An exhibition in two parts: featuring works by Atelier Aziz Alqatami, Khalid al Gharaballi, Abdullah Al-Mutairi, and Huda Abdulmughni at the Sultan Gallery; and works by Khalifa Al Qattan, GulfGraphxxs, Aziz Al Fraih, Mune.era, Reem Falaknaz, and Khalid al Gharaballi, installed in situ at the Khalifa Al-Qattan Archive.

The Sultan Gallery is proud to present a dual exhibition looking at educational practices in Kuwait through the close examination of local material heritage.

Curated by Alia Farid and Abdullah Al-Mutairi under the shared title “Artifacts of Education”, this set of shows offer an alternative perspective on local educational programs by presenting works which clarify the difference between schooling and learning. Distinct in their own curatorial directions, the exhibitions question the efficacy of prescribed learning spaces and practices in different ways. Farid, in her curatorial selections, brings to focus the lived reality of prescribed schooling programs in contrast with the programs’ idealized origins; while Al-Mutairi highlights self-initiated, non-institutionalized practices emphasizing community learning through forms of visual archiving.

These shows continue the conversation initiated by Farid in her latest curatorial project , “The Space Between Classrooms”, which premiered earlier in the year as part of the Swiss Institute’s Architecture and Design series. Farid here presents an abridged, Kuwait focused, version of the exhibition at the Swiss Institute, taking as a starting point the prototype for schools Alfred Roth designed for Kuwait’s Ministry of Public Works in the 1960s. Roth, a celebrated Swiss modernist architect, developed prefabricated schools that were to be replicated in each district across the country.

Works by Atelier Aziz Alqatami, Khalid al Gharaballi and Abdullah Al Mutairi reconstruct elements and scenes from the Roth schools to examine the memory of these modernist buildings, exploring how institutionally engineered values often govern collective imagination. Additional documentational images by Huda Abdulmughni contrast her experience attending school in the 70’s in one of Roth's original buildings with a more recent exploration of the school. Placing this architectural case study in dialogue with theories of alternative learning, the exhibition concurrently draws from an expanded notion of education and pedagogical practice as seen through the prism of ideas of philosopher Ivan Illich (1926-2002), most notably in his 1971 treatise Deschooling Society, a critical discourse on education as practiced in modern economies and a critique of mandatory schooling. In Illich’s view, formal education is a means of production, and as such, it is imbricated within a fundamentally circular and capitalist logic.

The second exhibition in the set, curated by Al-Mutairi, is the culmination of a year-long fellowship with Art Jameel’s Hayy Learning platform. The works in this exhibition will be presented in the late pioneering Kuwaiti artist Khalifa Al-Qattan’s personal archive; an extensive yet relatively unknown arts archive originally envisaged as part of the exhibition hall established by Qattan for the Kuwait National Council For Culture Arts and Letters (NCCAL) in Dahiat Abdullah Al-Salem in the early days of the modern arts movement in Kuwait. From the time he left the NCCAL in the mid 70’s up to his sudden passing in 2003, Al-Qattan took it upon himself to collect all arts-related material, in and around Kuwait, in hopes of eventually creating a public resource and repository for artists to learn and take inspiration from.

Compelled by the utilitarian and community minded intention behind Qattan’s archiving practice, Al-Mutairi displays within the archive itself a selection of regional image collecting practices which bring attention to alternative aesthetics in the Gulf. These collections reflect the rising interest in cultural archiving among young local creatives, seen most clearly on popular social media platforms such as Tumblr and Instagram with numerous pages dedicated to specific niche content often with socially conscious leanings. The exhibition includes new digital contributions by GulfGraphxxs and Reem Falaknas, as well as new physical works by Mune.era, Aziz Al-Afraih, and Khalid al Gharaballi. Additionally, the exhibition presents viewers with the opportunity to actively participate in community centered learning by pursuing their own research interests during their visit to the archive. Al-Mutairi will take on the role of what Ilich terms a community’s “Resource Librarian'' in Deschooling Society by guiding visitors towards their own research interests during their scheduled time at the archive.

The title of the exhibitions, Artifacts of Education, is taken from a term used by Illich, in which he states that “in order to deschool the artifacts of education the educational value of these artifacts must be directly recognized and available to the public”. New forms of learning demand new styles of educational relationships; a reevaluation of educational methods is needed to progress beyond past mistakes. Set against our current moment where traditional sites of education have been radically reconfigured for many, these exhibitions make visible the potential in everyday interactions for moments of thought and learning.