The announcement that Frieze will take over the existing Abu Dhabi Art (ADA) fair may have come as a surprise to some key players in the Gulf art scene but, according to Frieze’s chief executive Simon Fox, the plan was “considered for a reasonably long time”. The evolution of Abu Dhabi’s art ecosystem has been “many years in the making”, he adds, and now the “stars have aligned”.
Fox considers Abu Dhabi the “most interesting market in the region”, citing the weight of the major institutional projects newly opened or under way on Saadiyat Island. He is not concerned about the local demand for contemporary art, despite less corporate patronage and fewer major private collections. “We don’t need any more buying power than what is already in place, which has supported the growth of ADA for the past 17 years.” Moreover, he believes that the Gulf is a “growing” market. “We’re in it for the long term.”
Taking over an existing fair, rather than launching a new one—as Art Basel is doing in Doha—was partly to avoid “congesting the fair calendar”, Fox says. Still, launching in Abu Dhabi means that Frieze will hold four fairs in three months, which he admits will be “demanding”. The takeover is comparable to its 2023 acquisitions of the Armory Show and Expo Chicago, but because the Emirati fair will be rebranded, the “changes will be more noticeable”.
What this means for the exhibitor list of the inaugural Frieze Abu Dhabi in November 2026 remains to be seen, but many of the 140 galleries in this year’s ADA (the largest edition to date and the last before it is rebranded) have not taken part in a Frieze fair before.
No Abu Dhabi galleries are taking part in this year’s Frieze London or Masters. There are three exhibitors from Dubai—Lawrie Shabibi, Carbon 12 and Volte—plus two from the wider Gulf region, Dastan from Tehran and Athr from Saudi Arabia. Will this figure raise in future editions? “I would hope so,” Fox says, pointing to the increase in attendance of Korean galleries at Frieze fairs since the brand launched in Seoul in 2022.
According to the ADA director Dyala Nusseibeh, who will remain leading the fair, the Frieze rebrand will “build upon the work of ADA and push it outwards onto a global stage”. Meanwhile, Reem Fadda, the director of cultural programming for Abu Dhabi’s Department of Culture and Tourism, says that “Frieze Abu Dhabi comes as a big vote of confidence in Abu Dhabi’s market, development and the larger representation of the Global South”.
