Stadiums as High Art in a World Cup Fantasyland

AL KHOR, Qatar — It’s hard to describe how strange it feels to first arrive at Al Bayt Stadium, a giant stylized tent decorated with black stripes. Designed for the World Cup as an homage to traditional nomadic homes, Al Bayt, the heart of a manicured park 22 miles north of Doha, rises as if out of nowhere. and it seems both appropriate and absurd, spectacular and unusual — an oasis in the desert, or maybe just an illusion.

Newly completed last year, Al Bayt is one of seven new stadiums built for the World Cup in and around Doha, the capital of Qatar. (Eighth Stadium is an upgraded version of an old stadium.) Each stadium is more spectacular, more unexpected than the next. Each has contributed to the constant sense of cognitive dissonance that pervades this World Cup.

Qatar spent $220 billion to prepare for the tournament, building new buildings, new residential areas and even a whole new city. To be here now is to exist in a highly unrealistic bubble: a place where everything is newer and better, and exists, in the present moment, only in relation to itself.

On match days, it takes almost an hour by bus to reach Al Bayt. All the other stadiums can be easily reached by the metro system or connected to it by the free bus, so this has become the World Cup for commuters, an event reminiscent of World Cup. more opportunities than previous tournaments. In Russia, for example, in 2018, some fans had to travel to Yekaterinburg, nearly 1,000 miles from Moscow, to watch some matches. In Brazil four years earlier, the trip from Manaus to Porto Alegre more than doubled.

But here you can visit all the stadiums in one day.

For example, take the train west on the green line, passing the National Library of Qatar (architect: Rem Koolhaas), and you find yourself in city ​​education., a 2,900-acre campus that includes schools, research centers and incubators. A little walk along the road and there are 40,000 seats Education City Stadium, looming like a spaceship from an advanced civilization whose inhabitants have a taste for glitter. During the day, it changes color as the sun moves across the sky; At night, disco-style lights run along it, powered by thousands of diodes.

Along another metro line is the colorful 974 Stadium, whose name is a nod to the (unverifiable) number of shipping containers believed to have been used to build it and also the Qatar international dialing code. Stadium 974 is both original and witty and is expected to be dismantled at the end of the tournament. (Would World Cup matches be more interesting if they were played in an arena seemingly built out of Lego? Discussion.)

It’s interesting to think about what stadiums look like. Khalifa International Stadium has an impressive sloping top rim that reminds one of the Mobius strip. (Besides it was a striking building that resembled a spear thrust into the air that my colleagues guessed could be a control tower, a telecommunications center, or “something related to falconry.” ” but it turned out to be a hotel.)

At Al Janoub Stadium, the light pink undulating roof is means to evoke “the wind-stretched sails of traditional Qatari dhows,” according to the World Cup guide, but are instead known for evoking similarities to Georgia O’Keeffe’s floral paintings. (“What a shame,” said the stadium’s architect, Zaha Hadid, who passed away in 2016. speak when the comparison first appeared. “What are they saying? Everything with a hole in it is a vagina? It’s ridiculous.”)

Return to the metro and take the green line to the last stop, the Qatar Mall. There, you face two equal and opposite forces. Behind you is mall, a vast temple for retail and entertainment. In front of you, shrouded in a bright royal blue glow in the evening, is the majestic building Ahmad bin Ali Stadium, known as the Gateway to the Desert because of the barren landscape that extends far beyond it. Not everyone is a fan: Architecture Magazine described it is “a vast object planted in the desert by the whirlwind of money that revolves around FIFA.”

That is the problem, or one of them, with the mere idea of ​​the Qatar World Cup: majesty intertwined with madness. The exploitation of migrant workers used to build its bespoke arena; shipped grass and ornamental plants in places where these do not grow; the feeling that the infrastructure, rich in detail and high in design, is intended to create future demand rather than meet current needs; always feel too hot outside and too cold inside; Ornamental fountains in one of the driest places on Earth — all of which are difficult to deal with.

The other evening, I took the subway to the Free Zone station. After taking the shuttle bus and walking a long distance, I turned the corner to see the magnificent Al Thumama Stadium, sparkling like a crown of diamonds and silver, striking against the dark night sky. tight.

“It’s my favorite stadium,” said Abdulrahman al-Mana, a Qatari who works at the site but whose regular job is urban planner. He’s 24 years old and went to Cornell, with his tuition paid for by the government. He is proud of Qatar and proud of the stadium designed by a Qatari architect Ibrahim Jaidah and evokes the gahfiya, the traditional woven hat worn by Arab men underneath their ghutraor headscarf.

Al-Mana raved about how stadiums will in many cases be reduced in size after the World Cup and then repurposed as sports and community centers, surrounded by public buildings. park and landscape. “An important part of this is making sure there is a legacy for the future,” he said.

I thought about what he said as he took the subway in the other direction to Lusail Iconic Stadium, with over 88,000 seats, Qatar’s largest stadium, and the site of the World Cup final on the 18th. December. It’s a glittering jewel of a structure, a huge ravishing golden vase that somehow seems to absorb, create, and reflect light at the same time.

The stadium is located on the edge of Lusail, a growing city 14 miles from central Doha. Although the city does not exist in anything like its current form 20 years ago, it will soon be able to accommodate 450,000 people and serve as a hub for sports, commerce, entertainment and travel. Sure, it’s beautiful, said an Irishman who works at the league, who did not wish to be named, but if I really wanted to see something, I should check out the four futuristic towers that tower over the city. new, shining purple in the distance. He’s not sure what the towers are for — maybe they’re just decorative — but thinks it’s worth my time: There’s a giant shark there, he says.

Qatar is known for its avid animal collectors – the country has just received two giant pandas from China and is said to have plans to build Park dedicated to giraffes in Lusail – and so it makes sense for it to install a shark tank in the middle of a city with a vanity project.

Although there still seem to be few people living there, Lusail still has plenty of crowds experiencing its peculiar sensory overload. Cool air is blowing up from the ground, partly due to a giant cooling plant spewing steam next to the stadium. Inspirational songs blared from loudspeakers. Beams of light danced in the sky. Women dressed as giant red flowers walk on stilts. Someone is playing Arabic music on the saxophone. On either side of the street are shops: Al-Jazeera Perfume, a coffee shop called “Cup of Joe” and, for some reason, a Chuck E. Cheese store the length of a block.

The road seemed to stretch for miles. The tower in the distance turned out to be four office buildings designed by Foster + Partners, the future home of the National Bank of Qatar and the Qatar Investment Authority. The shark, suspended from cables between buildings, glittering and glittering like a disco ball, turned out to be fake.