Reformist sheikhs have spent the past decade using their wealth to snap up financial institutions and retail and leisure brands in an effort to transform the city-states they rule from one-camel towns into global business and tourism hubs. Now they want to use it to acquire something that is impossible to price and may, in fact, be impossible to buy at all: culture.
Abu Dhabi wants to partner with western art brands in Saadiyat island. “By bringing in partners, we can be quick; we can buy knowledge, expertise.” Design critics complain about the new 'cultural buildings, “architectural megalomania”. Frank Gehry calls it, "a cabinet of horrors”. Times Online
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Go Gehry!
Now my real reaction,
If the sheiks as it says in the article really hope to use art and cultural institutions to change and modernize their culture i say good luck, not because i think that the Mid-East is or will be stuck in the past, but because in my opinion art is not a catalyst but reflection of a culture, although granted this isn't always the case. But certainly in the new culture/art=money equation.
Which get's me to my second point..
A quote...
"Clearly, the sheikhs believe that by mixing their black gold with the genie of western architectural and artistic expertise, they can create a cultural oasis where a new generation of art-lovers and artists will grow."
My view, perhaps cynically is that this has more to do with creating a more diverse revenue stream (ie: moving away from oil) then it does a desire to revolutionize through art.
to me, it shows a keen salesmanship on the part of western peddlers, who have been courting the sheiks blind. it is no mystery uae being developed for an homogeneous certain preferred customers.
what kind of a new cultural future an opera house can offer at this hour of our times, is very questionable. so as the western culture itself. these guys aren't peddled or sold anything new or progressive but just the crumbs from the old boys' privileged art and culture talk and high level blue chip art market.
i can't even go into the fallacy and the fraud involved with marketing/consuming the western art as the cultural wonder product that works in any place. this is false. all this is more to do with creating club houses and venues of entertainment for the condos they are building for the equally nuevo rich targeted buyers.
as far as the buildings go, the more spectacular and the more outlandish they are the more press they get, the more sale value for the real estate market and wow tourism is established.
this is what it really is all about. a really conservative concept wrapped by seemingly futuristic form making. when these construction sites cleaned up and buildings are finished in ten years, will the 'reformist' sheiks also take off their garbs and start wearing western clothes and stay put when their wifes expose some generous portions of their breasts in their décolleté opera night dresses? or the same 'reformist' sheiks listen to the political message of modern art and completely liberalize their subject populations? will the guggenheims or the louvres remain open when the occupancy rate start to dwindle in relationship to dwindling of crude amounts that are mined?
i won't mix the packaging graphics and marketing technology with real cultural activity. unless, i come to acceptance and recognize 'this' as the new culture. but then again, won't the arias sound out of place when the crowds are really right for pop music? and why should i call this new, when i've already seen it in places like las vegas and orange county.
anyway, it is not like abu dhabi is going to jump start islamic contemporary art or anything like that... islamic culture already producing a lot art works. they, the 'reformist' sheiks are only exposing their own isolation and alterior motives by trying to patronize the cultural scene via infomercialist media to sell real estate. they are not doing anything near beneficial or cultural as these people any many others like them are doing, see below link.
http://universes-in-universe.org/eng/nafas/
...In this age of rapid building and unprecedented devolopment activity in United Arab Emirates, there is also large scale abondonment 'presently' underway. Dubai artist Lamya Gurgash photographs these unwanted places in her native country...
elseplace
i have to say i find these critiques very puzzling.
on the one hand, there is a condemnation of the UAE and other Gulf states for effectively joining the train that is modernism - as if in doing so is a repudiation of local or traditional values.
but simultaneously there is a condemnation that certain aspect of this tradition are suspect and not up to "western standards". that following western art practices and values is a debasement of inherent qualities, but not following western - even 'international' standards of expression and performance - are cause for concern, dismissal and negation.
if we take China as a parallel example, we can easily condemn the regime and its continuance to maintain power and control. but i don't think we can deny that there has been a wholesale change at the level of art production such that "Chinese Artists" are very much in the forefront of art practices at a global scale. this was not only not possible, but un-imaginable 15 years ago - maybe less.
so why is it not also possible that in 15 years - artists from the UAE and the Gulf are setting the agenda of art practice internationally. it is too early to say that the support - intentional or not by the major developers and government agencies in the region can't at least be given some credit for this situation - even if only as being the oppositional force to react against.
there is nothing in the history of western - as personified by the USA and its emergence as an economic, cultural and military power - that doesn't have a parallel with both China and the Gulf. all the art practices and individual artists that define "American Contemporary Art" come out of the same matrix of entrepreneurship, greed, support, salesmanship and the use of culture as a redeeming artifice. it is myopic and hypocritical to think otherwise.
there is nothing that has happened in Houston (and i think there are some great artists in Houston) that isn't from exactly the same condition as can now be seen in Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Doha. the only real difference is that these 3 cities have more diverse and more heterogenous populations and contexts than ever existed in Houston.
the images of Lamya Gurgash are very nice pieces, but from a contextural point of view they are quite nostalgic and fall back on a "western" image of change, progress and decay. they "work" exactly to the degree that they are not really about Dubai.
that is overly optimistic to expect a guggenheim branch or a mini louvre is going to create the productive conditions of fine art at a level par with the political critique when these institutions are the by products of real estate development, thats all, thats clear.
yes, perhaps there are some holes in terms of my use of western art as a terminal genre but they are really peripheral to main body of my criticism of corporate expansion of the blockbuster art eventism reformist sheiks want to import. i was talking about shallowness and arrogancy that these institutions alone can create a context for the production of art or germination of the artists.
i also think gurgash's work is intensely contextual down to imported bathroom tiles in granmother's bathroom... see if you are going to find the contradiction there.
i am surprised you summed it up as 'nostalgic.'
you are taking my use of western art as an attack to your values, that's great, extra points i wasn't expecting. yet i was using the term as a historical locator and as an active device that is called to rescue there. i have no problem with fine arts.
i don't say that a guggenheim or mini-louvre will in and of itself create a productive condition. in fact, they don't need to, as the productive condition already exists in the UAE. it exists because there is enough "commerce" (whether it is result of new condos, new financial service centres, new tourist destination or new services for the expansion of all the above) to allow artists in the region to have a base from which to emerge. this is both in terms of financial support but also patronage from individuals as well as corporations and government.
this is nothing new, as it is exactly the same model that has defined art production worldwide for the last 70 years - ie, that artists follow the money. the money allows those that followed it the opportunity to sustain their practice and these sustained practices in turn go on to nurture new practices.
everything you say about Abu Dhabi is almost exactly what was said about Houston in the 50' and 60's - this coarse, uncultured new town rising in the swamps of south Texas, flush with more oil money than brains, deciding it too would have a "opera house" (did they really mean 'opry house'), a symphony, a museum of fine arts, etc. and why would they do that when there was no culture there - just cowboys and oilmen? well, 50 years later there is a vibrant art community in Houston, the Opera is one of the more progressive in the USA and there is a broad base that is not bound by what is valorised in NYC, or London or LA.
it has not been 'western peddlers' who have courted the sheiks to take on board the Guggenheim or the Louvre - rather the sheiks sought out the museums. they felt compelled to diversity an economy too loaded to one form of resource - oil. the expansion of cultural and other sectors is a conscious attempt to make the change-over now - while times are good - and to do so in a progressive and not cataclysmic way.
-just to conclude-
but the point is, there is no place on earth where those in power and authority have chosen to invite subversion and profound transformation by way of art into their populace. rather they always assume art to have a "civilizing" effect on the populace, that it will give them kudos, that it will show their intelligence and forward-thinking ways. but in doing so, there is always a little infection that takes place, an openness that emerges that goes beyond the proper and the correct, until the very context of these practices is itself something different than when it all started. this is why i used the reference to current chinese artists - you can be assured that the chinese authorities do not know what they have let out of the bottle.
in regard to the photos of Lamya Gurgash, i am trying to say that the idea that these 'scenes' or 'tableau' that she photographs strive to evoke a sentiment of regret and mourning, that the "abandonment" of these environment is reflective of some lost, something extinguished. i would suggest that for most inhabitants, these are not moments of loss, so much a the leaving behind of something that is no longer relevant or "up-to-date". that the moving on to a new house, a new "modern" residence is in fact an invigorating experience, full of optimism and hope. for me, the nostalgia comes from following the all-too-familiar story of "modern" is bad - the past was always more real, more authentic than our present or future can ever be. for me, it is even harder to present these images as being about to "depict the sad notion of estrangement" when we understand that these housing units were all constructed about 30 years ago. maybe at the end of the day, they are just bad, worn-out old buildings.
great. "at the end of the day" let's bulldoze everything and build new new new. 30 years? knock it down it is old...
let's, "at the end of the day," money decide everything every art every grandmother's move. "at the end of the day," let's clear all that poor people's art and build new new new expensive 'rich' museums where money talks and artists who love the money produce produce. let's go to the museum after the movie "at the end of the day."
my art my money good art texas art, build build for the good art by the yard. their art my couch. couch art good art. guggenheim art. reformist sheiks asked us we didn't ask them. their money we build. build build. build condos. move the sand build condos. for us. at the end of the day just like us just like texas.
at the end of the day, this is what you are saying. i am guessing that you work for one of the corporations up there building the new sanitized UAE calling it diverse nationality wise but homogeneous wallet wise. i know you take it personally because you believe this is the new world, new culture, new way. but still texas from 60 years ago.
divert from oil to hi life. hi tourism hi art brought to you by gugg branch and their architect. they asked, we no peddle. don't forget to see the next blockbuster show with your neighbor beckhams.
this is pretty much what you have spilled out "at the end of the day..."
and if you think art is for the rich only, think again. i suggest. but we should talk about that some other time. this is pretty much about real estate sales for the reformist mo...
and, i do understand why you have a disdain for lamya gurgash's art, because she keeps pounding you with what you have been destroying and/or advocating. you'd rather she didn't do that don't you?
well, she is from dubai. how about that? why do you think i picked her art?
it must be nice writing all the way from LA about something that you see and read in the papers and magazines and be able to have such a clear and unambiguous understanding of it. i envy your ability to be so certain as to what the reality of Dubai or any other place in the world is.
i don't work for a corporation. i know and visit the local artists of Dubai - many of who are not trying to replicate euro-amero-centric concepts and images of art production. i don't disdain ms gurgash's art - i just don't find it very challenging or innovative - too much like what i have seen for the last 35 yrs. the fact that she is in Dubai - exactly how does that validate her work any more than it validates my critique just because i also spend time here?
you clearly don't want to read what i have written as i have never advocated that art is only for the rich - in fact what i said was that for all the cultural or social benefits of art, it is exactly it's non-controllability that makes it most successful and most at odds with the very people that buy it. but i you really think that art can exist for long outside of dynamic, evolving, commercially-propelled economies, then you haven't looked much at history.
are you saying (you can deny that and work around it too, which you have been doing all along) for art to exist you must have a "dynamic, evolving, commercially-propelled economies?" maybe you are confusing art with something else.
let's not even say i can't write anything about this from los angeles, this shows you are wearing pretty thin in your wishy washy whatever.
specially when we are discussing something that has bigger issues of exporting culture, in this case 'soft colonialism,' and it was initiated by me to begin with.
why didn't you say that in your first post and be done with it?
lamya gurgash photographs are not about innovation. they work with different words and personal histories. if i only looked art that was innovative, i'd be very limited and missing out on a lot of good art.
but, a lot of people don't find anything 'innovative' or 'challenging' in some of the most groundbreaking art that has been highly influential and political over the course of art history. so don't feel bad... which art do you find innovative and challenging? because those words legitimizing art, themselves are very much debated in a lot of art environments. look them up.
but anyway, there is a sense of resignation on my part discussing these with someone who can't even appropriate art for less than 'commercially propelled' economies. everything you have said so far about art must be viewed with that reference.
if you think art from poor inner cities of united states, cuba, continent of africa, palestine, vietnam, el salvador, nicaragua, ghettos of europe, favelas of brazil, fringes of istanbul and any other metropolis, and other less than commercially propelled places just don't exist, your 35 years of art critiquing have been shadow boxing sir.
A related article on Dubai, I was just re-reading today.
by MIKE DAVIS
FEAR AND MONEY IN DUBAI / New Left Review.
An excerpt-
Baruch Knei-Paz writes in his admirable précis of Trotsky’s thought:
"In appending new forms the backward society takes not their beginnings, nor the stages of their evolution, but the finished product itself. In fact it goes even further; it copies not the product as it exists in its countries of origin but its ‘ideal type’, and it is able to do so for the very reason that it is in a position to append instead of going through the process of development. This explains why the new forms, in a backward society, appear more perfected than in an advanced society where they are approximations only to the ‘ideal’ for having been arrived at piecemeal and with the framework of historical possibilities."
I also like this closing of the article;
"Al-Maktoum, who fancies himself the Gulf’s prophet of modernization, likes to impress visitors with clever proverbs and heavy aphorisms. A favourite: ‘Anyone who does not attempt to change the future will stay a captive of the past’. Yet the future that he is building in Dubai—to the applause of billionaires and transnational corporations everywhere—looks like nothing so much as a nightmare of the past: Speer meets Disney on the shores of Araby.
Orhan, I really liked your comments, especially the first, it offers a serious critical perspective that does not fall into one of the predictable tropes (the dismissive attitude, sometimes mixed with a tinge of racism and the "defensive" one, usually adopted by the Western "customers" of the Sheikhs that you described or by locals acting on national pride.)
Unlike the usual premise of most articles on the Gulf (that it is a place where money is so abundant that it does not matter,) the truth is that it is all about the money. Like anywhere else, there is a political economy that engulfs the entire process of "designing" Dubai (or Doha or Kuwait - and soon, Basra, Baghdad, Najaf, 'Amara,) architects and their products are part and parcel of this economy whether they know it or not. I am glad you pointed that out - among other good points.
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