Join Art Jameel’s researcher and writer in residence Nadia Christidi on a guided tour of Jebel Ali Village that explores how to see and read water supply and water infrastructures in the city of Dubai. The tour grapples with the elusiveness of key water infrastructures, which are often off-limits and or illegible to the public. It seeks to develop and present alternative methods, approaches as well as vantage points for viewing and understanding water in the city.

How do we look around key infrastructures rather than at them and what might we find at their margins?  From which sites could more of these key infrastructures be visible? What are some of the subtle and secondary signs of water that are hidden in plain sight and that we can train ourselves to recognise? And what is there to learn from seeing these?

The tour will provide a historical overview of the area’s urban and infrastructural development, tips for recognizing signs of water in the present-day landscape and a glimpse of future plans and their potential impact on surrounding neighbourhoods.

Registration is required. Meeting point details will be shared upon confirmation.

Nadia Christidi is a Syrian, Palestinian, and Greek researcher, writer, and arts practitioner based between Cambridge, MA and Beirut, Lebanon. Her work explores the political and economic dimensions of environmental imaginaries, earth sciences, and their representation in literature, art, and design. She has exhibited at Beirut Art Center; SALT Galata, Istanbul; and SALT Ulus, Ankara. Nadia was previously Assistant Director at Beirut Art Center and Interpretation and Learning Lead at Darat al Funun, Amman, and has worked on exhibition projects with Ashkal Alwan and the Young Arab Theatre Fund. Her writing has been published by Arteeast, ArtAsiaPacific, and TandemWorks. Nadia holds a BA in History of Art (2006) from Bryn Mawr College, Pennsylvania and an MA in Historical Studies (2015) from the New School for Social Research, New York. She is currently a PhD candidate in History, Anthropology, and Science, Technology, and Society at MIT.