Museum of Islamic Art relaunch to offer an ‘immersive cultural experience’
According to Qatar Museums (QM), the reopening of The Museum of Islamic Art (MIA) will offer both guests and visitors an "immersive cultural experience." The museum is still being renovated and will open this fall.
“The museum will look as beautiful as before but it will have a new message, it will be family-friendly, it will be visitor-friendly, it will have a fully new storyline. The new storyline will be totally different, we talk about the history, we talk about the beginnings of Islam, its spread, we talk about the religion. Then we have a journey from east to west or west to east, depending where you come from, so you learn the different parts of the Islamic world and they put the masterpieces into context,” said MIA Director Dr. Julia Gonnella.
“We are going to change how the objects are being displayed from being merely beautiful and relating them to our social value, for example, we are going to speak about the Haj and its importance, and so we are going to display the Sitara Al Ka’bah (curtain of Ka’bah) and the permanent galleries and its impact on the social and cultural life and related to art,” said MIA Deputy Director of Curatorial Affairs, Shaika Al Nasser.
The relaunch will showcase 70 objects that have never been on display before. Dr. Gonnella emphasized that each gallery will have a new application; the museum reopening will be like a whole new experience.
In the meantime, residents and visitors can virtually tour MIA via its 3D virtual tour guide, which is available on the museum's website. Further, MIA Park is still open to the public for individual sports activities.
Renovations of its galleries and interior began in the Fall of last year. This May, it revealed that a magnificent room from Damascus is coming alive again after four years of conservation and renovation – MIA is assembling 180 pieces of a magnificent wooden interior from Damascus to make a gorgeous room again that was once used for guest reception.
Dear Visitors 🌹
— Qatar Museums (@Qatar_Museums) June 1, 2022
We are still working hard to relaunch the Museum of Islamic Art
We look forward to welcoming you back for an immersive cultural experience when the museum reopens in autumn 2022https://t.co/o0KBIsdEva pic.twitter.com/9KCvCiM66y
Among the diverse collections at MIA are Islamic art, ceramics, glass, manuscripts, metalwork, textiles, woodwork, and jewellery.
“Our masterpieces come from both the secular and religious aspects of diverse worlds, all of which are connected by their profession of Islam, but many of which are non-religious in nature. The artworks are drawn from the treasure-houses of princes to the personal homes of ordinary people. Each object tells a fascinating story about itself and the world it comes from,” MIA said.
The MIA Library has over 21,000 books, making it one of the region's largest collections of Islamic art books.
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Source: Qatar Museum
