Yes, Ras Al Khaimah Art 2026 Festival is returning very soon with its 14th edition — opening on January 16 and running until February 8. It will take place within the historic walls of Al Jazeera Al Hamra Heritage Village, the UAE’s last remaining intact Emirati pearling village.

This year, the festival explores how ancestral voices and contemporary innovation shape creative expression across the UAE and beyond. Ras Al Khaimah Art 2026 Festival will present a month-long programme of exhibitions, performances, workshops, guided tours, film screenings, and curated culinary experiences. The festival brings together 106 artists from 49 nationalities, alongside local, regional, and international partners — a truly ambitious scope.

So, what exactly can we expect? Let’s dive in.

First of all, the Ras Al Khaimah Art 2026 Festival is about how civilisations are formed and what they leave behind. This year’s theme, Civilisations: Under the Same Sky, moves between the ancient Silk Road routes that once connected Ras Al Khaimah to the wider world and the global cities shaping culture today. It looks at creativity as something that grows through exchange — ideas travelling across time and place, shaped by memory, imagination, and coexistence.

Set within Al Jazeera Al Hamra Heritage Village, the festival once again creates a strong contrast between contemporary art and Emirati heritage. Alongside exhibitions, the programme includes workshops, guided tours, live performances, and film screenings. Each weekend has its own focus, from the opening days in mid-January to family-friendly programming, a globally themed weekend, and a final celebration rooted in local culture.

At the centre of it all is the first Ras Al Khaimah Contemporary Art Biennale, curated by Sharon Toval. The month-long exhibition brings together artists working across very different contexts and mediums, all engaging with how cultures evolve, intersect, and are reinterpreted over time.

Some artists take a quieter, more introspective route, like Sutee Kunavichayanont and Stefano Cagol, whose works touch on the metaphysical. Others push back more directly: photographers Hicham Benohoud and Marie Hudelot question how identity is constructed and seen. You will also come across artists such as Hannan Abu-Hussein, Sophy Abu Shakra, Kawita Vatanajyankur, and Francesca Fini, working with textiles, performance, and AI to rethink ideas of heritage, gender, and technology — each in their own way, without trying to offer a single answer.

Beyond the exhibition spaces, the festival opens up into other senses and experiences. The Hidden Table makes food part of the journey, with a rotating line-up of restaurant takeovers that bring different moods and flavours into the village: from fire-driven cooking by Portugal’s Chama to comforting Mediterranean dishes from Bungalo34, and thoughtful, seasonal menus by Newcastle’s Michelin-starred Restaurant Pine.

Guided tours add context in an easy, unforced way — whether through food, art, or the history of the pearling village itself — while performances and film screenings unfold across intimate, atmospheric settings, carrying the festival’s ideas into sound, movement, and storytelling.

For those who want to take part rather than just observe, workshops and masterclasses offer hands-on ways to engage. Rooted in traditional practices yet open to contemporary experimentation, they range from calligraphy and textiles to photography and specialised crafts, creating space to slow down, learn, and make something meaningful along the way.