Qatar will show off its quintet of new cultural attractions at the Venice Biennale

Ahead of next month's opening of the 18th International Architecture Exhibition at the Venice Biennale, Qatar Museums has shared a preview of their upcoming event that’s meant to showcase the major cultural builds it is in the process of creating by the end of the decade.

The country’s cultural arm will travel to present its schemes for the first time outside of Qatar in the form of a new documentary titled Building a Creative Nation. 

The ACP – Palazzo Franchetti will play host to the documentary, which features a variety of interviews, immersive content, architectural drawings, photography, and other media related to the slate of five new museums commissioned to ELEMENTAL (Art Mill Museum), Herzog & de Meuron (Lusail Museum), OMA (Qatar Auto Museum), Philippe Starck (Qatar Preparatory School), and UNStudio (Dadu, Children’s Museum of Qatar), respectively.

A special exhibition of Kengo Kuma’s life and work titled Onomatopeia - Selected Projects that was underwritten by the country will play side-by-side with the documentary under a metal pavilion structure designed by the architect for the Palazzo's central atrium.

In a preview, QM Chairperson Sheikha Al Mayassa bint Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani said: “When the opportunity to support the exhibition of Kengo Kuma on the occasion of the Venice Architectural Biennale 2023 arose, we felt that it would be a great moment to share the cultural projects that Qatar is embarking on [...] It is therefore a great moment in our modern history to reveal the extent of Qatar’s cultural program, amongst one of the greatest displays of architecture and most important showcases anywhere for epoch-making designs.”

The exhibition will be on view from May 14th until the Biennale closes on November 26th.