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www.thepeninsulaqatar.com CAMPUS | 3 COMMUNITY | 6 ENTERTAINMENT | 11 Doha College welcomes Best Buddies Qatar I’ve accomplished school representatives members mark Holy what I had set out for CLEAPSS Month of Ramadan for: Madhuri THURSDAY 23 JUNE 2016 Email: [email protected] thepeninsulaqatar @peninsulaqatar @peninsula_qatar As the Artist in Residence programme draws to a close, the exhibition celebrates the huge accomplishments of the current group of 18 artists in residence, ten of whom are Qataris. ARTIST IN RESIDENCE P|4-5 THURSDAY 23 JUNE 2016 | 03 CAMPUS Doha College welcomes school representatives for CLEAPSS oha College welcomed representatives from schools across Qatar for the recent CLEAPSS conference. Organised by Senior Science DTechnician Anisa Abdul Gafoor of Doha Col- lege, the event brought together science technicians and teachers to share best practices and laboratory skills to engage the students in advanced chemistry. CLEAPSS, first started in the UK in 1963, is an ad- visory service providing support in science and tech- nology for schools from nursery education through to A-level studies or equivalent, and it is the British standard that overseas practical work around British Curriculum Schools in the UK and abroad. It covers areas of health and safety, chemicals, living organ- isms, equipment, resources, laboratory design, facilities and fittings, technicians and their jobs, D&T facilities and fittings. Doha College called on the expertise of Robert Worley, a renowned veteran in micro-scale chemistry, who trained the participants over a two-day course. He demonstrated how a lot can be achieved using very small amounts of chemicals. “In a little, you can see a lot,” was the motto of this conference, which fo- cused on alternative procedures in practical chemistry for chemistry teachers, adding variety, improving safety, reducing cost, improving classroom manage- ment and improving student understanding of chemistry. The first day of the course dealt with waste dis- posal of chemicals, storage and handling, practical glass work skills, organising and managing prep rooms, common myths and efficient alternates, and a tour around the model facilities in the Doha College laboratories and prep rooms. The second day was centred on “Safe and Success- ful Advanced Level Chemistry,” which included practical experiments and an introduction to micro-scale chemistry as an alternative to macro techniques. These activities are designed to add variety to practical work in schools, not to replace the traditional methods. They also offer something extra such as better classroom control, increased safety, quick- er procedures and the underpinning of the essen- tial concepts required to improve the understanding of chemical changes at the atomic level, interpreting the visible with the invisible. Here is some of the feedback from attendees: “Once again, thank you so much for organising the course Anisa. It was so worthwhile, and all the effort you went to was really appreciated,” said Emma Bridges, Doha British School. “Thank you very much for facilitating the course in Doha and for all your hard work and effort. We were was very well organised. You are so cooperative, in- the diffusing precipitate. Gets me every time as well! really impressed with the content, your organisation formative and supportive,” said Shuchita Chakma, But we need to be thankful to Anisa. I have been and preparation, and we will certainly be able to ap- Nord Anglia International School, Al Khor. blessed with good technicians all through my teach- ply what we learnt,” said Ann Lourens, Park House. Worley himself was very impressed with the out- ing career, and now at CLEAPSS. Anisa is the tops and “I enjoyed the science workshop a lot, everything come of the event. “I loved your faces when you saw a treasure in Qatar,” he said. 04 | THURSDAY 23 JUNE 2016 COVER STORY Showcasing ‘Artist in Residence’ By Fazeena Saleem Fire Station’s Garage Gallery . blends together designs from Portu- cy, artists collaborated with fellow cre- The Peninsula Experimenting with sand as a ma- guese, Indian, and Islamic carpets. The atives and developed their own tech- terial, the work speaks to the move- performative process and movement niques. The Doha Fire Station was built ment and fabrication of identity in in- present in the references and produc- in 1982 as a Civil Defence building, and dividuals and objects as geographies tion of the work continues as the audi- was occupied by the fire brigade until sand carpet made with local and cultures converge, split and dis- ence walks through the carpet, further late 2012. It was then handed over to grains from the dunes of Qa- tribute through other contexts over shifting and displacing these particles Qatar Museums to renovate and turn tar, coloured with naturally time. Drawing on the artist Emelina through the gallery. “It took around it into a home for artists in residence. A fermented fabric dyes from Soares’ own composition of identity – 37 hours to complete the work. It’s a Aisha Nasser Al Sowaidi, a Qatari India is a centre of attraction at Qa- Indian ethnicity, Portuguese ances- blend of my identity, the place I was artist, in her work interrogates the tar Museums’ (QM) first ‘Artist in Res- try, and having been raised in the Mid- brought up and things I have seen. I memories and values associate with idence’ exhibition on show at the old dle East – her work ‘Shifting Identities’ want the visitors to walk on the carpet objects, as individuals as well as those and the sand to spread symbolising that are written into national senti- the shift of things in life,” said Soares. ments or traditions. Her work is con- As the Artist in Residence pro- cerned with the slippage and distor- gramme draws to a close, the exhibition of time and memory, particular- tion celebrates the huge accomplish- ly those memories established during ments of the current group of 18 art- the childhood. ists in residence, ten of whom are Her new series Shifted Reality Qataris. The exhibition showcases se- (2016) comprises three works that use lected works from each of the artists certain materials and textures — rough during their nine successful months and smooth, solid and fluid —to create in residency. It features a range of dif- surreal objects and experiences that ferent medium including art, photog- explore how we may keep alive the raphy, design and architecture and memory of something that may not be incorporates a variety of processes, entirely accurate. research, prototypes, and finished out- Another Qatari artist Hana Saleh comes. The exhibition provides artists Al Saadi’s work, primarily in sculpture with a platform where they can show- to interrogate the way an object can case their work and skills to the media, communicate certain ideas through its the community, fans of art and culture existence alone. During the residency, and collectors. Al Saadi has experimented with con- The Fire Station: Artist in Residence crete both in its fluid state and as a sol- programme started in September id form in the iconic shape of the cin- 2015. During nine months in residen- der block. THURSDAY 23 JUNE 2016 | 05 COVER STORY Yoga, Tired, Depersonalisation, and convergence of these symbols — some with freedom and vision and address- creating new perceptions and dimen- Attempting (all 2016) twist and distort of which come from Shi’a, Sunni, Chris- es fear and the stripping of senses that sions of space. In Sempione (2016), the traditional cinder block shape, ref- tian or Jewish culture — reflects the make reality impossible to read. colourful construction and packing erencing the perceived malleability of cultural diversity of the region and the Interests of Kelley Lowe from Italy tape is coiled tightly into a circular tar- our constructed surroundings through many voices present in the war. For me, is in chemical spectra of plastics, par- get placed on the gallery floor. In La- individual and collective presence and these paintings are a road map for un- ticularly the way the material degrades cune (2016), the artist has cast plastic alteration. The warped, looped infini- derstanding the chain of events in my and decomposes. Her research and ex- food containers in gypsum, which to- ty circle, Just Another Day (2016) sug- country,” says Marzouki. perimentation into such material spans gether create a small futuristic city, a gests the possibility of continuous mo- Fighter Jet (2015) is one such vast her entire artistic practice as well as spaceship, or perhaps a military base. tion that is subverted by heavy, end- system, looking at manipulation in previous studies in conservation. The Together these works seem to exist less repetition. technologies of observation and con- three works on display take objects outside standard realms of time and Sebastián Betancur Montoya from trol, of space and time. These become and materials discovered around the seasons, reflecting the resilience or Columbia is a self-proclaimed nomad. associations of remembrance or evoke city of Doha and recompose them into possibilities of recomposition as a re- Being resident at the Fire Station has an experience or place, created with new associations. sistance against decomposition and further exaggerated this transient ex- the knowledge that potential change Yellow plastic pieces from sites near disappearance. istence in which the displacement of and shifts will continue to occur. The the Fire Station become a shattered The exhibition is open to the public the physical structure and metaphori- animation PHOBIA (2016) is concerned and abstracted map in Roswell (2016), until November 2016. cal meaning of ‘home’ are muddled, as countries and borders are crossed and converge. The basic structure of a house is a repeated symbol that features throughout his work on display in the exhibition.

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