Deliberate Pauses / وقفات متروية

Deliberate Pauses
وقفات متروية

By Shaikha Al Mazrou

Curated by Faysal Tabbarah

“Wadi al-Uyoun was an ordinary place to its inhabitants, and excited no strong emotions, for they were used to seeing the palm trees filling the wadi and the gushing brooks surging forth in the winter and early spring, and felt protected by some blessed power that made their lives easy… For caravans, Wadi al-Uyoun was a phenomenon, something of a miracle, unbelievable to those who saw it for the first time and unforgettable forever after.” – ‘Cities of Salt’, Abdelrahman Munif

Lying within the Western Al Hajar Mountains on the UAE’s east coast, Hatta’s landscape has long been a threshold that oscillates between the urban and the rural.

Within these mountains, Emirati artist Mohammed Ahmed Ibrahim once recounted a story about taking fellow artist Hassan Sharif to see a circle he had created on the ground by overturning rocks, revealing their whiter sides against the sand. Sharif told him he had made a work of “land art.”

This anecdote, and countless others, asserts that there is a rich history of artistic practices that aims to amplify the land and subvert preconceptions about the landscapes of the Arabian Peninsula. It is within this continuum that Shaikha Al Mazrou’s practice has emerged and to which the artwork that she has conceived for Hatta’s Leem Lake belongs.

Thresholds are rarely and deliberately stopped at, they are passed through without much attention. In Hatta’s case, this long inhabited threshold offers a diverse landscape tapestry of natural crags, troughs, veins of sedimentary formations, agricultural fields, along with the deep reservoir of knowledge required to cultivate them.

To encourage us to walk deliberately through Hatta’s landscapes, rousing our curiosity about our collective natural heritage and its continued transformations, Al Mazrou tenuously embeds five red discs into the earth, sometimes vertically, and at other times horizontally, as the discs sometimes negotiate with the landscape’s intricacies and idiosyncrasies, and at other times amplify them. Strategically located along a hiking path, each disc invites a different interpretation from the people interacting with it: They become beacons, drawing the visitor closer; portals through which the visitor is invited to be fully immersed within the landscape, and places that invite pause, directing the view towards the wider landscape within which Leem Lake is embedded.

Through Almazrou’s artwork, visitors are encouraged to unearth forgotten or overlooked aspects of Hatta, and to consider the physical remnants, cultural artifacts, and oral histories associated with the landscape. To borrow from Munif, Al Mazrou asks us to see these landscapes as “something of a miracle” that inspires us to reflect on our place within the historical continuum and instill a sense of stewardship and preservation for the landscape's cultural and historical significance.

Deliberate Pauses is Dubai’s largest site-specific art installation and part of a long-term collaboration between Alserkal Arts Foundation and Dubai Culture & Arts Authority. The initiative aims to advance the UAE’s public art scene through a series of commissions at iconic locations, including Leem Lake in Hatta, the Shindagha Historic District, and the Al Quoz Creative Zone.

شيخة المزروع

يدعوكم هذا العمل الفني الذي يحمل بصمات الفنانة شيخة المزروع إلى التوقف وتأمل في مشاهد "بحيرة ليم" في حتا، وهي لوحة طبيعية تمتزج فيها درجات الأحمر والأصفر والبني، وبمحض الصدفة، عند التوقف، تنفتح أمامكم مسارات المناظر الطبيعية لتتجولوا فيها. ستجدون خمس مساحات رقيقة حمراء موزعة عبر مسارات "بحيرة ليم"، حيث تتفاعل كل واحدة منها مع ألوان المناظر الطبيعية وملمسها وأشكالها بطريقتها الخاصة.

توقفوا، تجولوا، وتأملوا دورنا كأوصياء على أهمية هذه المناظر الطبيعية ثقافيًا وتاريخيًا.

بتنسيق القبم الفني فيصل طبارة

بتكليف من: هيئة الثقافة والفنون في دبي "دبي للثقافة" ومؤسسة السركال للفنون

Biographies

Shaikha Al Mazrou is an artist whose work investigates form and reflects a fascination with material experimentation. Born in the United Arab Emirates, Al Mazrou creates minimalist sculptures and installations exploring structure, tension, and space.

Drawing inspiration from modernist principles and industrial aesthetics, her works bridge the physical and conceptual, using materials like steel, aluminum, and vibrant industrial coatings to challenge perceptions of weight, balance, and composition. Her approach synthesizes contemporary artistic movements, integrating aspects of color theory and geometric abstraction and manipulating industrial materials to challenge and expand traditional sculptural boundaries.

She is an Assistant Professor of Arts Practice at New York University Abu Dhabi. She earned her MFA in 2014 from Chelsea College of Fine Art, University of the Arts London, where she was awarded the prestigious MFA Student Prize. Prior to that, she studied at the College of Fine Arts and Design, University of Sharjah.

Faysal Tabbarah is an Associate Professor of Architecture at the College of Architecture, Art and Design at the American University of Sharjah (AUS) and Carleton University, and co-founder of the experimental architecture and design studio, Architecture + Other Things (A+OT), which is based in Sharjah. He was the Curator for the National Pavilion United Arab Emirates exhibition in the 18th International Architecture Exhibition 2023, La Biennale di Venezia. Tabbarah’s work across teaching, research, and practice explores the relationships between regional environmental and architectural imaginaries to develop alternative building practices that are rooted in their surrounding material and cultural environments.

Dubai Culture and Arts Authority (Dubai Culture), under the leadership of Her Highness Sheikha Latifa bint Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, is committed to enriching Dubai’s cultural scene based on the UAE’s heritage, and is building bridges of constructive dialogue between various cultures to enhance Dubai’s position as a global centre for culture, an incubator for creativity, and a thriving hub for talent.

Dubai Culture is keen on reviving and preserving the emirate’s historical heritage and developing the regulatory frameworks for the cultural and creative sector in line with its strategic roadmap 2020 – 2025.

The Authority also seeks to empower the enablers that support talent and stimulate active public participation by investing in the various assets under its remit, including the management of five heritage sites, five museums, Al Jalila Cultural Centre for Children, 17 archaeological sites and nine Dubai Public Library branches, all of which help contribute to creating an economic system that invigorates the cultural and creative industries. The Authority also offers 8 services and 26 sub-services.

A special thanks to Marhaba team for their support:

Project Manager: Sabu Damodaran

Structural Engineer: Abdul Majeed

Civil Engineer: Narayanan Sabu

Electrical Engineer: Santosh Kumar

Architect: Siddharth Balasubramanian

Fabrication Team: Shibu Kumara Pillai (Site Supervisor), Pandiyan Chinnarasu (Fabricator Supervisor), Krishna Chaudhary (Fabricator), Mohammad Nabi Alam (Fabricator), Collins Enow (Fabricator), Hasanul Haque Sadil (Fabricator), Faruk Alam (Welder), Faruk Alam (Welder), Mohammad Noman (Welder)

MEP Team: Kannadasan Karuppan (MEP Supervisor), Ganesh Vijayathevan (Electrician), Ramapandi Muniyandi (Electrician)

Civil Team: Kumar Shanmugavel (Civil Supervisor), Boominathan Muniyandi (Steel Fixer), Venkatesan Pichapillai (Mason),

Painters: Satheesh Rajappa, Mohd Ameen Imteyaz

Drivers: Muthupandi Arumugam, Muhammad Sajit