Marhaba Magazine

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Q A T A R

T O

Y O U

ARCHITECTURE Features the heart of Doha

SAFARI Dune Bashing, camping, and ATV Vol. 1

HISTORY

Iss. 1

Disover the Humble

Jan 2020

Beginning

Editorial

Salam alaikum! Growing up in Qatar has given me much love for the culture, history, and modernism through this magazine, I hope to share that love to you all. The country’s beauty influenced my knowledge and style as a student of the art, and therefore, showcase these influences. I hope through this, you will learn more about this loving country.

i Jan 2020

Trisha Panzo

Yawm Jayid,

Table of Contents

1 2 3

HISTORY Qatar Museum Reveals Conservation Efforts

06

Al Zubarah: The Hidden City

09

Souq Waqif, Our Modern Market

11

SAFARI What is Qatar Dune Bashing?

14

Arabian Night Campout

16

Oasis for Orion

17

ARCHITECTURE For I.M. Pei, History is Still Happening

20

The Sky Scapers

23

Katara in The Pearl

25

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HISTORY

Qatar Museums Reveal Conservation Efforts Behind the Making of the National Museum of Qatar

By Rania Hussein 03.13.2019 Photos by Trisha Panzo

As it prepares for the opening of the new National Museum of Qatar (NMoQ) on 28 March 28, Qatar Museums (QM) has revealed details of its expansive project of conserving and restoring the objects and artefacts that contribute to the immersive experience of this new museum, which showcases the country’s past, present and future.

The museum tells its sweeping story in three chapters — Beginnings, Life in Qatar, and Building the Nation — presented in eleven permanent galleries. Each gallery is an encompassing environment, which tells its part of the narrative through a creative combination of elements such as music, storytelling, archival images, oral histories and evocative aromas. Designed as distinctive experiences, these environmental galleries also contextualise an impressive array of archaeological and heritage objects, manuscripts, documents, photographs, jewellery, and costumes.

Dr. Haya Al Thani, Director of Curatorial Affairs at the National Museum of Qatar, said, “We have

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worked with teams of experts from Qatar and around the world to restore, protect and preserve each of the objects at the National Museum that help tell the overarching story of Qatar, its people and our place in the world. Although the National Museum focuses on creating an immersive experience using a variety of techniques, authentic objects are indispensable for connecting visitors to Qatar’s past. We have workedpainstakingly to bring them back to life.”

“Although the National Museum focuses on creating an immersive experience using a variety of techniques, authentic objects are indispensable for connecting visitors to Qatar’s past.”

The largest and most impressive of these authentic artefacts is the building that housed the original National Museum, and that now sits at the heart of the new NMoQ: the Palace of Sheikh Abdullah bin Jassim bin Mohamed Al Thani. QM fully restored and protected the Palace before construction began on the new NMoQ. One of Doha’s most recognisable landmarks, the Palace serves as a monument to a historic way of life in Qatar. It was restored and refurbished numerous times since it was built in 1906, which meant that the expert team for this new conservation project had to peel back the layers of previous work to unearth the splendour of the original design. Another challenge was posed by the age of the Palace and its location so near to the shore, which make it susceptible to cracking. To prevent further damage, architects placedconcrete piles underneath to support the structure once the water table was removed. To fulfil this ambitious brief, Qatar Museums engaged

specialists focusing on the development of sustainable building solutions using natural building materials.

All work was closely supervised and managed by specialists on-site and conducted in close collaboration with QM. From large-scale building restoration projects to artefact conservation, QM has worked with many local and international experts to preserve objects of historical significance using the latest techniques combined with knowledge and understanding of Qatar’s traditions. Specialist conservators have been working on preserving significant finds from archaeological sites around Qatar.

One such artifact is a pearl merchant’s chest from the 19th century. The object was block lifted from the excavation site at Al Zubarah, meaning it was taken from the ground with the surrounding soil due to the fragility of its condition. It will now be one of the highlighted pieces in the displays about Al Zubarah archaeological site.

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“The two-year-long restoration process on the Quran was overseen

by QM’s team at the Museum of Islamic Art, who discovered that an older Quran had been used to create the cover for Al Zubarah Quran, as one of the approved ways of utilizing older or damaged Qurans.”

Al Zubarah site yielded another object of great significance that will be on view at the NMoQ: Al Zubarah Quran, which is the oldest Quran created in Qatar and was written in Al Zubarah at the beginning of the 19th century

by Ahmed bin Rashed bin Juma bin Helal Al Muraikhi. The final page of the Quran bears the

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location of Ahmed’s birth, which was the city of Al Zubarah, indicting the city’s importance in the development of religious scholarships at the time. The two-year-long restoration process on the Quran was overseen by QM’s team at the Museum of Islamic Art, who discovered that an older Quran had been used to create the cover for Al Zubarah Quran, as one of the approved ways of utilizing older or damaged Qurans. A decision was taken to create “windows” on the cover to allow viewers to see the craftsmanship of the older Quran as well.

One of the most spectacular artefacts in the NMoQ collection, and a testament to the flourishing pearltrade relations between the Indian subcontinent and the Arabian Gulf, is the Pearl Carpet of Baroda. Commissioned by the Maharaja of Baroda in 1865 to adorn the tomb of the Prophet Mohammed (PBUH), the carpet has long been considered a remarkable work of art. Embroidery was a prevailing tradition

in Baroda, and artists who specialised in textile art were welcome at the Maratha court. This was also the case for jewelers and gem cutters as they were commissioned to create gifts that were presented by the Indian rulers to their visitors. Their love for jewels, long tradition of gift-giving and favorable financial circumstances enabled the lords and Maharajas of Baroda to create astonishing art pieces, including the beautiful Baroda carpet.

Over the span of a few years, an expert team of technicians has carefully restored the piece, which is made with more than 1.5 million Arabian Gulf pearls, as well as rubies, emeralds, sapphires and diamonds. The carpet will be displayed in the NMoQ permanent gallery called Pearls and Celebrations.

“The visitor’s chronological journey through the NMoQ will create opportunities to engage with these and other objects and learn about the role they play in telling Qatar’s story.”

The visitor’s chronological journey through the NMoQ, which extends through more than 1.5 km of experiences, will create opportunities to engage with these and other objects and learn about the role they play in telling Qatar’s story. n

2020 Jan 11

SAFARI

WHAT IS QATAR

DUNE BASHING? (AND HOW TO DO IT)

By Alexandra Wilson

W

hen you think of “off-roading,” your second though might not be “Qatar.” That is, unless you’ve gone dunebashing south of Doha. For anyone who visits the ultra-modern, skyscraper-filled Gulf metropolis, a day spent riding SUVs in the desert is a can’t-miss activity. Get your adrenaline pumping while you (safely) slide across the sand, go for a camel ride, and visit the stunning sea that sits in the middle of the desert, all in a day’s work.

KHOR AL ADAID, QATAR’S INLAND SEA Khor al Adaid occupies as somewhat controversial position, directly on the border between Qatar and Saudi Arabia.

(Along with a few other nearby countries, Saudi Arabia has severed diplomatic relations with Qatar and imposed a land, sea, and air blockade against the Gulf state.) In the 19th century, it was a haven for pirates, who could hide out and navigate the tricky waters. The Inland Sea is sort of a quirk of nature, as it’s as much a gigantic puddle in the desert as it is an ocean. The lack of rainfall means that the water is especially salty, which has created a fascinating, diverse

07.02.19 stable, navigating up and down the dunes requires the driver to constantly shift speed up and down. At various points, the car will have to slide across the sand, as if it were on ice. Dune bashing requires an intimate knowledge of the terrain and an understanding of what angles will allow the car to scale and descend the dunes without tipping over. (Don’t worry: the drivers are experts.) Dune bashing is typically done in an SUV with four-wheel drive and extra-wide tires. It has become an extremely popular weekend activity for many Qatari men. Groups will head out to the desert, sit on the dunes, and watch the cars zoom up and down the dunes. Or they’ll hop in the front seat and try to outdo their friends.

WHAT SHOULD I BRING TO DUNE BASHING? Since you’ll be spending hours in the desert sun, the most important supplies are lots of water, lots of sunscreen, sandals, and sunglasses. You’ll also want to make sure you have a camera, both to record what it’s like to scale the dunes and to capture the stunning views once you

“There’s truly nothing like it.

Khor al Adaid is a protected nature reserve, and it’s up for consideration as a UNESCO World HeritageSite.” ecosystem that includes creatures like sea turtles and desert foxes. At low-tide, you’ll be able to see fossils for all kinds of marine life from long ago. Khor al Adaid is quite literally a desert oasis, a sudden gleaming body of water that appears once you crest over the white dunes. The Inland Sea is about nine miles long and seven and a half miles wide. So, where does the water come from? It’s connected to the Arabian Gulf by a skinny channel that’s about six miles long.

There’s truly nothing like it. Khor al Adaid is a protected nature reserve, and it’s up for consideration as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. As the proposal for UNESCO inclusion reads: “There is no comparable lagoonal system of this type known elsewhere in the world.”

WHAT IS DUNE BASHING? Put simply: driving cars over sand dunes. But it’s way more complicated, and more fun, than that. Since the sand isn’t 14 MARHABA

reach Khor al Adaid. Depending on how long your tour is and what they offer, you may also want to pack a snack.

HOW TO GO DUNE BASHING IN KHOR AL ADAID You’ll need to book a dune-bashing trip through one of the various tour companies that offer them. Most companies offer half-day, full-day, and overnight trips. Overnight visitors will get to sleep in bedouin-like tents—some of which will offer various luxury amenities. Some tours will provide food, and some also offer camel rides during breaks in the dunebashing. Most will also offer at least one bathroom stop during the trip; it’s a desert, so there aren’t many places to go! A stop at the Inland Sea is typically the last activity before heading back to your ship. The trips also include multiple stops for drivers to re-adjust tire pressure so they can make sure you navigate the dunes safely. The SUVs can typically fit six or so people, so bring some friends. n

Photos by 365Adventures

ARABIAN NIGHTS:

C A MP OUT

By Sadi Mohammed Photos By elitetraveler Camping in vast open deserts is not just a pastime or play, rather it is a centuries-old lifestyle of the people of this region who love to spend their lives in the lap of nature. Now winter is back. The start of winter season also brings back the season of desert camping as thousands of people – particularly citizens – indulge in camping in open, night time-cold deserts to make their souls refresh and bodies agile.

Many citizens and residents wait for the winter season every year so that they can enjoy camping and desert life. Cold weather, tranquillity attract people especially families to enjoy the camping season. No doubt, the camping season presents a great opportunity to nature-lovers to break their dull, hectic routine of life through exploring vastness of nature, indulging in little adventures, meeting with friends, extended family members and enjoying the eager air of nights.

The citizens and residents make special preparations on weekends to spend some beautiful moments outside the cities at the camping sites. Camping also provides a fun atmosphere for children tired of everyday-the-same school and study routines.

In addition to recreational activities, camping also provides an important educational aspect to people who learn a lot about the life in the desert and practice many sports and traditional games.

For citizens, the camping is part of Qatari traditions, where the people looking for rest, tranquillity and recuperation begin to head towards camping-areas to replace the city’s life with the wildlife. Many people are keen to enjoy this season from the first day as it starts. They organise trips to the wildlife every week and purchase all necessary equipment such as tents, seats, lighting and other requirements that guarantee them comfort amidst beautiful nature. n

“The camping season presents a great opportunity to nature-lovers to break their dull, hectic routine of life through exploring vastness of nature, indulging in little adventures, meeting with friends, extended family members and enjoying the eager air of nights.”

2020 Jan 17

ARCHITECTURE

Photos by: Iwan Baan

For I. M. Pei, History Is Still Happening

By Nicolai Ouroussoff

I CAN’T seem to get the Museum of Islamic Art out of my mind. There’s nothing revolutionary about the building. But its clean, chiseled forms have a tranquillity that distinguishes it in an age that often seems trapped somewhere between gimmickry and a cloying nostalgia.

Part of the allure may have to do with I. M. Pei, the museum’s architect. Mr. Pei reached the height of his popularity decades ago with projects like the East Building of the National Gallery of Art in Washington and the Louvre pyramid in Paris.

Since then he has been an enigmatic figure at the periphery of the profession. His best work has admirers, but it has largely been ignored within architecture’s intellectual circles. Now, at 91 and near the end of a long career, Mr. Pei seems to be enjoying the kind of revival accorded to most serious architects if they have the luck to live long enough.

But the museum is also notable for its place within a broader effort to reshape the region’s cultural identity. the myriad large-scale civic projects, from a Guggenheim museum that is planned for Abu Dhabi to Education City in Doha a vast area of new buildings that house outposts of foreign universities are often dismissed in Western circles as superficial fantasies. As the first to reach completion, the Museum of Islamic Art is proof that the boom is not a mirage. The building’s austere, almost primitive forms and the dazzling collections it houses underscore the seriousness of the country’s cultural ambition.

“As the first to reach completion, the Museum of Islamic Art is proof that the boom is not a mirage.”

12 . 12. 2008

Perhaps even more compelling, the design is rooted in an optimistic worldview, one at odds with the schism between cosmopolitan modernity and backward fundamentalism that has come to define the last few decades in the Middle East.

The ideals it embodies that the past and the present can coexist harmoniously are a throwback to a time when America’s overseas ambitions were still cloaked in a progressive agenda.

To Mr. Pei, whose self-deprecating charm suggests a certain noblesse oblige, all serious architecture is found somewhere between the extremes of an overly sentimental view of the past and a form of historical amnesia.

“Contemporary architects tend to impose modernity on something,” he said in an interview. “There is a certain concern for history but it’s not very deep. I understand that time has changed, we have evolved.

But I don’t want to forget the beginning.

A lasting architecture has to have roots.”

“Contemporary architects tend to impose modernity on something,” he said in an interview. “There is a certain concern for history but it’s not very deep. I understand that time has changed, we have evolved. But I don’t want to forget the beginning. A lasting architecture has to have roots.” This moderation should come as no surprise to those who have followed Mr. Pei’s career closely. I recall first hearing his name during construction on his design for the Kennedy Library in Boston in the mid-1970s. The library, enclosed behind a towering glass atrium overlooking the water, was not one of 2020 Jan 21

Mr. Pei’s most memorable early works, nor was it particularly innovative, but the link to Kennedy lent him instant glamour.

The building’s pure geometries and muscular trusses seemed at the time to be the architectural equivalent of the space program. They suggested an enlightened, cultivated Modernism, albeit toned down to serve an educated, wellpolished elite. Completed 16 years after the assassination of John F. Kennedy, the library’s construction seemed to be an act of hope, as if the values that Kennedy’s generation embodied could be preserved in stone, steel and glass.

In many ways Mr. Pei’s career followed the unraveling of that era, from the economic downturn of the 1970s through the hollow victories of the Reagan years. Yet his work never lost its aura of measured idealism. It reached its highest expression in the National Gallery of Art’s East Building, a composition of angular stone forms completed in 1978 that remains the most visible emblem of modern Washington..

Yet his work never lost its aura of measured idealism. It reached its highest expression in the National Gallery of Art’s East Building, a composition of angular stone forms completed in 1978 that remains the most visible emblem of modern Washington.

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Since that popular triumph Mr. Pei has often seemed to take the kind of leisurely, slow-paced approach to design that other architects, no matter how well established, can only dream of. When first approached in 1983 to take part in a competition to design the addition to the Louvre, he refused, saying that he would not submit a preliminary design. President François Mitterrand nevertheless hired him outright. Mr. Pei then asked him if he could take several months to study French history.

“I told him I wanted to learn about his culture,” Pei recalled. “I knew the Louvre well. But I wanted to see more than just architecture. I think he understood immediately.”

Mr. Pei spent months traveling across Europe and North Africa before earnestly beginning work on the final design of the glass pyramids that now anchor the museum’s central court.

In 1990, a year after the project’s completion, he left his firm, handing its reins over to his partners Harry Cobb and James Ingo Freed so that he could concentrate more on design.

More recently he has lived in semi-retirement, sometimes working on the fourth floor office of his Sutton Place town house or sketching quietly in a rocking chair in his living room.

He rarely takes on more than a single project at a time.

Such an attitude runs counter to the ever-accelerating pace of the global age not to mention our obsession with novelty. But if Mr. Pei’s methods seem anachronistic, they also offer a gentle resistance to the short-sightedness of so many contemporary cultural undertakings.

Many successful architects today are global nomads, sketching ideas on paper napkins as they jet from one city to another. In their designs they tend to be more interested in exposing cultural frictions the clashing of social, political and economic forces that undergird contemporary society than in offering visions of harmony.

Mr. Pei, by contrast, imagines history as a smooth continuous process a view that is deftly embodied by the Islamic Museum, whose clean abstract surfaces are an echo of both high Modernism and ancient Islamic architecture.

Conceived by the Qatari emir and his 26-year-old daughter, Sheikha al Mayassa, it is the centerpiece of a larger cultural project whose aim is to forge a cosmopolitan, urban society in a place that not so long ago was a collection of Bedouin encampments and fishing villages. The aim is to recall a time that extended from the birth of Islam through the height of the Ottoman Empire, when the Islamic world was a center of scientific experimentation and cultural tolerance.

Seen from a distance, its blocklike forms are a powerful contrast to the half-finished towers and swiveling construction cranes that line the waterfront.

“My father’s vision was to build a cross-cultural institution,” said Sheikha al Mayassa, who has been charged with overseeing the city’s cultural development, during a recent interview here.

“It is to reconnect the historical threads that have been broken, and finding peaceful ways to resolve conflict.”

Mr. Pei’s aim was to integrate the values of that earlier era into today’s culture to capture, as he put it, the “essence of Islamic architecture.”

The museum’s hard, chiseled forms take their inspiration from the ablution fountain of Ibn Tulun Mosque in Cairo, as well as from fortresses built in Tunisia in the eighth and ninth centuries simple stone structures strong enough to hold their own in the barrenness of the desert landscape.

In order to create a similar sense of withdrawal from the world, Mr. Pei located his museum on a small manmade island, approachable from a short bridge. Seen from a distance, its blocklike forms are a powerful contrast to the half-finished towers and swiveling construction cranes that line the waterfront. Stepped on both sides, the apex of the main building is punctuated by a short tower with an eye-shaped opening that masks an interior dome.

From certain angles the structure has a flat, chimeric quality, like a stage set. From others it seems to be floating on the surface of the water an effect that recalls Santa Maria della Salute, the imposing Baroque church that guards the entry to the Grand Canal in Venice.

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As one approaches the building, the full weight of the structure begins to bear down, and the forms become more imposing. The bridge, flanked by rows of tall palm trees, is set diagonally to the entry, which makes the stacked geometric forms appear more angular and the contrast between light and shadow more extreme.

Soon a few traditional details begin to appear: the two small arched windows over the entry; a covered arcade that links the museum to an education center. These touches seem minor, but they provide a sense of scale, so that the size of the building can be understood according to the size of the human body.

The blend of modern and Islamic themes continues inside, where Mr. Pei draws most directly from religious precedents.

The hemispherical dome, an intricate pattern of stainless steel plates pierced by a single small oculus, brings to mind the geometric patterns used in Baroque churches as well as in ancient mosques.

The weight of the interior’s chiseled stone forms, with the dome resting on a faceted drum and square base, evokes both classical precedents and the late works of Louis Kahn, whose fusion of modern structure with a timeless monumentality was a turning point in Modernist history.

Mr. Pei has created a temple of high art, placing culture on the same pedestal as religion. His aim is both to create a symbol of Islamic culture and to forge a common heritage for the citizens of Qatar and the region.

Mr. Pei’s design lacks the depth and cohesion of Kahn’s greatest work. The structural system that supports the dome, for instance, is not particularly elegant; on one side the drum that supports it rests on slender three-story-tall columns, on the other it extends down to meet a wall that encloses a

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floor of offices before resting on a series of shorter columns, upsetting the room’s natural symmetry.

Nonetheless the meaning of the space is clear. Mr. Pei has created a temple of high art, placing culture on the same pedestal as religion. His aim is both to create a symbol of Islamic culture and to forge a common heritage for the citizens.

The grandeur of the atrium is only a prelude to the real climax: the galleries, which are as intimate as the atrium is soaring. Objects are encased in towering glass cabinets set on tables, giving them an accessibility rare in a major museum.

There is also just the right amount of space between the objects enough to let them breathe without being isolated.

And like the building itself, the collections are a reflection of the notion that Modernity and Islamic culture are not in opposition, but woven out of the same historical thread.

There are dazzling scientific objects here, including a display of astrolabes, as well as priceless works of calligraphy. (Philippe de Montebello, the director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, which owns one of the world’s premier collections of Islamic Art, put it best when I spoke to him at the museum’s inaugural gala: “Many of the pieces I’ve bid on over the past 10 years, they got.”)

Yet the most moving works are those that underscore the cosmopolitan values that are at the core of this museum: the notion that the free, open exchange of ideas is what builds great and tolerant civilizations: a matrix of Spanish Corinthian columns with Islamic flourishes; early translations of classical texts that formed the hinge between antiquity and the European Renaissance; a silk tapestry of a couple in front of a tent, illustrating the Islamic fable “Laila and Majnun” that is likened to Romeo and Juliet These are the moments that Mr. Pei’s architecture is meant to embody. His museum reminds us that building a culture, as much as a political or social agenda, can be an act of healing.

Like all great art, it requires forging seemingly conflicting values into a common whole. n

2020 Jan 25

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Special Thanks WRITERS

PHOTOGRAPHERS

Rania Hussein

Trisha Panzo

Alexandra Wilson

365Adventures

Sadi Mohammed

Elite Traveler

Nicolai Ouroussoff

Iwan Baan

2020 Jan 27

Visit www.tourqatar.com for more tours.

Published by Qatar National Publishers © January 2020