Ummah HQ
commissioned for “Monoculture” at MuHKA Museum, Antwerp, Belgium
curated by Nav Haq
Materials: Styrofoam, MDF, aluminium, ultra-pigmented custom acrylic paint, 3D prints, camera, monitor
Dimensions: 432 x 480 x 480 cm
2020
“Ummah HQ” is meant to house the Ummah, an anachronistic ideal of a united global community of Muslims believed to have existed in the 7th-8th century but never did in the form imagined today. The concept has been totally transfigured by conceptions of the nation and heavily exploited by political-Islamists since the 1970s.
The structure made of insulation foam looks like it is either under construction or a ruin. Both structural and ornamental, it is a true muqarnas dome. Muqarnas are a form of 3D tiling, thought to be the singular unique invention of so-called Islamic architecture.
They replaced Hypostyle domes, common for thousands of years prior which used intersecting arches bound by one keystone. However, each muqarna is a key stone. Some historians speculate that it expresses a concept of God as a force connecting particles adapted from Aristotelian atomism by Arab philosophers.
In Islam Arabic is Allah’s chosen language for the final transmission of scripture to mankind. The majority of the 1.8 billion muslims are taught to read Arabic but not to comprehend it. When reading the inscription around the base of “Ummah HQ” aloud its revealed that its actually transliterated English.
One pictured reads “Have you ever been spoken to like this before?” When shown at MuHKA Museum in Antwerp, Arabic and Dutch speaking guards and Dutch and English speaking visitors deciphered the meaning together.
While Islam claims the color green it is also used for green screens today. A camera and monitor project visitors into the complete interior dome of the 13th century Tomb of Zummurad Khatun, located in a vast graveyard in Baghdad. It is thought to be the first example of true muqaranas. The image links the anachronistic ideal to the fragmented present. Visitors can decide what the present really means
