Culture, Faith and Connection: Exploring the Islamic World Through Food

Q. What inspired the idea behind this exhibition, and why is food an important lens for understanding the Islamic world?

Dr. Tara Desjardins: The inspiration comes from an exhibition curated by Linda Komaroff, Head of the Islamic Art and Middle Eastern Department at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), called Dining with the Sultan, which opened in Los Angeles in 2023.

Initially, we discussed ways in which MIA could collaborate by perhaps taking the exhibition or lending objects. These discussions were happening during COVID. In the end we decided to organise a different exhibition based entirely on our own collection and unique audience. We felt that as food is such a universal topic that attracts so many people (and that Qatar is an international, multi-layered country), why not do something that reflects our local communities and engages them in a multi-sensory way that combines the historic with the contemporary.

Q. Can you walk us through the five sections of the exhibition? What stories do they tell collectively?

Q. How does the exhibition address the role of feasting in political and social life, especially through the "Dining with the Sultan" section?

Desjardins: This section deals with this topic indirectly by showcasing an assorted array of spectacular objects that were probably commissioned for a royal or elite patron. Feasting was political. If invited to court, an incredible ceremony took place with strict codes of conduct followed. This dining etiquette was reflected not only in the dress you wore, but also in the order in which dishes were presented. There was an obvious political component to this, whereby every court followed a different hierarchy of events that had to be understood and respected. Feasting, in all its splendour, came to identify and distinguish courts.

Q. The exhibition features videos of chefs preparing dishes tied to their traditions—how do these videos bridge the past and the present?

Desjardins: One of the things that we really wanted to bring into this exhibition was a contemporary component. We felt that it was important to show that food is very much a living practice, and that chefs today are always exploring new techniques, new dishes and recipes; a lot of them are also very much inspired by the past, either creating a contemporary twist on an old classic or following old recipes recorded 500 years ago. We also wanted to have a way to celebrate the chef, to bring to life this human element. Engaging historic objects with the public is not always easy but using food became an easy and amazing opportunity bring the past to the present. We also felt from the onset that including chefs from different regions of the world where we didn’t have objects from was a wonderful way to expand the narrative and breadth of the Islamic world.

Q. How does the exhibition explore Qatar’s role in shaping food culture, both historically and through contemporary culinary influences?

Desjardins: It does this through three sections of the exhibition. The first one being Breaking Bread as this engages with the local communities here by filming different bread making traditions. We also use one of the films by a Qatari artist, Aisha Al-Muhannadi, who captures an old bakery in Madinat Khalifa, Doha. It is very personal because this was a bakery where her family would go every day to get their freshly baked bread.

In the third section, we have the archaeological evidence of four different foods (barley, wheat, date, and aubergine seeds) that were excavated from one of these early Abbasid period sites in the north of Qatar, which is again a nice connection of bringing the past to the present.

And then we have the contemporary section. This is always nice because it speaks directly to Qatar. When I curate an exhibition, I like to have what I call a “Qatar connection” component. This section looks at sustainable practices in agriculture, as a starting point of a wider discussion. It uses the example of how Qatar had to become more self-reliant on food production as a response to the 2017 blockade. The message here is a need for cultures and communities to become more self-reliant, whether due to economic or environmental demands. We had a few photographers recommended to us from the Qatar Photography Centre, Katara who went out to one of Qatar's organic farms, Heenat Salma, to photograph it. We've incorporated a selection of those photos into the exhibition to add the artistic vision of these practices through the lens of a photographer.

Q. How did you approach the immersive and interactive elements, like the bread-making AV experience?

Desjardins: This was a fun section because it gets you out into the community. It was a bit of word of mouth and just exploring things that you had spotted whilst driving around Doha. The Afghan bakery, for example, is a small hole in the wall bakery. The guy who runs it has been here for decades. They make 3,000 pieces of bread a day, and it's mostly for the migrant workers who will queue up starting around 4 o'clock. We went with our Museum of Islamic Art (MIA) film specialist who filmed and took a bunch of different shots and then we gave it to our producer and film editor who is weaving in this footage into a story that's meant to be very evocative.

We also have scent stations in Section Three, Itinerant Ingredients, where we have six spices that are projected on the map of where they travel. This is going to be another aspect that is great for kids and families as an interactive component. We are proud of the fact that we have several interactives in the exhibition. We worked very closely with our learning and outreach team from the onset to have their voice and perspective, from the design and development stage to the interactives, not just screens, but also tactile stations to target much younger kids. We also have a massive food truck that has two different children's interactives, one that is a touch screen on how to prepare a healthy plate of food, and the other where little kids can play and cook.

Q. Sustainability and food culture are becoming increasingly important topics. Does the exhibition touch on this?

Desjardins: Yes, it does. This is touched upon entirely in Section Five—We Are What We Eat via the food truck, which has a children's interactive. Here we also explain that society went through a very long period of eating highly processed foods, canned goods, frozen goods, microwaveable meals, etc—things that people still rely on today. Fast food culture is also a big part of this, with fast food chains offering meals that are convenient and cheap. But what is the impact of these brands not only on yourself as an individual, but on communities and the environment? By looking at farming practices and sourcing locally, you can make personal choices that can make a difference in your own small way. I think the idea is to bring awareness that you can create a long-term impact on the world by maybe making even small personal changes.

Q. If you could highlight one must-see artefact or experience from the exhibition, what would it be?

Desjardins: There are a few parts of the exhibition I'm particularly proud of. I do like the archaeological seeds—I think that's fantastic. We worked for the first time with Qatar Museums’ (QM) archaeology department. Rob Carter and his team were brilliant at highlighting these objects. I also really like the wonderful tent panel in Section Four, Dining with the Sultan. It's a Mughal tent panel, from northern India, probably 18th-century which has never been displayed before. There's a magnificent monumental ewer that's also Indian, probably from the late 16th or early 17th-century. I'm a Mughal specialist so my heart is sort of in South Asia, so obviously I'm attracted to these objects. There's also a lovely, very large wooden lacquered dish that has a ship on it that we think dates to the early 17th-century, during the period of the Mughal emperor Akbar, and we've attributed it to Gujarat as a place of production. There are several pieces that I think are very exciting, hopefully for the visitors as well as for academics who come and look at the exhibition.

Q. What do you hope visitors will take away from this exhibition?

Desjardins: That it's fun, that it’s living, and that food can ignite multiple sensations. You have the visual, of course, but you have the communal that makes you think and reflect on our similarities more than our differences. Food ultimately is something that unites people and that we all have a shared appreciation for.