As part of its continued commitment to support and empower different communities in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, Facebook is set to celebrate the region’s vibrant art, creative and design ecosystem with an exclusive set of events at Dubai Design Week. Taking place from 12th – 17th November 2018 at Dubai Design District, Facebook will run events over six days, bringing together various groups including, design, art, community and technology.

The space, called ‘Tasmeem Facebook’ will host a myriad of activations during the course of six days, where guests visiting will have the opportunity to immerse themselves in interactive workshops, create and take home badges that can be made in a dedicated Badge Lab, and take a picture of themselves in a custom-designed Mirror Booth. The space will also host ‘The Lab’, where guests can learn more about how to effectively use various tools on Facebook.

Rasha Kashkoush, Head of Communications for Middle East, North Africa & Turkey at Facebook said: “Facebook’s mission is to give people the power to bring the world closer together and build communities around diverse interests. Our family of apps and services gives communities and creators the opportunity to connect with over 181 million monthly active users in the region, and we want to help them further by providing a nurturing space to express their creativity and innovative community-building ideas. At Dubai Design Week, the Tasmeem Facebook space aims to be a platform to facilitate burgeoning art, creative and design communities in the region to build meaningful connections with others in powerful, personal and practical ways.”

During the event, Facebook will showcase the incredible creative talent across the MENA region, partnering with the below entities to encourage people to express themselves through the medium of art:

• • Blank Canvas, which is a community building initiative on Facebook that supports emerging talent and crowd-sourced creativity. At the event, a user-generated installation will be available from 10am-10pm everyday, where people can paint on canvas-covered cubes as a form of artful expression. The installation will bring together elements of culture, design, history, and individuality, becoming a manifestation of those that attend Dubai Design Week, and their relationship with Facebook.
    Blank Canvas will also provide two-hour facilitated community expression workshops with live music, where participants can contribute to the same large piece of canvas, moving seats and building on one another’s artwork.
  • 81 Designs, will host interactive workshops offering visitors an opportunity to learn how to do a traditional, unique style of Palestinian cross-stitch embroidery ‘Tatreez’. The materials which will be provided to the participants, have been collated and prepared by Palestinian refugee women.
  • MNDBAR, is an independent collective space that uses emerging technologies and design thinking tools to shift mindsets. Workshop attendees will learn the basic principles of innovative problem solving, how shift their perspective from expert to explorer, and identify opportunities for improvement, transformation and innovation.

More details on the workshops are available in the below links:

• Blank Canvas: https://www.facebook.com/events/329826274503386/
• 81 Designs: https://www.facebook.com/events/340763283356870/
• MNDBar: https://www.facebook.com/events/2334849176589376/