In less than a decade, Saudi Arabia has emerged as one of the world's fastest-growing centers of contemporary art. Both for Saudi artists and international creatives invited to exhibit, install, screen, teach and produce, more than 100 new events sponsored by more than two dozen new arts organizations now offer opportunities across the country. Artists such as Dana Awartani, whose neoclassically symmetrical installation "Where the Dwellers Lay" (above) nestled at the outdoor exhibition Desert X AlUla 2022, and dozens of others are showing at recently opened, large-scale venues, including Riyadh's JAX District, Jiddah's Hayy Jameel cultural center and Red Sea Film Festival, and Dhahran's cultural center, Ithra.

From co-op farms and export-driven factories to market stalls run by young entrepreneurs, continental Africa's smallest country is adapting its globally popular crop of groundnuts peanuts to changing climate, changing markets and rising aspirations.

In 2011 I moved to the United Arab Emirates. and I joined a group of cave explorers. After Several weeks of training, we traveled to Oman's Eastern Hajar Mountains, some 150 kilometers south of the capital, Muscat.

Since the 1970s, independent filmmakers have been a rare breed throughout the Arabic-speaking world. But as a rising number of film festivals and streaming platforms open, opportunities for both artistic expression and viewing experiences are growing faster than ever.

Born in a village in northwest Algeria, Cheika Remitti sang high-energy songs of love, loss and society that pioneered rai music. Beloved by fans for more than 60 years until her death in 2006, her influence and popularity endure.

Originally designed for tiles adorning the mosque in Istanbul commissioned in the 16th century by Ottoman Grand Vizier Rustem Pasha, this 12-fold rosette combines geometry with plant and flower motifs to achieve a centrifugal, undulating, harmonious composition.

My mother recalls having this dish for breakfast during family day trips, such as to Mazari-Sharif (in northern Afghanistan) for the Red Tulip Festival (Guli Surkh), during the spring equinox. It would be made in a beautiful copper karayee, a shallow heavy-based pan used in Afghan cooking. The karayee would be placed directly over a portable kerosene burner, where the eggs, vegetables and spices would bubble away. The large karayee is then placed in the middle of the breakfast spread, surrounded by naans and various chais, for everyone to help themselves.