Imad Murad - Doha

Qatari artist Youssef Ahmed is trying - through impressionist art - to return to the past and document his memories of the local environment, through his art exhibition that he opened in the house of Mohammed bin Jassim in the Musheireb museums in the Qatari capital, Doha.


The local visual language overwhelmed the series of exhibition paintings inspired by the poem of Marzouq Bashir, "Lynne praises Ali Lull" (meaning: when we remember the past), and the memories of his childhood in the two neighborhoods of Jasra and the ancient Musheireb.


The artistic intersections of art, history and society intersect in artistic paintings. His artworks from oil paintings and engravings accompany the audience on an artistic journey to explore the past. They are decorated with gradations of sandy color and successive shades that send a feeling of nostalgia to the past.

Ahmed, who is one of the pioneers of the modern art movement in Qatar, employed his impressionistic methods by evoking vivid pictures of the neighborhoods and areas of Msheireb and Al Jasra, and the peaceful landscapes in which picturesque greenery adorns mud houses.

The exhibition witnessed a remarkable popularity in its first days (Al-Jazeera Net)

Qatari architecture
The exhibition - which opened three days ago and lasts three months - expresses a Qatari architectural language, and reflects the various urban and societal purposes that this style of architecture serves, as it has not neglected any form of life in the pre-oil world.

The head of the museums, Msheireb Hafiz Ali, believes that the exhibition is presented in an innovative way, as the paintings accompany videos explaining and inspiring the paintings, and the visitor can transfer to this era in all its vocabulary as soon as he enters the exhibition.

Ali pointed out that the exhibition - whose number reaches 49, all for the first time - will be accompanied by artistic workshops and lectures that nourish the meaning that was created for it, and present to new generations the image that Doha used to be in the past.

As for the artist Youssef Ahmed, he considered his exhibition a message for all generations. He who witnessed Qatar with this architectural art will remember the past and dive into the beautiful memories that he experienced during his childhood. As for the generation who did not witness that era, he put before them the past of their country and the shape of life in the past.

Through these paintings, he tried to convert the poetic text of the famous poem "Lin Eriat Ali Lall" - of the late musician Abdel Aziz Nasser and from the words of the poet Marzouk Bashir - into artistic paintings.

Youssef Ahmed is one of the pioneers of modern art in Qatar (Al-Jazeera Net)

Contact with conscience
The exhibition witnessed a remarkable turnout on the opening day, which indicates, according to the artist, that people are attracted to something close to their hearts and touching their conscience.

He believes that hosting the historical house of Muhammed bin Jassim for his art exhibition has added a lot to him, as this house is part of the exhibition and is not a place to host it only.

Msheireb has revitalized Beit Bin Jalmud, the House of Company, the House of Muhammad Bin Jassim, and the House of Radwani, and transformed them into museums so that these museums will be the living memory of this vital and historical area.

The artist Youssef Ahmed is one of the pioneering artists for his contributions to the development of modern and contemporary art in Qatar, and his artistic career has spanned through various stages over more than four decades.

In his work, the artist used to document the Qatari environment and the traditions of its people, producing abstract and unique paintings of Arabic calligraphy, as it was known in particular to produce artworks using a wide range of colors, materials and various natural landscapes, such as deserts, swamps and ponds, a feature that usually controls his paintings .