In preparation for the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022™, Qatar has been transforming into an outdoor art museum experience with installations by Jeff Koons, KAWS, Peter Fischli & David Weiss, Shilpa Gupta, Shua’a Ali, and Faraj Daham, among other international, regional and Qatari artists.

As part of Qatar Creates, the year-round national cultural movement that curates, promotes, and celebrates the diversity of cultural activities in Qatar, Qatar Museums (QM) launched a programme in August 2022 of new and commissioned public artworks by celebrated Qatari, regional and international artists, presented throughout Doha and the nation. From the Qatari desert to the bustling Souq Waqif, the nation’s public spaces have transformed into a vast outdoor art museum experience, featuring more than 100 public artworks, which will be on view for locals and the 1.5 mn visitors who are expected to travel to Doha for the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022™. 

HE Sheikha Al Mayassa bint Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, Chairperson of QM, said, ‘The addition of 40 new, major works of public art is a significant milestone for Qatar’s public art programme. Public art is one of our most prominent demonstrations of cultural exchange, where we present works from artists of all nationalities and backgrounds. From the arrivals at the best airport in the world — Hamad International Airport (HIA) — to every neighbourhood in our nation, public art is there to make your experience unique. These works vary in size and form, and they encompass a wide range of subject matter, but all further our mission to make art more accessible, engage our publics, celebrate our heritage, and embrace the cultures of others. 

‘More importantly, artists from every corner of the world — representing all continents — have been invited to express their artistic creativity with our very own diverse population. Our longstanding commitment to public art is visible across Qatar, and we hope these works will be welcomed by locals and enhance the experiences had by the millions of visitors we expect to welcome to Doha this year.’

QM is working with various entities across the city on Qatar’s public art programme including HIA, the Supreme Committee of Delivery and Legacy (SC), and the Public Works Authority (Ashghal) to install artworks in a variety of both highly trafficked and unexpected public spaces, designed to surprise and delight passersby, including parks, shopping areas, educational and athletic facilities, HIA and Doha Metro stations, as well as stadiums that are hosting the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022™ matches.  

Abdulrahman Ahmed Al Ishaq, QM’s Director of Public Art, said, ‘Doha is a vibrant destination, and adding more than 40 new public art installations will further transform the city into a dynamic urban canvas that serves to spark conversations and provide sources of inspiration for all. Qatar Museums’ public art programme, more than anything else, serves as a reminder that art is all around us, not confined to museums and galleries, and can be enjoyed and celebrated whether you are going to work, or school, or the desert or the beach.’

Qatar  is home to one of the world’s finest and most diverse collections of contemporary art, and QM is at the centre of it all. Making art a part of everyday life, Qatar became one of the first countries in the Gulf to create a comprehensive contemporary public art programme. To date, the programme has grown to encompass approximately 70 works by more than 60 artists from Qatar, across the MENA region, and around the world.  

Qatari and MENA region artists whose work is presented in the public art programme include Adel Abidin, Ahmed Al Bahrani, Shouq Al Mana, Shua’a Al Muftah, Salman Al Malek, Monira Al Qadiri, Simone Fattal, and Faraj Daham.

One of Qatar’s new public art is Tom Claassen’s Falcon (2021), which QM unveiled outside the Departures Hall at HIA in July 2021. The large scale golden falcon depicts the national bird of Qatar.

HIA is home to an extensive collection of public art, including the popular Untitled (Lamp/Bear) by Urs Fischer, Small Lie by KAWS, Flying Man by Dia Al Azzawi, and much more. To learn more about Art at HIA, see Traveller Information in the Discovering section. 

Other public art highlights include Richard Serra’s 7 at MIA Park and East/West-West/East in Zekreet, A Blessing in Disguise by Ghada Al Khater at the Fire Station, Bruce Nauman’s Untitled (Trench, Shafts, Pit, Tunnel and Chamber) at M7, Flag of Glory by Ahmed Al Bahrani and Gates to the Sea by Simone Fattal at the National Museum of Qatar (NMoQ), Subodh Gupta’s Gandhi’s Three Monkeys at Katara Cultural Village and Spooning at M7 at Msheireb Downtown Doha (MDD), Maman by Louise Bourgeois at the Qatar National Convention Centre (QNCC), Smoke by Tony Smith at the Doha Exhibition and Convention Center (DECC), The Miraculous Journey by Damien Hirst at Sidra Medicine, Bench by Saloua Raouda Choucair at MIA Park, and more.

New public artworks

• A collection of temporary sculptures and installations by Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama – including Blooms Forever (2019), Flower that Speaks All About My Heart (2018), Dancing Pumpkin (2020), and Narcissus Garden (2022), among others – are in view on the grounds of Museum of Islamic Art (MIA) and MIA Park.

• German artist Katharina Fritsch’s newly installed iconic bright blue Hahn (2021) is on view at the Sheraton Grand Doha Resort & Convention Hotel.

Maqam I, Maqam II, Maqam III (2022) by Lebanese artist Simone Fattal, for which she has created three granite sculptures in a blue coloured granite with a manifold shape that can be perceived at once as a dune, a construction or a tent that appear to be geographical landmarks.

• On view at Al Masrah Park is Dugong (2022), a massive, approximately 21 m high and 31 m wide polychromed mirror-polished stainless-steel sculpture by American artist Jeff Koons in the form of a dugong, an endangered marine mammal native to Qatar’s waters that has inhabited the waters off the peninsula for centuries. An artwork also celebrating the dugong is the Dugong Family installation by Iraqi sculptor Ahmed Al Bahrani in Al Ruwais.

• Commissioned works by Brazilian artist Ernesto Neto include an installation in the Qatari desert are titled Slug Turtle, TemplEarth (2022), and CocoonEarth, Our Goal is the Life (2022).

• KAWS’ site-specific commission THE PROMISE (2022), depicting the American artist’s companion figures in a tender gesture suggesting a parent carefully passing the globe to the hands of a child, is a unique piece for the future Dadu, Qatar Children’s Museum, and is on view at its park.

• Doha Mountains by Swiss artist Ugo Rondinone, on view along Ras Bu Abboud Beach near Stadium 974, echoes the colours of the five Olympic rings that encircle the 3-2-1 Qatar Olympic and Sports Museum.

• A mosaic installation titled Qatari Walls ‘Village of the Sun’ (2022) by American artist Rashid Johnson comprises four walls.  

• On view at Al Masrah Park is Doha Modern Playground (2022), a site-responsive playground by Shezad Dawood inspired by a group of four key modernist buildings in Doha.

• Located along the West Bay North Beach is Kuwaiti artist Monira Al Qadiri’s Zephyr (2022), a large-scale recreation of a microscopic organism seen in fossilised marine algae found in the Arabian Peninsula. 

• Peter Fischli & David Weiss’s sculpture Rock on Top of Another Rock (2022) is made up of two nearly 30-ton boulders that are stacked and balanced without aid. On view at the Qatar National Theatre, the installation is the last work created by the Swiss artist duo.  

• A series of sculptures by Korean artist Suki Seokyeong Kang titled Here We Hear (2022) on the Doha Corniche encourages spectators to congregate and interact with one another.

I Live Under Your Sky Too (2022) is a light installation by Shilpa Gupta in the form of an animated sentence in which the Indian artist’s handwriting rises and shines from lines of a ruled book to read ‘I Live Under Your Sky To’ in three interwoven languages, at Stadium 974.

• American conceptual artist Lawrence Weiner’s All the Stars in the Sky Have the Same Face (2011/20) is a large banner in red, white and blue that extends across Stadium 974. 

• Inspired by construction debris and location marks or neshan found in both urban and desert environments, Qatari artist Shua’a Ali’s Tawazun (2022) in Msheireb Downtown Doha (MDD) and Milestones (2022) in Old Al Ghanim explore the relationship between past and present day Doha using symbolic stacking of materials to create visionary, balanced and agglomerative sculptural forms. 

• The site-specific work Us, Her, Him (2022) by Lebanese artist Najla El Zein is on view at the Flag Plaza along the Corniche. It explores the relationship between form, use, space and emotion through themes relating to abstract conceptions of the body.

• Located around the Qatar National Theatre is American artist Faye Toogood’s Clay Court (2022), an immersive display of 17 hand-shaped sculptures.

• The enormous Gekröse (2011) is one of the late Austrian artist Franz West’s largest works, presenting a monumental, wielded aluminium sculpture that is as imposing as it is whimsical, in bright pink hues, that may concurrently attract and shock viewers at Al Masrah Park.

• Iraqi artist Adel Abidin’s light installation They Asked Me to Change It, and I Agreed (2022) on the façade of Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art, which explores contemporary art as a means of dialogue and change and adds to the existing works Al Safina (The Ship) by Egyptian artist Adam Henein and The Guardian of the Fertile Crescent (2001–2010) by the late Iraqi painter and sculptor Ismail Fattah. 

• Qatari artist Shouq Al Mana’s Egal (2022) is installed along the Lusail Marina Promenade, and serves as a tribute to Qatar’s history and traditions.

Explore the wonderful and extensive world of public art in Qatar as the country boasts a dynamic art and cultural scene. From striking sculptures and specially commissioned artwork and photography, Qatar’s public art pieces are immersive, informal and interactive.

For more information on art in Qatar, visit the Qatar Creates website qacreates.com and the Qatar Museums website qm.org.qa


Photos: Iwan Baan, Courtesy of Qatar Museums

Author: Ola Diab

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