The US-Qatar Business Council (USQBC) and the Qatar-America Institute (QAI), completed a two-day outreach trip to the city with Nasser Allenqawi, Consul General of the State of Qatar from New York. The visit included a series of high-level engagements in the city focused on education, culture, and business. The visit is part of a series of outreach visits focused on enhancing the US-Qatar bilateral relationship.

As part of the Qatar America Institute’s Expressions Series on those that have been inspired by Qatari art and culture, noted author and architectural critic Philip Jodidio and former Senior Associate Dean of Northwestern University in Qatar, Richard J. Roth, kicked off the Chicago-based events with a dialogue on contemporary architecture and urban development in Doha, Qatar.

The event gathered Chicago area architects, engineers, business leaders and students for an overview by Jodidio that included discussion of Qatar’s state-of-the-art museums and internationally acclaimed original architecture including the I.M. Pei-designed Museum of Islamic Art; the Qatar National Library; Msheireb Downtown Doha with major design and sustainability innovations by Chicago-based architects and engineers; the Sidra Medical and Research Center, and a host of Pritzker-laureate architecture that forms the campus of the Qatar Foundation and six top US universities in Doha; and the newly-opened National Museum of Qatar—Jean Nouvel’s second iconic work to be built in Doha.

Jodidio and Roth expanded the discussion with audience members to focus on ways the special relationship between the US and Qatar has led to an increasingly progressive and open country, radical innovations in sustainable public transit for Doha, and the highest concentration of original architecture by Pritzker Prize in the world.

“There is a desire for openness, there is a desire for lasting quality, there is desire for modernity,” said  Jodidio. “Some of this must seem strange for people who listen to the news and sometimes hear negative things about the region, but after 18 visits and extensive time working in Qatar, I can tell you this is a truly inspiring place that is open, forward-thinking, and preparing its own people for a future which might just be one without carbon-based fuels, gas, and oil.”

The US-Qatar Business Council, in partnership with the Chicago Regional Growth Corporation and the Illinois District Export Council, hosted a business luncheon featuring Allenqawi. The luncheon took place in downtown Chicago, and welcomed over 35 executives and export managers from the Chicago area.

Source: Peninsula