The artist’s much-lauded film Drama 1882 (2024), a retelling of the Urabi revolution, made for the Egyptian Pavilion at the last Venice Biennale, had further airings this year at moca Geffen in Los Angeles in February, Talbot Rice in Edinburgh in June, and Amsterdam’s Stedelijk in July. His exhibition at luma Arles in July featured Shawky’s typical mix of film, drawing and puppetry to narrate the tragic story of Pompeii and find connections between Ancient Greek and Egyptian mythology. I Am Hymns of the New Temples unfolded across 5,000sqm of brightly coloured vitrines, as visitors walked among a pink replica of Vesuvius overlooking the gallery. Earlier in the year Shawky spent time in South Korea, where his 2024 exhibition at Daegu Art Museum came to a close; he held a solo show at Seoul’s Barakat Contemporary and was at the MMCA Gwacheon for a June pairing with the work of Akram Zaatari. Whether retelling the history of the Crusades with marionettes or, as in Drama 1882, using musical theatre to depict the British colonisation of Egypt, Shawky speaks of history itself as an ‘artistic creation’; accordingly, he describes his work more as a ‘translator’, constantly reinterpreting the past and using myth and history to understand the struggles of the present anew.

Despite his international touring, with a display of his work already scheduled at Hong Kong’s M+ next year, he is now focused on Qatar, where the artist brings to bear his unique mix of artist and organiser. As artistic director of the Doha Fire Station since 2024, Shawky has helped organise the institution’s exhibitions and residencies, this year hosting shows by former residents Aissa Deebi and Fatma Al-Naimi. Using the space to continue the work he began with MASS Alexandria, the independent art school he founded in 2010 (now lapsed), Shawky runs the nine-month Arts Intensive Study Program through the Fire Station. His responsibilities in the emirate have now doubled: named artistic director of Art Basel’s inaugural Gulf outing, launching in February next year, he will be curating a fair that claims to set aside the booth format and gather instead around the theme of ‘Becoming’. As the artist himself admitted, ‘I am an unconventional choice.’