ARAK Collection

The ARAK Collection announces Billy Fowo as a recipient of its 2026 Curatorial Fellowship.

Fowo is a Cameroonian curator and writer based in Berlin, Germany, with research interests spanning the sonic, linguistics, and literature. He is a graduate of de Appel Curatorial Programme (2023) and currently works with SAVVY Contemporary – The Laboratory of Form-Ideas.

He has contributed to major international platforms, with texts published in catalogues and publications including the São Paulo Biennial (36th edition), Sharjah Biennial 15, Kunstforum International, and Mousse Magazine. He has also served on the Selection Committee for the Future Generation Art Prize 2023/24 and as a juror for Encontros da Imagem 2025.

For the ARAK Collection Fellowship, Fowo will develop a curatorial project that examines abstraction and form-making practices across African and diasporic contexts, challenging inherited distinctions between art and craft, tradition and contemporaneity.

The ARAK Collection announces Aleesha Suleman as a recipient of its 2026 Curatorial Fellowship.

Suleman is a Kenyan-Indian cultural practitioner, writer, and curator from Kenya, Mombasa, based in Qatar,Doha. Her research-driven practice explores questions of identity, memory, and place through postcolonial, class, and subaltern frameworks, with a particular focus on East Africa, the Indian Ocean, and global diasporic formations. Working across exhibition-making, writing, and community-led enquiry, she examines how historical power structures continue to shape visual culture and modes of cultural production.

She currently works as an Exhibitions Project Manager at the Museum of Islamic Art under Qatar Museums, where she has contributed to major exhibitions including presentations of works by Ara Güler and installations by Yayoi Kusama.

Suleman holds an MA in Museum and Gallery Practice (Distinction) from University College London, and a BS in Foreign Service (Honours) from Georgetown University.

For the ARAK Collection Fellowship, Suleman will develop a curatorial project focused on the Tsinga Tsinga school

Introducing 2026 Advisory Board Member Heba El Kayal

Heba El Kayal is a curator, writer, and advisor from Cairo, specialising in modern and
contemporary art from the Middle East and North Africa. She holds a BA in English &
Comparative Literature (American University in Cairo), an MA in Modern Art History &
Curatorial Studies (Columbia University), and is pursuing an LLM. Her career spans Dubai,
Beirut, New York, and London, working with auction houses, collectors, and artists. She
served as Chief Curatorial Consultant at the Norval Foundation, curated the Generations
section at the Investec Cape Town Art Fair 2025, and holds advisory roles with ArteEast
(USA), Strauss & Co (South Africa), and the ARAK Collection.

Introducing 2026 Advisory Board Member Lifang Zhang

Lifang Zhang is an art historian and writer based in Beijing, currently a Postdoctoral Fellow at Tsinghua Institute for Advanced Study in Humanities and Social Sciences (TIAS). She earned her PhD in Art History from Rhodes University, South Africa. Her research focuses on contemporary African art and Afro-Asian artistic exchanges. Zhang has curated and co-curated research-based projects including Viable Visions: Retrospective of Martin Abasi Phiri in Lusaka and If These Walls Could Talk in Harare.