Jean Nouvel's National Museum of Qatar to Open in March 2019
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Qatar Museums, the government organization overseeing the development of cultural institutions announced that the Jean Nouvel–designed National Museum of Qatar will open to the public on March 28, 2019.Jean Nouvel's new 40,000-square-metre building incorporJean Nouvel's National Museum of Qatar to Open in March 2019
Qatar Museums, the government organization overseeing the development of cultural institutions announced that the Jean Nouvel–designed National Museum of Qatar will open to the public on March 28, 2019.Jean Nouvel's new 40,000-square-metre building incorporates the restored historic Palace of the son of the founder of modern Qatar, Sheikh Abdullah bin Jassim Al Thani (1880–1957) while seamlessly integrating innovative artworks commissioned from Qatari and international artists, rare and precious objects, documentary materials, and interactive learning opportunities, reports Qatar Tribune.The National Museum of Qatar will be organized in three 'chapters' — Beginnings, Life in Qatar, and Building the Nation -— presented in eleven galleries. The visitor's chronological journey, which extends through more than 2.7 km of experiences, starts in the geological period long before the peninsula was inhabited by humans and continues to the present day.The route passes through a succession of impressive, remarkably shaped volumes until it reaches its culmination in the very heart of Qatari national identity, the thoroughly restored Palace of Sheikh Abdullah.Artworks commissioned for National Museum of Qatar include a piece by Qatari artist Ali Hassan at the ground-floor public entrance, a work by Qatari artist and arts patron Sheikh Hassan bin Mohammed bin Ali al Thani at the entrance to the galleries, and a sculpture by Iraqi artist Ahmed al Bahrani in the outdoor space known as the Howsh or caravanserai.The museum will be the house of commissioned artworks which will include a monumental installation by French artist Jean-Michel Othoniel comprising 114 individual fountains set within the lagoon, with their streams designed to evoke the fluid forms of Arabic calligraphy, and a sculpture by the Syrian artist Simone Fattal, Gates of the Sea, which evokes the petroglyphs found in Qatar at Al Jassasiya.«Qatar is an ancient land, rich in the traditions of the desert and the sea, but also a land that hosted many past civilizations. While it has modernized its infrastructure, it has still remained true to the core cultural values of our times,» Qatar Tribune quotes Qatar Museums Chairperson HE Sheikha al Mayassa bint Hamad bin Khalifa al Thani.«To fuse these contrasting stories, I needed a symbolic element. Eventually, I remembered the phenomenon of the desert rose: crystalline forms like miniature architectural events that emerge from the ground through the work of wind, salt, water, and sand,» says Jean Nouvel.http://www.blouinartinfo.com/ Founder: Louise Blouin Read more