A new design biennial in Doha, Qatar, provides an important platform for designers from across the region—bringing practitioners to the fore from countries such as Lebanon, Iraq, Egypt and most pertinently, Palestine.
The central strand of the biennial, which is organised by the cultural body Qatar Museums, is the exhibition Arab Design Now (until 5 August) at M7 in Msheireb, the creative district of Doha.
Dima Srouji, a London-based Palestinian artist, is presenting a freestanding wall partition entitled Transparent Histories (2023), which “imagines the future archaeology of Jerusalem as a Palestinian city”, she says.
The piece is the second iteration of a work she made last year for the Islamic Arts Biennale in Jeddah, Srouji adds. “It is about imagining a future archaeology of the city of Jerusalem as a Palestinian capital hundreds of years in the future. It is about being underground looking up at the surface of the earth and imagining new monuments and seeing existing monuments. You have recognisable plans, such as the plan of the Holy Sepulchre, and I also imagine future monuments.”
The layout echoes the style and technique of the Italian architect Piranesi, echoing his 18th-century Campo Marzio map of Rome. “He felt something was lost in the spirt of the city, which I think is similar to the way Jerusalem is losing its spirit,” Srouji adds. READ MORE...
