cultures and eras. The work reads through touch and proximity, its mass tempered by subtle shifts in tone and texture.

Future Fables by Vibha Galhotra encloses fragments of demolished buildings within a steel framework. The structure shelters traces of recent change, transforming debris into a place for reflection and shared narratives.

Several works in Desert X AlUla 2026 engage directly with ecological systems. Maria Magdalena Campos-Pons shows Imole Red, an installation inspired by AlUla’s sunsets and Yoruba spiritual traditions. Color and planting combine within a garden-like structure that acknowledges water as a sustaining presence within the valley. The work carries a sense of continuity between land, ritual, and care.

Ibrahim El-Salahi, Desert X AlUla 2026, image courtesy Lance Gerber

Lebanese artist and composer Tarek Atoui presents The Water Song, continuing his research into listening practices initiated during the AlUla Arts Festival 2025. Instruments emerge partially from the ground, encouraging visitors to attune to subtle vibrations carried through soil and air. The landscape becomes an acoustic field shaped by movement and attention.

Nearby, rare sculptural works by the late Mohammed AlSaleem appear for the first time, including The Thorn and AlShuruf Unit. Created during the 1980s, these geometric forms extend upward with a measured sense of aspiration, shaped by desert horizons and celestial reference points.

Mohammad AlFaraj, Desert X AlUla 2026, image courtesy Lance Gerber

Sara Abdu, Desert X AlUla 2026, image courtesy Lance Gerber

Vibha Galhotra, Desert X AlUla 2026, image courtesy Lance Gerber

María Magdalena Campos-Pons, Desert X AlUla 2026, image courtesy Lance Gerber

Tarek Atoui, Desert X AlUla 2026, image courtesy Lance Gerber

works by Mohammed Al Saleem throughout the exhibition are on loan courtesy of Riyadh Art collection, The Royal Commission for Riyadh City

project info:

event: Desert X | @_desertx

location: AlUla, Saudi Arabia

on view: January 16th to February 28th, 2026

photography: © Lance Gerber | @lance.gerber

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images courtesy of hector zamora

‘using modest material, hector zamora’s lattice detour interrupts and refocuses how visitors interact with this beloved space, situated atop the met and surrounded by the manhattan skyline, creating a meditation on movement, transparency, and interference,’ comments max hollein, director of the met. ‘manifesting itself as a protective wall, curved artwork, and permeable screen, lattice detour is a transformative, charged, and timely intervention.’

in lattice detour, hector zamora uses the wall to create a response in viewers that communicates the impact of barriers: obstructing access to open, expansive outlooks on the world. this wall, although presenting some of those characteristics, presents gestures that counterattack the wall’s primordial function. the bricks, stacked 11 feet high, have been turned to their side to show their perforations. this arrangement allows light and air flow through, referencing celosía walls — latticed structures found in vernacular architecture around the world providing shade and ventilation.

as visitors move around the wall’s arched structure, the tactility, materiality, geometric patterns and shadows cast become apparent. these elements suggest that the work’s role as a partition is not the one intended. instead, through the grid of its openings, the gravity of the massive walls turns into an ethereal mesh. the wall therefore becomes an element that invites viewers to look into the other side and reconsider the panoramic view and the implications of obstruction and permeability within a social space.

‘well known for his site-specific installations that re-articulate public spaces and the built environment, zamora challenges and redirects our expectations of the cantor roof garden as a social space, asking the visitor to navigate a barrier to the open view beyond the parapet,’ adds sheena wagstaff, the met’s leonard a. lauder chairman of modern and contemporary art. ‘constructed of bricks composed of mexican earth, using local labor and traditional processes, zamora’s lattice wall is a poetic metaphor writ large, and a critique of the social, political, and economic considerations inherent in its making.’

project info:

name: lattice detour 

artist: hector zamora

location: cantor roof garden at the metropolitan museum of art in new york

exhibition dates: august 29–december 7, 2020

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all images by © iñaki bergera, unless otherwise stated

héctor zamora erects ‘truth always appears as something veiled’ as part of the solo houses ‘summer group show.’ the work is influenced by and expressive of the ancient knidos labyrinth, a radial maze carved in a block of black marble. the project generates a single circular route which leads toward its center and returns with no alternate options or shortcuts — in opposition to those western types which create an intricate network. the layering, perforated brick walls partially obstruct the view both inward and outward, offering a new perception between the hidden and the open. these semi-translucent walls generate a visual permeability which serves to establishes a conceptual contrast with the classic labyrinth typology which comprises walls that entirely obstruct the visitor’s vision, calling for walkers to cross them in search of the center.

image © solo houses

the solo houses group show transforms the rolling green landscape into an imaginary country called tendre. here, the many stages of love are mapped in the form of pathways and small villages in a topographic and allegorical representation. over the course of this trajectory, a further eight works of art mark stops along the trip through the land of the tendre. héctor zamora’s ‘truth always appears as something veiled’ — first presented in 2016 — occupies the eighth point along the route. 

project info:

project title: ‘truth always appears as something veiled’ (2016)

artist: héctor zamora

architectural initiative: solo houses

show: solo summer group show  

photography: iñaki bergera

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‘brasil’ | brazilian cargo bike + bricks
x architecture biennial, são paulo, brazil
hors les murs, the tuileries garden, paris, france
image courtesy of héctor zamora

the heavy packs allude to shaky building foundations found throughout the brazilian landscape
image courtesy of héctor zamora

‘brasil’, 2013
clay bricks, metal bicycle
image © designboom

brasil at art basel miami beach
image © designboom

‘protogeometrías’
image courtesy of héctor zamora

‘protogeometrías’
image courtesy of héctor zamora

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‘white noise’ by héctor zamora | images courtesy of héctor zamora

deciding on installation parameters

the local community receives instructions

flags are disseminated

the first flag in installed

digging process

part 2 of the installation, relocated indoors

at the close of the day, the flags were removed and brought back to the city center: for the second part of the installation, the flags were inserted into concrete blocks so that the same visual effect could be achieved indoors. héctor zamora’s work will next be displayed at the lyon biennale 2011.

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‘sciame di dirigibili’ / stuck inflatable zeppelin, 2009
image © designboom

image © designboom

image © designboom

zeppelin installation inside the arsenale
image © designboom

image © designboom

image © designboom

image © designboom

image © designboom

image © designboom

still from the video installation

still from the video installation

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