This article is part of our special coverage of the Art for Tomorrow conference in the Italian cities of Florence and Solomeo.
DOHA, Qatar – Tomorrow’s world feels alive today in Qatar’s glittering, post-World Cup atmosphere.
But for Sheikha Al Mayassa bint Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, the past also defines Qatar. As Chair of the Board of Qatar Museums, she is a speaker at this year’s Art for Tomorrow conference in Italy, organized by the Democracy & Culture Foundation, in partnership with DailyExpertNews. Sheikha Al Mayassa said she would address specifically the importance of heritage across the planet, the shared sense of how the past can inform the future and the ways in which different cultures can coexist in mutual respect to define what art defines for the present and the future.
In a recent interview in her sunlit office upstairs in the recently renovated Museum of Islamic Art, Sheikha Al Mayassa spoke about her interest in cultural heritage and the future of art in the Middle East and around the world.
She is a member of the Qatari royal family. (Her brother, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, is the country’s current emir, and her father, Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, ruled the country from 1995 until he stepped down in 2013.)
The family reportedly purchased some of the world’s most expensive works of art, including Cezanne’s “Card Players” in 2011 for $250 million. She is at the forefront of Qatar’s high-profile place on the art world stage and helped found Art for Tomorrow in 2015.
“When Art for Tomorrow started here in Qatar, we had two museums in our 25-year plan because we were just starting our mandate,” she said. “We have combined not only artists and creative people, but also policy makers, planners and decision makers.”
This cohesive approach is at the heart of Qatar’s vision for the future, most evident in two massive museums slated to open in 2030. The Lusail Museum, at 560,000 square feet and designed by Swiss architecture firm Herzog & de Meuron, will be one of the the world’s most extensive collections of paintings, drawings, photography, sculptures, rare texts and applied art, much of it from Qatar Museums’ so-called orientalist collection, created by European painters depicting the Muslim world.
“Lusail Museum: Tales of a Connected World,” an exhibition through Saturday at the Al Riwaq Gallery near the Museum of Islamic Art, previewed the planned museum, featuring hundreds of artworks, many from the collection of the Royal Family, as well as a model of the Lusail Museum, which will be the centerpiece of the ongoing development of the Lusail area, anchored by one of several stadiums built for the World Cup last year.
Also in 2030, the country plans to open the Art Mill Museum, housed in a former flour mill and designed by Pritzker Prize-winning Chilean architect Alejandro Aravena. The museum and arts complex, which will be located along Doha’s waterfront, will feature the facade of the mill with its towering silos.
“We keep the silos as part of our identity,” said Sheikha Al Mayassa. “I think buildings create an identity of a place. Qatar is not such a big country geographically, so we want to keep as much as possible.”
Coming from a country not widely associated with a rich history, given the scorching climate in a peninsula that was largely uninhabitable for centuries, Sheikha Al Mayassa said Qatar nonetheless had a rich heritage.
“If you go to the north of Qatar, we have a UNESCO site of ruins where you can walk and explore and see how people lived,” she explained. “When you visit the National Museum, you can see how old the country is. I think preserving heritage is not just about buildings, it’s about sites, and showing the tribes we know we’re descended from.”
The country’s natural history is also celebrated at the National Museum of Qatar, whose design is inspired by the desert rose, a formation of sand, sea water and the gypsum or barite crystals whose shape can resemble a rose and is found in the numerous salt basins scattered across this peninsula. The swirling and layered facade has made the museum one of the most recognizable landmarks in the country.
“My father’s vision for Jean Nouvel, the architect, was to go to the desert and find something from the geology of the land and find something that we could extend to the design of the museum,” she said. “He chose the desert rose, which was almost impossible to build at the time, but technology made it possible.”
To honor the past – even in a country usually represented by its shiny new skyscrapers that rose after the discovery of significant oil and natural gas deposits – Sheikha Al Mayassa thinks the future will follow.
“I think incubating young talent is what we do, and I think it’s an investment in tomorrow,” she said. “We do it for film, art and fashion. After all, artists need inspiration. I truly believe that culture is a bridge that brings everyone together.”
That’s where Art for Tomorrow seems vital, she said, because in a world where people feel increasingly separated, togetherness is even more important.
“I think Art for Tomorrow will become a platform for people to meet, to listen to different people and ideas,” she said. “Art in all its forms, be it film, fashion, visual arts, dance or music, brings people together.”
She pointed out that this does not necessarily mean that art in any form is accepted in every culture. She recalled an incident at last year’s Art for Tomorrow conference in Athens when someone asked if Qatar would ever consider hosting a specific photo exhibition known to contain provocative imagery, uncensored.
“I told the woman that she was not a partner for us because we have a curatorial conversation with the people who come here because we have to respect our own norms and cultural traditions,” said Sheikha Al Mayassa. “I think culture brings together people of different backgrounds and norms and allows for constructive dialogue in terms of respect. But the freedom of one ends as soon as he or she infringes on the other.”
That sense of differences – and similarities – is rooted in the focus on the past, present and future coming together in an evolving global art culture in an ever-volatile world.
“I think there’s a need for a place for discourse and tolerance because I feel like there’s a lot of intolerance around the world today because people think you should behave a certain way,” she said. “I think culture can help spread that.”