DUBAI— For the second edition of their Dubai fair, London-based organizers Brian and Anna Haughton gave the event a new name and an expanded agenda. Art Antiques Design Dubai, as the event is now known (it went by Art & Antiques Dubai last year), ran February 18–22 at the Madinat Arena, Madinat Jumeirah, and had some 35 exhibitors from nine countries. It also featured a partnership with the online antiques, vintage furniture, and design vendor 1stdibs.com, which sponsored a section of the fair called AAD Interiors, with four professionally designed “rooms” that used pieces from both dealers participating in the fair and those who were not present, such as New Yorkers Brian Kish, Donzella 20th Century Gallery, and Cristina Grajales.

Overall, the fair produced few reported sales and failed to attract huge crowds, but the attendance was respectable and those in the know said that all the “right” people — government officials, royals, and the all-important royal decorators — were on hand.

Philippe Rocha of Espasso, a company based in New York and Los Angeles that specializes in modern and contemporary Brazilian furniture, manned one of the AAD Interiors booths. His experience at the fair led him to conclude that “Dubai is a completely different market [from Western markets], more conservative and hermetic. They are looking for something new but are a bit afraid to spend money for it. But at some point this new design will infiltrate, and we have to be a leader, not a follower.”

Rocha said that visitors to the fair loved the wooden bowls made by Brazilian artist Etel Carmona. The dealer also reported that he had two offers on an unattributed vintage bar made of jacaranda wood, metal, and Formica, which is on reserve at $9,500. It will be sold, if not to the collector who has it on reserve, then to one of the other two.

Jane Kahan of New York, another AAD Interiors dealer, showed modern tapestries by the likes of Magritte and Léger and ceramics by Picasso. The works drew significant interest at the opening of the fair, with people coming back on the following days for a second and third look, especially to see two tapestries by Vasarely, each priced at $115,000, and the Picasso ceramics, priced between $25,000 and $70,000.

New York’s Maison Gerard, also affiliated with AAD Interiors, had success at last year’s fair, selling three or four items as well as other pieces in the week after the fair closed. This year, the gallery reported selling a few small objects on the next-to-last day and said they were negotiating with an expatriate Frenchman about some major pieces and with a French designer about a pair of Art Deco iron gates attributed to Edgar Brandt and priced at $48,000.

The most spectacular item at the fair was a manuscript by Omar ibn Said brought by D.C. dealer Derrick Beard. Said was a Muslim slave in the United States in the mid-1800s, and he wrote the first Arabic slave narrative ever produced in North America or Europe. Written in 1831, the text was translated into English twice, first in 1848. Although he maintained his Muslim faith throughout his life, Said loved the teachings of Jesus and Moses and attended a Presbyterian church. He died in North Carolina at the age of 94 in 1864, one year before emancipation. The manuscript has been shown in museum exhibitions, but this is the first time it has been included in a selling exhibition, according to Beard. It carried a price tag of $30 million, or double its value before the election of Barack Obama. “I don’t expect it to sell today or tomorrow,” said Beard. “But interest could come out of showing it. I really would like a Middle Eastern government to buy it.”  

One artist who made her international debut at the Dubai fair was Saudi Arabia’s Adilah Bundakji, a former fashion designer who now divides her time between Jedda and Pakistan. Bundakji makes spectacular embroideries based on verses from the Koran and the Kiswah, a gold-embroidered black cloth that shrouds the holy Kaaba shrine in Mecca. She has no gallery representation but has been showing to clients in Saudi Arabia for the past 12 years. Her embroideries are woven with pure silk threads on tapestry cloth using a variety of techniques and are priced around $10–12,000. One of her most evocative pieces was a black and silver embroidery of the 99 names of Allah.

Liv Ballard, an exhibitor from Los Angeles, showed jewelry that she designs, which is then made by a master goldsmith in Rome and sold at Maxfield boutique in Los Angeles and online through 1stdibs.com. Her limited-edition designs are based on mythical themes and cartography. “What we make is essentially bespoke jewelry,” she said. Her booth attracted considerable attention, and although she had not sold anything by the fair’s second-to-last day, she said that she noticed lots of hits from the Emirates on her Web site. One of her outstanding pieces is a “Caput Mundi” necklace, an 18-karat, yellow-and-white gold and blue sapphire pavé pendant surrounded by a diamond pavé equator. It was priced at $37,500. The globe can be personalized with diamonds on the cities of choice.

London rare books dealer Bernard J. Shapero said he did a bit of business last year and was hoping to build on it. The star of his booth, which he shared with London dealer Sam Fogg, was David Roberts’s lithograph collection The Holy Land, Syria, Idumea, Arabia, Egypt and Nubia, one of the few surviving complete sets from the 200 subscribers’ copies printed between 1842 and 1849. The six-volume set was priced at $450,000. Fogg, who did not attend the fair himself, had a rare complete Qur’an in Eastern Kufic script, from Persia or Mesopotamia, dating from the 11th century. The work was examined carefully by several potential Emirati buyers on the fair’s opening night. Another star item was a large calligraphic tile from Kashin, in central Iran, from the early 13th century.

Lewis Smith of London’s Koopman Rare Art, who was exhibiting for the second time, said that the gallery had not sold anything by the day before the fair ended, though several possible deals were in the works. “People here need to think,” he said, “they don’t get it in a minute.” Simon Phillips of London’s Ronald Phillips, Ltd. said that he, too, was “waiting for the big one.”

That seemed to be the consensus at the fair. Because Arabs are known for bargaining, many exhibitors had their hopes pinned on success in the last few moments, but no one emailed after the closing, as they said they would, to report additional sales.

Still, if you looked around, you could find scattered sales. Sladmore Sculpture Gallery of London sold two bronze sculptures by Mark Coreth, one of a lioness and the other of a cheetah, each priced at around $11,000. “We have clients here,” says Edward Sladmore, “so we’d be silly not to come. We have sold to new clients so far, and we have interest in a Degas sculpture priced at $165,000.”  

New York private dealer Barbara Deisroth, a specialist in 20th century decorative arts who was visiting the fair, said she found the audience who came to hear her speak the day before at a seminar in Abu Dhabi was “just learning about antiques but were smart and asked good questions. The Emiratis don’t really like antiques,” she said. “They prefer new things. So it’s a learning process.”

So will the show succeed in the future? It seems likely to at least continue, because the UAE government is determined “that Dubai will be a key destination on the global art map,” according to an official at the Department of Tourism and Commerce Marketing, who were sponsors of the fair. Another sponsor was Dubai First, a bank whose credit cards not only have no limit, but also have a diamond embedded in them.