The Museum of Modern Arab Art

Introduction
This paper discusses Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art in Dohar, Qatar. It examines the historical developments of the museum, which was founded recently in 2010 with a collection of works provided by Sheikh Hassan bin Mohammed Ali al-Thani (Raza 2011). Mathaf, which simply means “museum” in Arabic, now boasts a collection of over 6000 works “spanning the late 19th century to the present” (Raza 2011). This paper provides an assessment of the museum’s collecting process, which is “intimately linked with the construction of a new Qatari identity for global consumption and national cohesion” (Exell 2014). The paper also analyzes the museum’s exhibition style, programmes, and overall structure and compares it to the Museum of Islamic Art, Doha. Mathaf represents an Arab perspective on modern art and contemporary life. It reflects the shared history of the Arab world by contemporary artists and fulfills the need for modern culture to be promoted as a force that shapes society and progresses it forward. Through the works of art collected and displayed at Mathaf, society is illuminated by the Arab artists who seek to influence, impact, and communicate with their contemporaries about issues that are of lasting importance. Not only does the art in Mathaf speak to the world, but so too does the curatorial expertise and the authority guiding the institution’s exhibits. This paper will show why Mathaf is recognized by critics today as one of the top cultural attractions of Qatar.
History
Mathaf is the first of its kind in Qatar. It owes its origins to the great love of contemporary art nursed in the heart of Sheikh Hassan bin Mohammed bin Ali al-Thani. The purpose of the modern art museum is to “foster creativity, promote dialogue and inspire new ideas about modern and contemporary Arab art” (Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art n.d.). Since museums are cultural institutions that “adjust to the changing needs of their audiences and recognize the factors that influence visitation rates in order to attract, engage, and maintain their visitors” (Karafotias 2016), Mathaf presents itself as a cultural force in the 21st century, standing at the forefront of Qatari society and the Arab community as a sponsor of cultural ideals, cultural expressions, and artistic empowerment.
The building itself is a celebration of high-mindedness and education. Situated in a renovated and architecturally transformed school (the work was achieved by French architect Jean-Francois Bodin) in Doha’s Education City region, Mathaf serves as a “remarkable example of recycled architecture that purposefully complements the building’s former identity as a space for learning and exploration” (Raza 2011). The building itself is full of elegance, charm, taste and is well-thought out in terms of planning and structure. Even though the building is only designed to be a temporary house for the museum, it is a worthy home for the collections of Sheikh Hassan.
The three exhibits that opened the museum were: “Sajjil: A Century of Modern Art,” “Interventions: A Dialogue Between the Modern and the Contemporary,” and “Told/Untold/Retold: 23 Stories of Journies through Time and Place.” Each of these exhibits showcases the talent, style, and beauty of the Arab world. It is evident that Sheikh Hassan’s aim in opening these works of art to the public was to embrace the rich culture and heritage of the Arabian people and display it for the modern world in a striking, modern setting that illuminates the significant progress made by the people of Qatar. A country that neglects to embrace its people and its past is a country that is destined to forget its identity and fall into confusion about who and what it is and who and what it should cherish. Mathaf shows that Qatar is not about to make that mistake, thanks to the well-trained eye of Sheikh Hassan.
As Shabout, al-Khudhairi and Chalabi (n.d.) note, Doha, Qatar, is part of the new Arab world and is playing an important role in shaping the identity of the Arab world in the 21st century. What is significant about this role is that the identity that is being cultivated in Doha does not conform “to secularized newly independent Arab countries, such as Egypt and Iraq, of the middle of the twentieth century” (Shabout, al-Khudhairi, Chalabi n.d.: 15). Instead this identity establishes a new Arabian face—one that is represented well by the state of Qatar: a rich, prosperous, modern country. Mathaf comes into play as expressing a vision that is at once regional but also global in its modernity. Mathaf embraces an ideal that is “no longer popular in contemporary rhetoric on art, but nevertheless essential to its understanding, namely, cultural Arabism” (Shabout, al-Khudhairi, Chalabi n.d.:15-6). In other words, Mathaf bridges the old and the new, and gives those passing between the two its blessing to share ideas, communicate, and embrace in peace and understanding.
The First Exhibits
The Sajjil exhibit was designed to illustrate the depth of the Mathaf collection and consisted of 200 paintings, sculptures and other works, the purpose being to historicize the modern art movement in the Arab region. The works were selected by Shabout, al-Khudhairi and Chelabi—respected scholars of the modern Arab art world. The taste and knowledge of modern Arabian art shined by including works such as that of Turkish-born Iraqi artist Jewad Selim, who founded the Baghdad Modern Art Group, Turkish-born Fahrelnissa Zeid who formed the Fahrelnissa Zeid Institute of Fine Arts in Amman, and Syrian artist Madiha Umar, who joined Baghdad’s One Dimension Group, which radically explored and expressed Arabic calligraphy in abstract designs. While the Sajjil demonstrated an example of the expanse of modern Arabic art, it was still somewhat constrained by the limits of the collection of Sheikh Hassan (Raza 2011). And though it did not provide much of a glimpse into Egyptian artists, who did help to develop modern art in North Africa (after all, the museum is really a celebration of the Qatari notion of Arabia), it does project a narrative that is forceful and compelling. For example, the section of the exhibit called “Huroufiyah” exhibited works that were very experimental in terms of what they did with Arabic text and lettering. This section exhibited a thematic structure that captured the bridging of the old and new that Mathaf meant to showcase. The workd by Hassan Sharif entitled City (1981) showed a “black-and-white etching of Arabic text and numbers within an abstract urban façade” (Raza 2011), which perfectly and artistically encapsulated the newness and oldness of the Arabian world.
The Interventions exhibited was curated by Shabout as well and consisted mainly of sculptures with a few paintings. One such painting touched on the violence in the Middle East in recent years and was titled Victim’s Rose (2010). It was in the abstract genre and the canvas on which it was painted was filled with bullet holes to express the way that Iraq (the native place of the artist) had been riddled with bullet holes following the fall of Saddam Hussein. Other works echoed this sentiment and gave this exhibit a mournful and melancholy feeling.
Told/Untold/Retold also meant to capture the spirit of the times. The exhibit focused on the “forced migration within the 22 Arab states due to war and unrest: the large sculptures tread a very fine line between the playful and the menacing” (Raza 2011). This contemporary exhibit served to highlight the problems that the Arab world continues to face and it served to give voice to the struggles of the Arab world as their region and homeland is invaded and overthrown by external forces exercising geopolitical aims that do not correlate with the objectives of the native Arab population—and so violence is often the result and forced migration the outcome. For the museum to display these haunting works is to give voice to the region’s major issues and remind the viewers to come together as a community, embrace one another and be mindful of the cultural heritage that the Arab people possess even in times of severe difficulty such as these.
The Collecting Process
As Dr. Exell (2014) points out Mathaf continues to collect and display works that aid in the construction of a new Arab identity that is also couched in the old word. The bridge between the two is Qatar, which has become immensely wealthy since its independence in 1971. Its many commercial works and cultural programs help to keep this identity moving in a positive direction while simultaneously opening a door to dialogue with other cultures. Exell (2014:1-2) notes for instance that “this kind of disciplinary collecting of Islamic and Western art reflects an exposure to the museums and art markets of Europe and the U.S., and articulates an engagement with global, or ‘universal’, value systems, aesthetics and discourses of knowledge.”
Yet while Mathaf is certainly a new kind of museum, the act of collecting and displaying is not new in the Gulf region. For example, the personal private collection of Sheikh Faisal bin Qassim al-Thani opened in 1998 near Doha and showcased many works. What makes Mathaf unique, however, is Sheikh Hassan’s own personal relationship with the museum and his own authoritative stake in its collections.
Curating Arab Modernity
Mathaf’s main inspiration has been Sheikh Hassan all along (al-Khudhairi n.d.). Curating Arab modernity has therefore begun with Sheikh Hassan, “whose acquisitions were inspired from the beginning by an insatiable curiosity” (al-Khudhairi n.d.:19). Sheikh Hassan’s passion was driven by the question of knowing “what place Arab artists had in the story of modern art” (al-Khudhairi n.d.:20). Sheik Hassan befriended many artists in Qatar and in other countries in the Middle East. He made his first purchases in 1986 at an exhibit in Doha: they were works by his artist friend Yousef Ahmad as well as other Qatari artists. Sheikh Hassan did not want to limit his collection to Qatari artists, however, and so with the help of Ahmad he broadened his scope, met new artists from other countries, and began to cultivate his collection in earnest.
Curating Arab modernity begins therefore with Sheikh Hassan’s foray into collecting works of art from living Arab artists. As Shabout, al-Khudhairi and Chalabi (n.d.:16) note, Mathaf “presents a narrative of possibilities that tells one story of the formation and development of modern art in the Arab world.” What the first exhibit Sajjil did for Mathaf was to perform “the act of recording the works and experiences, and of restoring the agency to the artists and their negotiations of making culture and history” (Shabout, al-Khudhairi, Chalabi n.d.:16). In other words, the act of curating in Mathaf is more about the act of giving voice back to the artist and allowing the modern Arab artist the opportunity to speak for the Arab people, for their experiences, their present, their past, and their future.
Selecting the works for Sajjil therefore depended on the curators’ ability to transcend the obstacles of inclusivity in the modern Arab world and embrace the challenge that diversity of experience heralds. Shabout, al-Khudhairi and Chalabi (n.d.:17) state that one “particular challenge of translation versus transliterations of artists’ names in accordance with new postmodernist theories was further complicated by the plethora of misspellings in English and French found all over the Internet today. A system of consolidating the different spellings to ultimately create a record of reference was researched and devised, based on artist’s preferred spelling when information is available,” or most commonly used otherwise. Respect for the artist, the artist’s preferences, and the artists’ vision is what drives the curating duties at Mathaf.
Additionally, Mathaf creates an environment where there is an “urgent need to allow for new understandings of the visual production within its historical contexts, but also the need to contribute to renegotiating Arabs’ positions to and in modernity” (Shabout, al-Khudhairi, Chalabi n.d.:17). Curating this space is a challenge because of the “inherent subjectivity of collecting” that can operated as a kind of confirmation bias on the part of the curators: in other words, what is being displayed in the museum? Is it the work that is meant to be representative of the modern Arab world? Or is a collection of works that the curators feel most strongly represents a vision of the world that they seek to project? Knowing how to achieve the goal of Mathaf in an objective and disinterested way while still retaining the need to discern which pieces deserve a place in the museum is another challenge for the curators of the museum.
Comparison to the Museum of Islamic Art, Doha
The Museum of Islamic Art, Doha was opened in 2008, two years prior to Mathaf, and was influenced by the styles of ancient Islamic architecture: its shape and design resemble the old world mosques, with their enormous geometric patterns emphasizing the grandeur of the interior. Mathaf’s architecture on the other hand resembles the mid-century modern style of the 20th century and even conveys elements of Bauhaus and the spirit of Breuer and Frank Lloyd Wright with the focus on flats, lines, simplicity, and the ethereal. Mathaf embraces its modernistic roots, while the Museum of Islamic Art embraces its traditional Islamic roots—and both are evident in the external character of the museums.
The Museum of Islamic Art is nearly ten times larger than Mathaf, too. At 45,000 square meters of space, the museum is enormous and represents the enormity of Islamic heritage in the Arab world (Elkhereiji 2016). The Mathaf on the other hand is only 5,500 square meters of space, which represents the still relatively small space in time and history that the modernist movement in art represents. If the Museum of Islamic Art is a monument to the past, Mathaf is a small symbol of the present and the place that modern Arabic art maintains in society.
There are five floors in the main building of the Museum of Islamic Art in Doha. There is a glass façade that covers the north face and gives a panoramic view of the Persian Gulf, which accents the tremendous majesty of the museum and accentuates the deep, rich mystery of the intertwining of art and culture, life and death, the present and eternity.
Mathaf consists of seven galleries on the upper floor, with the atrium and five galleries below for revolving exhibits. Being a renovated schoolhouse, the museum was not chosen for its panoramic views but rather for its place in the Education City, which represents the museum’s firm setting with one foot in tradition and one foot in the present, looking forward to the future of the Arab world and what its artists hope to accomplish as the make anew the Arab identity to reflect their own stories, experiences, hopes and struggles.
Conclusion
In conclusion, Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art is dedicated to the spirit and newness of the Arab identity in the 21st century, while celebrating the history and artists of the Arab countries. There is a link between the old culture and the new Arab culture in Mathaf, and the museum itself represents and serves as the bridge between these two identities. It recognizes the struggles and voices of the Arab artists and the people whose lives they describe in their works. It celebrates the modernist movements in art with abstract works that capture the otherworldliness of the 20th and 21st centuries. At the same time it is a labor of love for Sheikh Hassan, whose own private collection is on display in the public museum. A friend of artists for many years, Sheikh Hassan has been the driving force for Mathaf and it is through his passion and desire to see modern Arab art have its place in the Arabian world that Mathaf now exists as a window for the world onto modern Arabic artists are doing to celebrate their own culture, their own identities, and their own sense of communication with the past, the present and the future (Murray n.d.). For that reason, Mathaf stands out as unique in the Arab world.

Bibliography

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