Arial sunset over Qatar and the National Museum of Qatar
Qatar Muse The Marvelous
Museums of Qatar
— By Laura Tanna
Doha is an amazing city with incredible museums! Now that Qatar has won the right to host the FIFA World Cup Games in 2022, tourists have started paying attention to this small but very wealthy country. Located on a peninsula that juts into the Persian Gulf, just across the Arabian Sea from Iran and with Saudi Arabia on its land border to the south.
“Citizens of Qatar have one of the highest per capita income in the world thanks to natural gas production. Qatar became the first Arab country in the Persian Gulf to give women the right to vote in 1991”
Qatar is strategically placed in the middle of a politically sensitive area, which explains why the Al Udeid United States air base in Qatar currently houses at least 10,000 American military personnel and is home to the US Central Command with operations throughout the Middle East. Citizens of Qatar have one of highest per capita incomes in the world thanks to natural gas production. Their country’s population of 2.6 million includes less than 400,000 actual Qataris with over 120 different nationalities making up the rest of the population, creating a vibrant and exciting work environment.
Top: Doha Museum of Islamic Art; (L-R): Official Image of H.E. Sheikha Al-Mayassa bint Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani, Photo by Brigitte Lacombe; Exterior of the Museum of Modern Art, Mathaf, Photo Courtesy of the Museum Of Modern Art, Mathaf.
A Bedouin society whose economy was known for its dhows and pearls, the increased production of oil in the 1970s and the exploitation of natural gas in the 1990s irrevocably changed life. Now the skyline is ablaze with skyscrapers along the glamourous Corniche and the city hosts spectacular architecture. Women have definitely been part of this modernization. Qatar became the first Arab country in the Persian Gulf to give women the vote in 1991. Women are not veiled, can drive, and are in the forefront of important aspects of development. H.E. Sheikha Moza bint Nasser, the consort of the former Emir of Qatar, has led education and social reforms. She chairs the Qatar Foundation for Education, Science and Community Development which she co-founded in 1995 and in 1997 this Foundation launched Education City, which was inaugurated in 2003 on the outskirts of Doha. Foreign universities form part of this complex, including campuses of Virginia Commonwealth University, Weill Cornell Medical College, Texas A&M University, Carnegie Mellon, Georgetown University School of Foreign Service, Northwestern and the list goes on. Both foreign and Qatari students attend these universities and in 2010 Hamad bin Khalifa University was established in the name of the former Emir, now referred to as His Highness The Father Emir. He handed power in 2013 to his son with Sheikha Moza. Now the 8th Emir of Qatar, their son Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, is the youngest reigning monarch in the world.
It helps to keep a crib sheet handy with names of all the different members of the ruling Al Thani family as it can get quite confusing, especially as many family members have done astonishing things with their money. Readers may remember the Fall/Autumn 2015 Issue of Jamaque Paradis when the Editor asked me to include in my article something about Sheikh Hamad bin Abdullah Al Thani’s remarkable collection described in the book Beyond Extravagance A Royal Collection of Gems and Jewels, my introduction to the Al Thani family interest in art, culture and sharing their collections with others.
Another fascinating family member is Sheikh Faisal bin Qassim Al Thani who opened his incredible private museum to the public in 1998. Located near Education City, 25 minutes out of Doha at his farm, the Sheikh Faisal Museum is built over a fort in Al Samriya. Born in 1948, he started with a small trading company which became the enormously successful Al Faisal Holding Company. Throughout decades of his life, this widely travelled man collected paintings, weapons, classic cars, rare books, clothing, exquisite carpets — well you get the idea — all displayed in three vast buildings.
Two years ago he recruited Kees Wieringa, a former concert pianist, composer and museum director from The Netherlands, to become the Director of Sheikh Faisal Museum, to design and install new galleries amongst other duties. When I interviewed him in January 2018, Mr. Wieringa exclaimed: “Yes, maybe you can say this is the most remarkable museum in the world. Here you can see it’s an image of Qatar. Doha is a melting pot of cultures, maybe more than in New York – Indians, Pakistanis, Asians, Africans, Europeans, South Americans – all these people are living together in a very small country. Sheikh Faisal is a very important man, not only because he’s rich, but he’s creating a new heritage for this country. When cultures are living together they influence each other and they can learn from each other. That’s a very nice idea that you can see here in this museum. To be part of the development of Qatar, that’s the motivation for me to do this.”
Top: Museum of Islamic Art View from Interior of City across the Harbour, Photo Courtesy of the Museum of Islamic Art; (L-R): National Museum West View from the Doha Bay, Photo Courtesy of the National Museum; Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art Exterior, Photo Courtesy of Mathaf; Interior of Museum of Islamic Art in Doha, Photo Courtesy of the Museum of Islamic Art.
As we spoke, school children arrived to view the largest Koran in the world, vintage cars — which especially attract Chinese visitors — colourful Bedouin carpets and those distinctive Arab boats, dhows, something which teaches children about their Qatari heritage when Doha was a fishing village and men were diving for pearls. There’s ninth century pottery from Iraq, a 15th century cannon from Persia and a section on religions, including Orthodox Christian artefacts, Jewish Moroccan pieces, religious statues from Ghana and Benin. Mr. Wieringa shows us an especially intriguing item, a huge Persian carpet hanging so that one can view both sides, no knots showing, Shia symbols on one side and Sunni on the other with Christian symbols woven in as well. He called it “the Peace Carpet, the Mona Lisa of the Arab world.”
Sheikh Faisal Museum was preparing “Cultures in Dialogue,” an exhibition in conjunction with UNESCO to open in Malta, before touring other European cities. Leaving me to continue my visit with Joseph, a delightful Egyptian Coptic guide, and Mr. Walid al-Dulaini, who previously worked in the Baghdad Museum, Mr. Wieringa mentioned that Sheikh Faisal’s collection contains more than a hundred thousand items, and is not only the biggest museum in Qatar, but the only private one.
Other museums in Qatar are administered through Qatar Museums Authority (QMA) of which H.E. Sheikha Al-Mayassa bint Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani is Chairperson. Declared the most influential person in art on ArtReview’s Power 100, this is perhaps because Bloomberg reported that her annual acquisition budget for Qatar Museums could be as much as a billion US dollars. Sister of the Emir and daughter of The Father Emir and H.E. Sheikha Moza, Sheikha Al-Mayassa graduated with a B.A. from Duke University in 2005, including a year at the Sorbonne in Paris. Married with four children, she is a formidable individual who in a February 2012 TED talk said her goal was to create a local art collection to help shape her country’s identity. Noting in 2013 that 70% of the Qatari population is under 30, she has a vision of art and education for the next two decades.
“The Arab Museum of Modern Art I think is fantastic. Sheikh Faisal Museum is mind blowing, the amount of stuff you see! It reminds me of Museo Bardini in Florence.”
Her father opened the Museum of Islamic Art in 2008 after they coaxed renowned architect I.M. Pei out of retirement to design an iconic repository for the treasures accumulated since the 1980s. For six months he travelled the Muslim world to absorb a sense of what would be the truest expression of a building to showcase this body of work collected from Spain, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Turkey, India and Central Asia. I.M. Pie said it was the 9th century Ibn Tulun Mosque in Cairo which inspired him and rejecting all proposed sites, he suggested building an artificial peninsula jutting into the water so that nothing could encroach upon the museum in the future. The five-story limestone-coated structure with a dome and panoramic views of the Persian Gulf and the skyscrapers of West Bank is phenomenal. Open to the public free of charge, with a library, café, 200-seat theatre, classrooms, and restaurant, outside it even has a purpose-built park, open 24 hours a day. The state of the art, temperature-controlled displays of metal work, ceramics, jewelry, woodwork, textiles and glass from three continents dating from the 7th to the 19th century are so modern I had a nostalgic yearning for the homey, old-fashioned displays of Sheikh Faisal’s collection. Together these museums offer an entry into the soul of a nation, firmly anchored in tradition while transitioning into a new era.
The stated purpose of the Qatar Museums Authority as an organisation is to be a cultural instigator for the creation generation. To that endeavor Matahf, the Arab Museum of Modern Art was opened in 2010 exploring 20th century Arab painting, sculpture and photography, though some works date from the 1840s. Sharif Massouh, a Syrian Christian who had lived in Antigua and Barbuda as a youngster, working for Mathaf’s visitor services, said Mathaf has the largest collection of modern Arab art in the world with 9,800 pieces, but only displays 250 at a time, rotating them every six months. The word mathaf means museum so we were in the Mathaf Mathaf, located in Education City. Originally a girls’ school for Qatari ladies, the building houses a collection donated by Sheikh Hassan bin Mohamed bin Ali Al Thani, a relative of the Father Emir.
Mr. Massouh noted that while the building looks like it’s under construction, as though with scaffolding and network, the idea is that Mathaf is modern. Contemporary art looks into the future, always new, happening, being constructed. Describing sculptures outside the museum’s entrance he called them protectors of Mesopotamia, the land between two rivers — Iraq, Syria, Palestine, Jordan and Lebanon — the Fertile Crescent. Under it is the Arab peninsula or Al Jazeera, the Arab word for island, which is where the name for the television station started by the Father Emir is derived. Artwork by Iraqi artists Ismail Fatah, Ismail Azzam and Dia al Aaawi was highlighted and that by Kuwaiti Sami Mohmmad and Lebanese Salwal Shoucair who died in 2017 at the age of 101.
Mr. Massouh explained that under the direction of Sheikha Al-Mayassa many museums are being built. The Fire Station Museum opened 2012, and there are projections for a Sports Museum, Children’s Museum and an Orientalist museum is to be designed by Herzog & de Meuron. The most stunning museum is undoubtedly the National Museum of Qatar (NMoQ), designed by French architect Jean Nouvel, which opened at a star-studded international event with 700 guests on the evening of March 27th, 2019. The building is an avant-garde structure with hundreds of intersecting vertical and horizontal discs of fibre-glass reinforced concrete, interlocking to create spaces protecting from the desert heat. Inspired by petals of desert roses – crystallised natural mineral formations occurring underneath the surface of shallow salt basins found in the Gulf – the splendor of the design speaks for itself. Built around the original family home and seat of government for 25 years, eleven permanent galleries loop around almost a mile of award-winning Koichi Takada architects’ desert scape interiors so that the structure becomes a bridge between the past and the present. As advocated by Sheikha Al Mayassa, the National Museum of Qatar is a way “to define ourselves instead of forever being defined by others…celebrating our identity.”
Preparations for 2022 World Cup are evident everywhere, from the metro being built, to more housing and at least seven stadiums under construction. This was a bone of contention several years ago when the government was accused of not protecting the rights of primarily Nepalese, Pakistani, Bangladeshi and Indian workmen. Publicly called out on the issue, the Emir launched an investigation and undertook to reform the kafala system whereby employers provided poor living accommodations, dangerous working conditions and arbitrarily restricted workers from leaving the country. In October 2017 Human Rights Watch praised Qatar’s commitment to improving workers’ treatment and the International Trade Union Confederation on January 30, 2018 announced they believed that the kafala system would be scrapped by the end of March.
Our direct flight from Miami to Doha on Qatar Airways was superb, providing better service than on American or British. With lie flat seats in business class, the 13 plus hour flight over was a breeze, and on the return 16-hour flight I saw two award winning movies while sipping champagne. Qataris themselves are not allowed to drink alcohol, though apparently provisions are to be made for alcohol zones when the foreign football crowd comes in 2022. Our Five-Star Four Seasons Hotel on The Corniche featured bars and excellent restaurants including Nobu Japanese cuisine, Il Teatro Italian specialties, a Pool Grill and our favourite, Elements, with a mix of Arabic, Asian, Indian and seafood. Also a Shisha Terrace overlooks the sea for those wishing to smoke their hookahs and eat fancy “street food” with a twist.
The brilliant concierge staff organized my museum visits and found us a guide and car to Souq Waqif, the traditional market existing for over a century, though after a 2003 fire it was rebuilt in 2006 to conserve the traditional Qatari architecture with mud-rendered walls and exposed timber. Now it’s a popular place for tourists and locals alike to buy garments, spices, souvenirs, enjoy restaurants and Shisha cafes or boutique hotels. Or to take your falcon to the hospital. That’s right. The Falcon Hospital isn’t named after Mr. Falcon. It is a pristine veterinary hospital where scores of immaculately white robed Qatari men may be found with birds in hand seeking care for their prized possessions. Not to be missed, nor the local shops to buy the falcons. Best of all was when men atop beautifully decorated Arabian horses came riding through, carrying a Qatari flag.
I sat down with the Four Seasons Hotel manager, Andrea Obertello, an Italian Argentinean woman who had once worked at the Sandals in Montego Bay! Having worked in Uruguay, Marrakech, Miami, and Florence, she had no problems with a staff in Doha comprising 50 nationalities. I wondered whether the blockade imposed by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain and Egypt on June 5, 2017 had any affect on business.?
T-B: Sheikh Faisal Bin Qassim Al Thani Museum, Photo courtesy of the Seikh Faisal Bin Qassim Al Thani Museum;
Horsemen in Souq Waqif, Photo by Laura Tanna
Ms Obertello reasoned that Qatar is a very strongly positioned country, highly educated, and so having a highly educated country with that thinking process of “OK, I need to find how to resource and restructure my country quickly to cope with this,” made all the difference. Eggs, milk and dairy products used to come from the KSA so Qatar brought in 500 dairy cows and now all the milk and eggs are produced in Qatar. In seven months they turned it around. Coffee-roasting plants are coming, hydroponic agriculture, 30 more aircraft are arriving as Qatar Airways flies to 150 destinations around the world.
What surprised Ms. Obertello is that many of her guests were not Qataris taking “staycations”. Since the locals could go the big hubs of Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Bahrain, they were checking into their own hotels for the weekend to enjoy the beach, pools, spa and restaurants. Asked if there was socializing between expats and Qataris she said: “Sure. I never felt distance or differentiation, except for the language barrier from time to time and in certain gatherings that are only for gentlemen or vice-a-versa. There’s not even a lot of rules in terms of our physical appearance outside. You don’t have to veil. You don’t have to cover. Needless to say, there is a limit, right? You will never go out in super shorts but on a private beach you can be in a bikini. That is something that in other countries you cannot.”
Like everyone else, the Four Seasons Hotel was gearing up for 2022. A complete renovation of all the rooms was soon to start. Situated in the most prominent area of Doha, on the West Bank of The Corniche, the Four Seasons enjoys many prominent guests and celebrities who come to Qatar. What does she suggest visitors see or do? “I would definitely advise them to see the museums. The Museum of Islamic Art, even if you’re not interest in Islamic art, just for the sake of admiring the architecture. The Arab Museum of Modern Art I think is fantastic. Sheikh Faisal Museum is mind blowing, the amount of stuff you see! It reminds me of Museo Bardini in Florence.”
Then she floors me by adding, “You need to go to the National Library, designed by Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas. Architecturally, it’s like an open book. On the collections, they spent almost a billion dollars. They have the second largest collection of historical maps in the world. Number one is in London. The heritage section where the maps are is worth seeing. They have the Napoleon inventory maps, the ones when he was going to Egypt. Ten of those. Like, how can you even have that? And the heritage section, they did it as if it were an actual excavation. They changed the stone, all made of beautiful marble. When you walk in, you have to look down to see the heritage section, like it’s a labyrinth. It’s modern, but it looks like you need to go and discover it. The official opening is in April but the curator lives here, Dr. Wastawy, what a great lady. She’s fantastic. I can introduce you.”
Alas, I was leaving and my visit is short. I never stepped foot into a shopping mall and my guide told me they are like luxury community centres, because while it is a lovely 75 degrees at the end of January, by mid-summer it will be well over 100 degrees so everyone goes to the air conditioned malls, one of which is so luxurious he told me that the owner refused to have a self-service Starbucks so Doha has the only Starbucks with waiters. What I can I tell you. This is one place worth a visit, even before 2022. — JP