The proposed Al-Shamal Stadium for 2022 WorldCup. To be built. Expected capacity: 45,120 Photograph: Qatar 2022 Bid Committee

Qatar, once a pearl-fishing port and the poorest of Gulf states, has after years of oil production, grown into one of the richest of countries with the second highest per-capita income (after Liechtenstein), and it has become an epicentre of art and culture in the Middle East. Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art (in Arabic “mathaf” means museum) opened in December, 2010 in Doha, Qatar, culminating a decade of successful funding and expansion of the arts in the Middle East. Qatar, which already has the I.M. Pei-designed Museum of Islamic Art in Doha, is also in the process of completing several other museum projects and a controversial new stadium.

A new National Museum of Qatar is being rebuilt around the original early 20th century palace of Sheikh Abdullah bin Jassim Al-Thani by French architect Jean Nouvel, scheduled to open in 2014. Rising out of the desert, the cascading plates of the museum’s new organic façade will be built at the edge of a lagoon to celebrate the culture of Qatar’s past, and ostensibly, showcase its current prosperity.

Renderings of Jean Nouvel’s National Museum of Qatar planned for 2014

The new Emir of Qatar, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani’s vision was to mold tiny Qatar into a centre of world culture, and the newly-opened-Mathaf’s major challenge to Middle Eastern art will be to push the boundaries of Arab taboos – by their ability to display nudity and politically sensitive subjects without censorship. Qatar already has set precedence among the Gulf states with its democratic use of media, and Qatar Media Corporation owns the much respected Al Jazeera international news network, which is headquartered in Doha, Qatar. Also taking a lead role, unusual for most women in the Middle East, is HE Sheikha Al Mayassa bint Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani, the second of the Emir’s three wives, who as Chairperson of the Qatar Museums Authority, spearheads the country’s cultural expansion and move towards preserving its cultural heritage.

Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art © Mathaf: Arab Museum of Art

I. M. Pei designed Museum of Islamic Art at Doha, Qatar - Hassan Ammar/Associated Press

The Museum of Islamic Art in Doha, Qatar is built on a man-made island. Photo: Keiichi Tahara

Besides money flowing into the arts and new pride in a national identity, the resurgent interest in soccer in the Middle East had also empowered Qatar’s bid to compete with giant nations in bidding for the 2022 World Cup, which it won according to the announcement on December 2nd 2010. The necessity of building an air-conditioned stadium in the middle of a desert has led to a lot of questions on environmental efficacy. Qatar has one of the world’s highest carbon dioxide emission rates (higher than the U.S.) because of its liberal energy use, (Qataris pay no income taxes) and irrigating the desert to sustain the high level of lifestyle expected, generates an environmental toll. It remains to be seen whether the new developments will be but castles in sand or the new integration of environment technologies will create sustainable architecture for the future.

The design proposals for the new stadium can be viewed here and in the video below.

Al-Khor Stadium in Al-Khor. Proposal. Expected capacity: 45,330 Photograph: Qatar 2022 Bid Committee

Serpentine Gallery Pavilion 2010 Designed by Jean Nouvel© Ateliers Jean Nouvel Photo: Philippe Ruault

The Serpentine Gallery in London’s Hyde Park is having a slumber party right at the heels of their annual summer party, which took place around their 10^th and latest eye-catching Pavilion, designed by the French architect Jean Nouvel.

Nouvel’s scarlet Pavilion set the scene for the darlings of the British art set attending. Ron Arad, Antony Gormley, Gavin Turk, Dinos Chapman,  Sir Peter Blake, Grace Jones, Tracey Emin and model Lily Cole were among the guests invited to play ping-pong and tennis with champion players and have their heartbeats recorded by French artist Christian Boltanski’s installation The Heart Archive. Also on view in the permanent galleries inside was the summer show of new inkjet prints by Wolfgang Tillmans.

July 8 2010 Summer Party at Serpentine Gallery, London, England. L to R: Dinos Chapman and Keith Tyson, Sir Peter Blake and Chrissie Blake, Tracey Emin. Photo: Nick Harvey

Serpentine Gallery Pavilion 2010 Designed by Jean Nouvel © Ateliers Jean Nouvel Photograph: Philippe Ruault

Julia Peyton-Jones, the director who had originally envisioned this fund-raising concept, hosted this 40^th anniversary party for the gallery with the new, much talked about co-director Hans Ulrich Obrist. This year’s Pavilion is built on impressive cantilevered structures painted in vivid red, set in dramatic contrast to the green of the Hyde Park lawns. Nouvel said in his opening speech, “I want more disorder in this place,” imagining a relaxed place for people to play. The Pavilion is canopied by large retractable awnings and a sloping freestanding wall that allows the park to inhabit the interiors.

Notable architects that had been invited in previous years to design the free-form Pavilion include Daniel Libeskind (2001), Frank Gehry (2008), and Rem Koolhaas/Cecil Balmond (2006). The architect Zaha Hadid who had designed the 2000 Pavilion also came along for the celebration.

Spending the night in the park may not be as sordid as it sounds, because as part of the summer program, the gallery and the Victoria & Albert Museum are staging a sleepover event inside the Pavilion, beginning late at night with films, music, talks and a midnight banquet that will continue on until breakfast is served the next day at 8am. Artists, psychologists and scientists will host experiments throughout the night for the wired, sleepless guests to explore the psychedelic qualities of insomnia and alternative sleep-states.

Guests might be treated to some lullabies as well.

Sleepover at the Serpentine Pavilion: A night of creative thinking: 30-31 July 2010 from 10pm – 8am
Wolfgang Tillmans 26 June – 19 September 2010, Serpentine Gallery, Kensington Gardens   London W2