Personal Narratives, Intangible Histories at World Expo, 2025

In collaboration with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Culture, DDX produced a dynamic programme of exhibitions and residencies at the Saudi Pavilion for World Expo 2025, offering global audiences an immersive experience of Saudi creativity. Among the highlights, the group exhibition Personal Narratives: Intangible Histories invited visitors to engage with the work of three pioneering female Saudi artists, exploring memory, identity and the ways culture shapes personal and collective narratives.

The exhibition featured Sara Abdu, Reem Al Nasser, and Daniah Alsaleh, who presented completed works reflecting on place, tradition and human experience through poetic, abstract and immersive approaches.

In the Cultural Arts Studio, Sara Abdu explored memory and reconciliation through her signature anthropomorphized, melancholic figures, creating installations that referenced both the conscious and unconscious mind. Her practice meditates on self, memory, home, mortality and immortality, inviting viewers to engage with human inner territories through a careful, labor-intensive process.

Reem Al Nasser brought a human presence to the Pavilion with multiscreen video works reflecting on identity and tradition in wedding rituals. Drawing on photography, graffiti, video and sound, her pieces are informed by ethnographic research, personal experience and close observation of cultural mobility and change.

Daniah Alsaleh reimagined Saudi landscapes through abstract, mixed-media works informed by a residency in northern Saudi Arabia in collaboration with the German Archaeological Institute and the Goethe-Institute. She accompanied archaeologists on visits to excavation sites in AlUla and Tayma, focusing on carnelian beads as a recurring object of cultural and historical significance. 

In the studio, Daniah demonstrated the transformation of raw carnelian into pigments, alongside maps and contextual explanations, connecting her contemporary artworks with tangible historical material. She also gave talks, hosted meet-and-greets and shared insights with visitors, creating an educational and interactive experience.