The PRCA MENA Regional Awards celebrate excellence in the public relations and communications industry across the MENA region. The event will take place on 25th April at Taj Dubai Business Bay. Unquestionably, this event promises to be an unforgettable evening honoring the outstanding achievements of PR agencies, PR professionals and organisations.

As part of this partnership, McFill Media will provide comprehensive media coverage of the Regional Awards. Firstly, they will be highlighting the winners, finalists, and key moments of the event. Secondly, McFill Media will ensure that the accomplishments of the PRCA community receive the recognition they deserve. Most importantly, they bring extensive reach and expertise in media to the partnership.

Monika Fourneaux, Head of PRCA EMEA is thrilled about this partnership. She remarked, “We are delighted to collaborate with McFill Media to showcase the talent and innovation within the PR industry.” Regarding this partnership she further added, “Indeed, their commitment to promoting excellence aligns perfectly with our mission. We aim to celebrate and elevate the achievements of PR professionals across the MENA region”.

“We are excited to partner with PRCA MENA for the Regional Awards,” said McFill Media spokesperson. “As leading media platforms, we are dedicated to highlighting industry excellence. We aim to provide our audience with insightful coverage of this prestigious event”.

For the latest updates, stay tuned for exclusive coverage of the PRCA MENA Regional Awards by McFill Media.

For more information about PRCA and categories of these Regional Awards, please visit PRCA MENA Regional AWARDS.

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There has been an increase in NFT-related operations throughout the Middle East and Africa region, particularly in the UAE. The largest contemporary art expo in the MENA region, Art Dubai, welcomed more than 100 local and international art dealers in 2022, as well as a digital network of 17 platforms and galleries devoted to showing and selling NFTs. Although there has been a noticeable increase in the buying, selling, and creation of NFTs in the UAE, more and more nations are attempting to impose strict regulatory measures on NFTs.

Numerous cutting-edge NFT marketplaces have also appeared in the nation over the past 12 months, making it relatively easier for the general public to buy, sell, and trade in NFTs. Numerous players are entering the UAE NFT market, ranging from NFT-based startups to cryptocurrency exchanges. Numerous NFT marketplaces have also supported the increase in NFT trading transaction value and volume, and the trend is anticipated to continue for the following three to four years in the UAE.

The rise of blockchain-based gaming is expected to drive NFT market growth in the UAE. With blockchain-based gaming, people are frequently awarded cryptocurrencies or NFTs for participating in gaming tournaments.

The United Arab Emirates has always welcomed new and emerging technology. For NFTs as well, the UAE has adopted NFT technology. For the UAE’s 50th birthday celebration, the postal operator in the country issued NFT stamps to celebrate the federation’s National Day.

MORROW, an NFT curatorial platform, was also launched by Dubai Culture. Therefore, the growing adoption of NFTs has resulted in a thriving NFT scene in the UAE. The trend is expected to accelerate further over the next three to four years as global players look to capitalize on the growing UAE market.

Large companies are entering the NFT sector to take advantage of the expanding market and accelerate their expansion. Big enterprises are entering the NFT industry to take advantage of the expanding global market and accelerate their expansion now that Dubai and Abu Dhabi have announced that crypto-related activities and businesses are legal in the UAE.

Emirates Airlines declared its entry into the metaverse and NFT sectors in April 2022. To improve the flyers’ metaverse experiences, the business is anticipated to provide services and several digital collectibles. The company also disclosed that work on the NFT and metaverse projects has already begun and is scheduled to go live soon.

The Middle East and Africa region now have a vibrant market for artists and fans thanks to these cutting-edge technologies that have revolutionized pop culture and art.

In collaboration with Sotheby’s and the Visual Arts Commission, the Saudi Arabian Ministry of Culture launched an NFT digital art forum to further promote the NFT market and raise awareness among collectors, artists, and curators.

Digital artists in Egypt are increasingly using non-fungible tokens (NFTs). Although the NFT market is still in its infancy and is not as developed as some other markets, the industry is expanding as more and more artists choose to release their ground-breaking art collections as NFTs. Similar patterns are evident in South Africa, where many well-known people are launching NFTs.

The world’s movie stars, musicians, and athletes have also entered the NFT space. A few well-known individuals are actor Dan Mace, musician Goldfish and the Kiffness, influencer Diipa Khosla, and cricketer AB de Villiers. The popularity of NFT among the general public has soared since these well-known brands began operating in South Africa, fueling the market’s expansion over the previous 12 months.

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It has also set up a pavilion at the Burj Plaza that has been specially designed by Ghanaian architect Alice Asafu-Adjaye for its launch last week, which coincided with the All Africa Festival in Downtown Dubai.

The pavilion is wrapped in a curving lattice made of wood and its interior galleries flow into each other. The design mirrors the exhibition’s theme of connections, highlighting the links between African artists across generations and the making of artistic ties between Africa and the region.

“We’ve connected revered and acclaimed artists with emerging and mid-career contemporary African artists,” says Afia Owusu-Afriyie, one of the gallery’s curators. In the show, Anatsui’s works are presented alongside other established names such as Ghanaian photographer James Barnor and painters Larry Otoo and Betty Acquah, as well as younger talents Yaw Owusu, Isshaq Ismail and Kojo Dwimoh, among others.

The highlight is undoubtedly Anatsui’s new body of work. Known for his assemblage sculptures made from bottle caps and wire, the artist, who is from Ghana and lives in Nigeria, has shown in major institutions in the region and across the world. In 2015, he was awarded the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement by the Venice Biennale. Previously, his work has been shown at the Sharjah Biennial and Guggenheim Abu Dhabi.

His 80-metre sculpture Detsi, vivid with deep reds and yellows, is an ongoing work that the artist began in 2008, while Silent One from 2021 is a black and gold piece that looks as slick and molten as oil. Striking in their colour and the fluidity of the metallic material, the works also contemplate the role of liquor, used as currency in the transatlantic slave trade, in linking Europe, Africa and North America.

Efie Gallery is also presenting one of the artist’s lesser-known wood panel sculptures from this year. Made by scorching varicoloured wood planks – a process employed by the artist to refer to brutal histories of colonial powers in Africa – the patterns on the work seem to spell out a genetic sequence, as the title DNA indicates.

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Thomas Dermine, Belgium’s Secretary of State for Scientific Policy, said the country was focused on returning works from the holdings of the Royal Museum for Central Africa in Tervuren. The institution is primarily devoted to objects from the Congo, and was opened in 1897 as a means for Leopold II to show the treasures and wealth he had accumulated through his colonization of that part of Africa.

The works to be returned are only a part of the museum’s holdings. Of the 85,000 objects from the Congo in the museum’s collection, it is estimated that only 883 objects, which totals to less than 1 percent, were brought to the country illegally. Dermine said that 58 percent were obtained legally, and the remaining 40-plus percent of the collection required further research.

The objects came to Belgium in 1885, the same year  Leopold II declared himself the ruler of the Congo Free State, and 1960, the year that the Democratic Republic of Congo declared its independence from Belgium. In the intervening years, the citizens of the Congo endured various brutalities from Belgians who relied on their labor to support the rubber and chocolate industries.

Last July, the Belgium government suggested creating a commission focused on reckoning with colonialism, but the country’s parliament has yet to formally create one, causing frustration among experts. Earlier this month, curators and scholars in the country took matters into their own hands and drafted a document that calls for a full-scale repatriation of objects “closely linked to the conquest, occupation, and colonization of the immense Central African region.”

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Kate Cowcher, a lecturer of art history at the University of St Andrews discovered it during a research for a lecture. She noticed that a painting she recognised as by Tanzanian artist Sam Joseph Ntiro was curiously held in a collection in rural Scotland.

She learned that many of the collection’s works were being stored in a high school in Lochgilphead. Though the majority of the 173 works, amassed in the 1960s and 1970s, are by Scottish artists, it also contains a group of 12 paintings, drawings and prints from Africa. They were acquired by the author Naomi Mitchison, who, in collaboration with the Argyll County Council, set up the Argyll Collection to provide children in rural Scotland with access to art.

“Discoveries of African Modern works of this nature are rare anywhere, but especially in somewhere like Scotland,” says Giles Peppiatt, Bonham’s African art specialist. Peppiatt points out that because the African Modern market is relatively nascent and comparatively unlucrative, the likelihood of these works being forged is very low.

The ten works (plus two others that are still being identified) are now due to go on show at the community art centre Dunoon Burgh Hall from 21 May in an exhibition titled Dar to Dunoon: Modern African Art from the Argyll Collection (until 13 June).

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