An exhibition at Contemporary Art Platform in Shuwaikh brings Palestinian women’s lives and achievements into focus, combining personal histories with works by Sliman Mansour and other Palestinian artists.
An exhibition in Kuwait is bringing together two ways of preserving Palestinian history: the images artists create and the individual lives that sit behind a collective story.
At Contemporary Art Platform, known as CAP, National Day of Palestinian Women | A Tribute to Sliman Mansour opened on 26 October and runs until 26 November 2026. Organised with the Embassy of the State of Palestine in Kuwait and curated by Dr Tina Sherwell, it places women’s contributions to cultural and public life at the centre of the exhibition.
The programme extends beyond the gallery walls. Alongside the artworks, it incorporates personal histories and a discussion programme focused on Palestinian women in Kuwait. Together, these elements give the exhibition a local dimension, connecting the preservation of Palestinian cultural memory with people whose work has become part of Kuwait’s everyday cultural life.
Individual lives within a collective history
The exhibition combines works of art with the stories of 42 Palestinian women, according to Kuwait Times’ reporting from the opening. The women come from different generations and backgrounds, with their histories spanning the British Mandate period through to the present.
Rima Khalidi selected and wrote the biographical accounts. In the newspaper’s interview, she explained that she wanted audiences to encounter women as individuals with accomplishments and personal histories, rather than primarily through accounts of conflict and displacement.
That approach gives biography a substantial role within the exhibition. Visitors encounter specific lives alongside the broader cultural and historical themes expressed through the artworks.
The distinction matters to the exhibition’s subject. A collective identity can be represented through familiar images and symbols, but personal accounts introduce differences in experience, profession and ambition. Bringing both into the same space allows the exhibition to address Palestinian women as participants in history as well as subjects within art.
A tribute through Palestinian art
According to CAP’s exhibition announcement, the show includes works by Sliman Mansour on loan from the Barjeel Art Foundation in Sharjah, alongside selections from CAP’s own collection.
The participating artists listed by CAP also include Samia Halaby, Laila Shawa and Mona Hatoum. Their inclusion places the tribute within a wider presentation of Palestinian artistic practice, rather than limiting the exhibition to a single artist’s career.
CAP identifies Mansour’s 1977 painting Sad Tunes in its exhibition material, crediting the Barjeel Art Foundation. His work’s recurring attention to Palestinian identity, rural life and cultural memory provides a connection between the artistic tribute and the exhibition’s focus on women.
The loans also make the collaboration between institutions tangible. Works held by a foundation in Sharjah are being shown alongside a collection based in Kuwait, bringing material from different holdings together for a particular curatorial purpose.
Within this setting, the biographical accounts offer another way into the subject. The paintings and the written histories approach cultural memory through different forms, asking visitors to move between artistic interpretation and individual experience.
Connecting the exhibition to Kuwait
The accompanying public programme brought the subject closer to the host country through a panel titled Palestinian Women in Kuwait: Stories, Voices and Contributions, scheduled for 2 November.
The published programme named writer and TAQA Productions founder Hooda Shawa; Faten Abu-Ghazaleh, a longtime volunteer at the Palestinian Culture Center; chef and Matbakhi owner Sawsan Daana; and piano teacher Lamies Hikmat Al-Shakhsheer.
Reem Shurrab, media and communications officer at the Palestinian embassy in Kuwait, was listed as moderator.
The selection brings writing, cultural volunteering, food and music education into the same conversation. It gives the exhibition’s theme a practical setting: contributions made through producing cultural work, teaching, running a business and sustaining community activity.
It also broadens the meaning of cultural preservation. Alongside artworks and collections, the programme recognises forms of knowledge carried through performance, cooking, education and personal storytelling. These are different ways in which a community’s experiences can become part of the life of another country.
The platform behind the programme
Founded in 2011 by art collector Amer Huneidi, CAP is a private nonprofit arts organisation based in Shuwaikh’s Design District. Its work combines exhibitions with educational activities, a public art library and programmes involving local and visiting artists.
CAP’s institutional outline describes workshops, seminars, film screenings, artist discussions and exhibition visits for school groups. Those activities provide the background to its use of an exhibition as the starting point for a wider public conversation.
Its 2026 programme has also addressed Kuwait’s own places and histories. Earlier this year, IN SITU: Art, Research, and Practice on Failaka Island presented projects from FIKAR’s first two seasons, covering 2023–2024 and 2024–2025.
That exhibition brought together artists and researchers working across disciplines, with projects engaging with Failaka’s history, landscape and biosphere. It offers another example of CAP presenting art in relation to research and the experiences attached to a place.
The current exhibition turns that attention towards Palestinian women, combining works from institutional collections with accounts of individual lives. Running until 26 November at CAP in Shuwaikh, it gives visitors an opportunity to consider both the images through which a people are remembered and the personal histories those images cannot tell alone.
