Months into the Covid-19 outbreak, we have passed the flurry of confused responses. We are all at home, working (or trying to), and cultural organisations have gone from sending out cancellation notifications to sending emails about live-streamed webinars and lectures.
Now, from my living room sofa, I can wander around the New York Museum of Modern Art’s revamped galleries, attend a performance exchange lecture with a Tate Modern curator, listen to NYUAD’s spoken-word poetry event, Rooftop Rhythms, and check out shows at Alserkal Avenue. But logging on to these events is very different from attending them in person, not only in the obvious ways – no need to brush your hair – but in terms of the cultural logic behind each event.
Museums are built on the notion of being accessible to the widest audience possible. Subsidies in many countries are directly related to footfall: the more who visit, the more they get. But it does not work like this online: social media advertisements are prized for their ability to target narrower subsections of the public.
In an interesting exchange during Art Dubai’s Global Art Forum webinar, Shumon Basar, the forum’s commissioner, and Rahul Gudipudi, exhibitions curator at Jameel Arts Centre, discussed how the coronavirus has shunted life towards online consumption.
Basar wondered whether the notion of connectivity could be considered a human right; Gudipudi responded it could, citing the January ruling by India’s Supreme Court, in response to the internet shutdown in Kashmir, recognising access to the internet as part of freedom of speech.
This freedom of speech governs the information that passes along on the internet, but not the right for others to access it. The model here is the rhizome: where any point can be connected to any other, no matter how different or similar.
Developed by French philosophers Deleuze and Guattari in the 1970s, the rhizome is frequently used as the visual metaphor for the internet. It’s also a metaphor for the spread of a virus: from person to person. As the successful shift of entire white-collar economies to individual kitchen tables demonstrates, the coronavirus has hit a population that had been preparing for social distancing for a long time. Not only in that we have been practising isolation on social media, but we have also changed our way of thinking from pre-internet days.
Large portions of the population already “come together” as “followers” such as on social media. Curated news feeds encourage solipsism, and algorithms create echo chambers.
After lockdowns are lifted, organisations will return to putting on events, with programmes structured around the capacity of how many people can come together in a space. However, how much this present moment will really alter arts programming is unclear. But, at least to my mind, it has put into focus both the positives of coming together in a public space, as well as the ways museums could use digital programming in more interesting and helpful ways.
[The virus] has put into focus both the positives of coming together in a public space, as well as the ways museums could use digital programming in more helpful ways
By this I mean leaning into the specificity, instead of away from it, such as micro-targeting communities underserved by cultural organisations, and seeing what forms of creativity and art histories exist there, or giving audiences more of a voice to speak back.
On a conceptual level, the liberatory promise of Deleuze and Guattari’s rhizome was that it was multiplanar and creative, throwing aside a hierarchical model, where connectivity doesn’t have an entrance point.
The coronavirus is the same: it disregards conventional biases around class, wealth and nationality – the invisible boundaries that render public spaces, especially the art world, not truly open – and its chain of transmission has made people previously overlooked by certain sectors of society more visible, almost as if we are seeing the world through the perspective of the virus.
We have begun to think through the rhizome in everyday life, following chains of connection, a lead museums would do well to follow.
The years Ramadan fell in May
Infiniti QX80 specs
Engine: twin-turbocharged 3.5-liter V6
Power: 450hp
Torque: 700Nm
Price: From Dh450,000, Autograph model from Dh510,000
Available: Now
SCHEDULE
Saturday, April 20: 11am to 7pm - Abu Dhabi World Jiu-Jitsu Festival and Para jiu-jitsu.
Sunday, April 21: 11am to 6pm - Abu Dhabi World Youth (female) Jiu-Jitsu Championship.
Monday, April 22: 11am to 6pm - Abu Dhabi World Youth (male) Jiu-Jitsu Championship.
Tuesday, April 23: 11am-6pm Abu Dhabi World Masters Jiu-Jitsu Championship.
Wednesday, April 24: 11am-6pm Abu Dhabi World Professional Jiu-Jitsu Championship.
Thursday, April 25: 11am-5pm Abu Dhabi World Professional Jiu-Jitsu Championship.
Friday, April 26: 3pm to 6pm Finals of the Abu Dhabi World Professional Jiu-Jitsu Championship.
Saturday, April 27: 4pm and 8pm awards ceremony.
Henrik Stenson's finishes at Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship:
2006 - 2
2007 - 8
2008 - 2
2009 - MC
2010 - 21
2011 - 42
2012 - MC
2013 - 23
2014 - MC
2015 - MC
2016 - 3
2017 - 8
The burning issue
The internal combustion engine is facing a watershed moment – major manufacturer Volvo is to stop producing petroleum-powered vehicles by 2021 and countries in Europe, including the UK, have vowed to ban their sale before 2040. The National takes a look at the story of one of the most successful technologies of the last 100 years and how it has impacted life in the UAE.
Read part four: an affection for classic cars lives on
Read part three: the age of the electric vehicle begins
Read part one: how cars came to the UAE
The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
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Upcoming games
SUNDAY
Brighton and Hove Albion v Southampton (5.30pm)
Leicester City v Everton (8pm)
MONDAY
Burnley v Newcastle United (midnight)
Farasan Boat: 128km Away from Anchorage
Director: Mowaffaq Alobaid
Stars: Abdulaziz Almadhi, Mohammed Al Akkasi, Ali Al Suhaibani
Rating: 4/5
Pari
Produced by: Clean Slate Films (Anushka Sharma, Karnesh Sharma) & KriArj Entertainment
Director: Prosit Roy
Starring: Anushka Sharma, Parambrata Chattopadhyay, Ritabhari Chakraborty, Rajat Kapoor, Mansi Multani
Three stars
More from Neighbourhood Watch:
Tonight's Chat on The National
Tonight's Chat is a series of online conversations on The National. The series features a diverse range of celebrities, politicians and business leaders from around the Arab world.
Tonight’s Chat host Ricardo Karam is a renowned author and broadcaster with a decades-long career in TV. He has previously interviewed Bill Gates, Carlos Ghosn, Andre Agassi and the late Zaha Hadid, among others. Karam is also the founder of Takreem.
Intellectually curious and thought-provoking, Tonight’s Chat moves the conversation forward.
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Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
All you need to know about Formula E in Saudi Arabia
What The Saudia Ad Diriyah E-Prix
When Saturday
Where Diriyah in Saudi Arabia
What time Qualifying takes place from 11.50am UAE time through until the Super Pole session, which is due to end at 12.55pm. The race, which will last for 45 minutes, starts at 4.05pm.
Who is competing There are 22 drivers, from 11 teams, on the grid, with each vehicle run solely on electronic power.
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
Kill%20
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UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE – FINAL RECKONING
Director: Christopher McQuarrie
Starring: Tom Cruise, Hayley Atwell, Simon Pegg
Rating: 4/5
TERMINAL HIGH ALTITUDE AREA DEFENCE (THAAD)
What is THAAD?
It is considered to be the US's most superior missile defence system.
Production:
It was created in 2008.
Speed:
THAAD missiles can travel at over Mach 8, so fast that it is hypersonic.
Abilities:
THAAD is designed to take out ballistic missiles as they are on their downward trajectory towards their target, otherwise known as the "terminal phase".
Purpose:
To protect high-value strategic sites, such as airfields or population centres.
Range:
THAAD can target projectiles inside and outside the Earth's atmosphere, at an altitude of 150 kilometres above the Earth's surface.
Creators:
Lockheed Martin was originally granted the contract to develop the system in 1992. Defence company Raytheon sub-contracts to develop other major parts of the system, such as ground-based radar.
UAE and THAAD:
In 2011, the UAE became the first country outside of the US to buy two THAAD missile defence systems. It then stationed them in 2016, becoming the first Gulf country to do so.
Company%20Profile
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Killing of Qassem Suleimani
Read more about the coronavirus
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