The Gulf Art War

In October, 2005, Thomas Krens, the director of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, flew from New York to Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates. In the gilded lobby of the Emirates Palace hotel, Mohammed bin Zayed al Nahyan, the crown prince, described his vision for Saadiyat Island, a twenty-seven-billion-dollar development not far from the city’s downtown. Saadiyat, which Emiratis refer to as “the island of happiness,” would include luxury hotels, Marbella-style villas, and a boutique shopping quarter. Most important was a vast cultural district, which Zayed hoped would position Abu Dhabi—both the city and the Emirate that bears its name—as the patron of a modern Arab Renaissance. A new Guggenheim was to be a centerpiece of this effort.