RA.

Sana Munasifi touches on a great point in her recent review of the Fifth Annual Abu Dhabi Music and Arts Festival. She highlights the recently opened Abu Dhabi branch of the Arabian Oud House as an example of the type of grass-roots, ground-up, regionally relevant and contextual initiative (= investment) that may ultimately produce results (= returns) with more significant impact than those from grand Saadiyat like projects.

The way I see it, why not do both if you have the means to? And I imagine Abu Dhabi has the means to do almost anything it wants.

I sensed an outcry amongst the Dubai cultural movers and shakers when Saadiyat was launched which I always found astonishing. For years the standard art-opening conversations included rants on the regional governments' lack of investment and interest in the Arts & Culture industry. Yet when Abu Dhabi announces the biggest Arts & Culture project undertaken in modern times, there is a backlash about the way the money is being spent (trophy-museums, blatant tourism projects, unoriginal etc). As someone who has been active on a grass-roots level in the burgeoning regional culture scenes I have always believed that the most interesting movements and developments emerge through individuals and small groups and that these ground-up movements would benefit from a larger cultural eco-system which the mega projects planned in Abu Dhabi and Doha and Dubai will undoubtedly provide.

Back to Sana's article, she raves about a new find for me: Iraqi Oud player Naseer Shamma:

"Mr Shamma broke with oud convention with his work "Oriental Orchestra". Thisperformance at the festival saw 67 international musicians playing 15 ouds, ten kanoons (similar to the harpsichord) and nine nays (a kind of flute), with drums, tambourines and other instruments. The concert included solos and call-and-response phrases between Mr Shamma and different instrumental groups, but most songs featured the full orchestra. The multitude of minor tones created a clangy, dissonant sound, which was, as Mr Shamma admitted, shocking in its unorthodoxy. But the jingle of the orchestra injected his compositions with new, lively personality. It was a welcome change from the regional classics performed throughout much of the rest of the festival."

And she makes lots of great observations- my favorite:

"The festival, like much in the Emirates, was rife with status symbols. Seating sections included VIP, VVIP and Pearl and Diamond seating (I'm still unsure which was more elite)."

I am a real believer in Abu Dhabi, I think it (along with Doha) will be a fascinating global city in a few decades. Mohamed Bin Zayed and Hamad Bin Khalifa are currently the Middle East's most interesting leaders.

Calendar

it's a testament both to the astonishing power of film as a medium as well as to the talent of armenian-candaian director atom egoyan that the long shots of 'monumental' flocks of sheep in calendar (1993) are so affecting. egoyan's no-budget film about  a woman (the devastating arsinée khanjian, egoyan's wife) who leaves her photographer-husband for their driver / guide on their trip to Armenia where they are photographing stunning churches (for a calendar) is bewitching.

the photographer obsessively plays back his video footage of the trip over and over trying to reconstruct his wife's falling for another man right in front of his lenses. in parallel he has a series of (mostly middle) eastern women (perhaps escorts) over to his place for what seems like and audition to replace his ex-wife.   

as the photographer (played by atom) talks and questions over the video footage, he is at turns cold and distant then jealous, confounded and hurt. as we watch over the footage with him we realize the relationship is broken much earlier than he does, but we learn of her falling in love with the guide with and through the photographer (with some help from messages left on his answering machine by his wife). it surprised me. so much so that i re-watched the movie immediately looking for hints of the burgeoning relationship. the photographer's wife and the guide are on screen together for most of the film and yet their relationship struck me as secondary while initially watching.

familiar egoyan themes of loneliness, miscommunication and video-voyeurism appear with his very distinct 'cold' (chillingly so) and 'distant' approach that paradoxically produces deeply moving films.
haunting musical support from djivan gasparian.
seek this out.

DUBAI NEXT: Face of 21st Century Culture
Firestation, Vitra Campus, June 5 – September 14, 2008

An exhibition by the Dubai Culture & Arts Authority in cooperation with the Vitra Design Museum.
Curators: Rem Koolhaas & Jack Persekian

DubaiNext_EN

This exhibition tells the story of Dubai from a cultural angle. It shows the making of 21st century culture, built upon the vision and heritage of the Emirati people and their fellow global citizens everywhere, as well as how these ideas take shape on architectural, urbanistic and cultural projects for the next decades. Being shown parallel to the exhibition “Living under the Crescent Moon” the exhibition “Dubai Next” will complement the museum’s focus on Arab domestic and contemporary culture in 2008.