Quoz Art Festival and a spot of ISEA

The Quoz Arts Festival returned to the neighborhood this year, with a new branding, a wider audience, and a lot of food. Literally, one lane of Al Serkal Avenue, turned into a food street. A satellite attraction was the upcoming expansion of the Avenue, the construction for which was now looking much closer to completion in the plot next door.

Before taking a look around the galleries, though, I dropped in at the Fridge for the final performance of ISEA 2014: Maziar Ghaderi's Dissolving Self, featuring Vrinda Bhandula's dance performance visually augmented with a live projection behind her, controlled by her movements. It's not the first motion-controlled rendering in the world, but the simple bi-chromatic star field, coalescing, expanding and spining with her was beautiful in execution.

I only had the time to look at a few galleries. One I liked a lot was FN Designs and its exhibition of pop art, especially the long panorama of iconic aspects of Dubai life, pixelated and colored in a style reminiscent of retro computer games.

At Grey Noise, Michael John Welan's Lupus consisted of works in the metaphorical vein typical of the gallery, using different media and/or cultural symbols to wistfully allude to the demise of the Irish wild wolf.

Further afield, Mottahedan Projects' multi-artists exhibition, The Other Side of Visibility, featured a diverse and mostly interesting array of art, with my favorites including the works of Tala Madani (right), Maryam Hoseini (top left) and Habib Farajabadi (bottom left).

A mystery fort and a quick bite in Muteena

An evening errand took me deep into the bowels of Deira this week. I figured that since I had a couple of hours to pass, I might as well take a walk around.

On my way back, I came across this fort tower on Omar bin al Khattab road, sitting between Muteena and Rasheed streets. I had passed this construction once before, many years ago, but at night. A nice little park has been built around it, but I could find no plaque or nav info telling me what exactly it is.

It's a few stories tall, and would have towered over contemporaneous housing, so I guess it would have been used by the local security force to watch for raiders, fires or disorder.

Back when I lived here, I used to love coming to Muteena street for a walk in the park and a snack at one of the many eateries that line the street. The park between the roads is wide enough for a fair bit of landscaping and a winding path for jogging or cycling among the numerous palm trees. It runs the entire length of the street, and sees plenty of footfall. A huge and diverse selection of restaurants also lines the street on either side, including some great Pakistani and Persian places.

And just as I was looking for a quick bite before heading back, I come across this place to stop for a chaat and chai.

Visual cello at The Courtyard Playhouse, and Al Quoz Street Night Art

The Courtyard Playhouse hosted its first musical act with a two-night free showcase performance by cellist Isis M, featuring guitarists Alex Pascoe and Adam Hoult. I went to the second show, which also happened to be during the Street Night Art event.

 The concert began with a demonstration of Alex's impressive vocals and songwriting, backed by Adam, and supported by Isis on the cello.

The stage was then left to Isis, as she played several of her own compositions to a backdrop of vintage videos of the sea, as well as a few videos produced by local artists. Although there were quite a few technical hiccups and other lapses, it was a good performance overall, and an interesting concept.

Outside and down the road, about half of street 4B had been taken over by a new street festival organized by ALL Quoz twixt the warehouses.

The artification was, however, to be thoroughly temporary; no warehouse walls were made available for graffiti. Instead, long boards were set up on stands for artists to work on.

Music and/or dance was constantly on somewhere or the other, with performers taking turns with a variety of genres across three stages.

Many activities were available for visitor participation, including bus painting, a street painting studio, a conversation chair, and others. Numerous artists also lined the street with their work, available for bidding or purchase.