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Rand Abdul Jabbar (Iraqi-Canadian, b. Baghdad, 1990) borrows from the vestiges and ephemera of history to produce reconstructions of its records, events and experiences. She contends with personal and collective memory while engaging in research around the resounding legacies of imperialism, archaeology, mythology and material culture. Employing sculpture, writing, video and installation as primary mediums, her work unfolds through an experiential dialogue between recollection and re-imagination, devising anchors that facilitate the retelling and adaptation of the past into a space for the reclamation of agency and affirmation of identity. Abdul Jabbar was awarded the Richard Mille Art Prize in 2022. She received a Master of Architecture from Columbia University in 2014.
Recent exhibitions include In Interludes and Transitions, Diriyah Contemporary Art Biennale, Diriyah (2026); All Manner of Experiments: Legacies of the Baghdad Modern Art Group, NYUAD Art Gallery, Abu Dhabi (2026); Proximities, Seoul Museum of Art, Seoul (2025); Public Matter, Public Art Abu Dhabi Biennial, Abu Dhabi (2025); Molding Anew, Lawrie Shabibi Gallery, Dubai (2024); In the Presence of Absence, Desert X AlUla, AlUla (2024); A Permanent Nostalgia for Departure: A Rehearsal on Legacy with Zaha Hadid, Contemporary Art Center, Cincinnati (2023); For the Phoenix to Find Its Form in Us: On Restitution, Rehabilitation and Reparation, SAVVY Contemporary, Berlin (2021); Phantom Limb, Jameel Arts Centre, Dubai (2019); This Land’s Unknown, Biennale d’Architecture d’Orléans, Orléans (2019); and An Instant Before the World, Biennale d’art contemporain de Rabat, Rabat (2019). Her work and writing has been published in numerous publications including In Plain Sight: Scenes from Aridly Abundant Landscapes (Kaph Books), Monumental Shadows (Kaph Books), Architecture of Culture (Irthi Contemporary Crafts Council), Architecture of the Territory: Constructing National Narratives in the Arab World (Kaph Books), Woman Made: Great Women Designers (Phaidon), Between East and West: A Gulf (Actar Publishers), and WTD Magazine.
Image: Portrait of Rand Abdul Jabbar. Courtesy of the Royal Commission for AlUla.
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