The programme will be presented as part of Qatar Creates, the year-round national cultural movement that curates, promotes, and celebrates the diversity of cultural activities in Qatar, with a number of the exhibitions opening during Qatar Creates Week in October.
The wide-ranging exhibitions, presented in museums, galleries, and cultural hubs across Doha, are:
- The Present: The Future of the Past, Air 6 & 7 Exhibition, August 31 to December 16, Fire Station: Artist in Residence.
- Masterpieces of Furniture Design, An exhibition by QM and the Vitra Design Museum, September 8 – December 9, M7.
- The Shape of Time: Art and Ancestors of Oceania from The Metropolitan Museum of Art, October 24 – January 25, 2024, National Museum of Qatar (NMoQ).
- Growing Kopi, Drinking Qahwa; Stories of Coffee in Qatar and Indonesia, Presented as part of the Qatar – Indonesia 2023 Year of Culture, October 24 – February 17, 2024, NMoQ.
- Dan Flavin | Donald Judd: Doha, October 25 – February 24, 2024, QM Gallery – Al Riwaq.
- Fashioning an Empire: Textiles from Safavid Iran, October 23 – April 20, 2024, The Museum of Islamic Art (MIA).
- De/Constructed Meaning, October 26 – March 5, 2024, Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art.
- The Mailbox Project: Cities Under Quarantine, October 26 – March 5, 2024, Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art.
- Mehdi Moutashar: Introspection as Resistance, 26 October 2023 – 5 March 2024, Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art.
- Distilled Lessons: Abstraction in Arab Modernism, 26 October 2023 – 5 March 2024, Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art.
- Mal Lawal 4, December 20 – January 2024, NMoQ.
“Masterpieces of Furniture Design, An exhibition by QM and the Vitra Design Museum”, will showcase more than 50 iconic pieces that span 200 years of design, accompanied by the encyclopaedic *Atlas of Furniture Design, the most comprehensive book on furniture design ever published.
“The Shape of Time: Art and Ancestors of Oceania from The Metropolitan Museum of Art” will host nearly 130 cherished works from the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s unparalleled Oceanic collection, which are travelling outside of The Met’s walls for the first time in nearly a century, as the Michael C Rockefeller Wing is being renovated.
“Growing Kopi, Drinking Qahwa; Stories of Coffee in Qatar and Indonesia” is organised in collaboration with the National Museum of Indonesia, highlighting traditional and contemporary coffee cultures in Qatar and Indonesia through interactive and sensory experiences.
“Dan Flavin | Donald Judd: Doha” will showcase the work of Dan Flavin (1933-1996) and Donald Judd (1928-1994), two of the most influential figures of Minimalism, who met in 1962 in New York.
The exhibition focuses on their shared engagement with material, colour, and form and will be the first major museum presentation to consider their artistic dialogue in nearly two decades.
“Fashioning an Empire: Textiles from Safavid Iran”, highlights the critical role silk played during the Safavid period (1501-1736 CE).
The exhibition was conceived by and first presented at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Asian Art, Washington DC.
“De/Constructed Meaning” is a collaboration with VCUarts Qatar faculty and staff. This project space exhibition will focus on an installation that acts as a writing device on sand showcasing the evolution of the Arabic script interpretations.
“The Mailbox Project: Cities Under Quarantine” is a project born out of the pandemic-induced isolation that consists of 57 handmade, handstitched books created in-house in Beirut that were shipped to 19 different countries.
Reza Abedini designed each book for a specific artist and invited them to fill in the book's blank pages.
In 2021, the project was realised and shown in Villa Romana and Florence Italy.
“Mehdi Moutashar: Introspection as Resistance”, the artist's first solo exhibition in Qatar, presents a constellation of new and existing works in a wide variety of mediums, demonstrating how his conceptual practice bridges contemporary art with the heritage of the Arab-Muslim world.
“Distilled Lessons: Abstraction in Arab Modernism” examines experiments in abstraction that differentiate Arab modernism from its counterparts around the globe.
The presentation of works from Mathaf collection privileges a specific take on abstraction that focuses on how regional artists have drawn ideas, visual elements, and techniques from the rich and diverse heritage of the Arab-Muslim world, particularly calligraphy and ornamentation.
The biennial exhibition “Mal Lawal” (“From the Old Times”) invites local, regional, and international collectors to exhibit works from their personal collections and share their stories with the public.
“Mal Lawal” was conceived by QM Chairperson HE Sheikha Al Mayassa bint Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, with the aim of showcasing local heritage and offering insight into private collections and the practice of collecting in the region.
With a focus on the 1990s, this edition of “Mal Lawal” adopts a curatorial approach exploring the history of gaming, marked by the emergence of advanced graphic capabilities which spurred remarkable growth in the gaming world.
The exhibition aims to highlight how local collectors have preserved memories of this crucial time in gaming through their collections, which reflect the rising popularity of home game consoles during that period.
