I have just traveled from an area crippled by winter's snowy grip to a land of endless sun. An opportunity to show my work alongside other international artists at the 29th Annual Emirates Fine Art Society Juried Exhibit has brought me to the other side of the globe. The path between the Sharjah Art Museum and our hotel has now become mindless. The first time I walked it, the city streets seemed foreign and overwhelming, I wondered how many times I would get turned around. Now it is just the path we take to and from setting up at the museum. How can something so foreign quickly become so familiar? Sharjah is considered a cultural center in the United Arab Emirates. The buildings have an old world quality, but few are much older than I am, so there is a bit of a gray area between where the culture truly is and where the image of the culture begins. There are flashes of this quasi-Epcot Center-esque feeling when you find out many of these buildings are a facade. So what is true? The fact that the warmth of the sun is only out-shined by the warmth of the people is true. The images I carried with me here of the middle east are not true of this country. It is true that under this constitutional monarchy all people are considered equals, affording women the rights I simply assumed they were denied. Though above all else, the sacredness of hospitality seems to be the greatest truth here, within and between these buildings which I now travel through.
