Contemplate the meaning of this tall art installation on a man-made peninsula jutting out from Doha into the Persian Gulf.
Walk along the Corniche in Doha and pass the Museum of Islamic Art to visit 7, an outdoor sculpture by Richard Serra in MIA Park. The number seven has very important symbolism in Islam. From seven days of the week and seven colors of the rainbow to seven heavens, the number appears multiple times in the Quran and in everyday life.
The iconic sculpture consists of seven steel plates mounted upright at the end of a man-made peninsula. Each plate is 8 feet (2.4 meters) wide and 78 feet (24 meters) high. The plates lean against each other in a circle with a design allowing several entrances to the round space at the base. Step inside and look upward to see the regular heptagon, a figure with seven equal sides, created at the top of the art installation.
Sheikha Al Mayassa bint Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, then the daughter of Qatar’s emir, commissioned Serra’s work. Serra found inspiration for the tall shape from the Ghazni minaretin Afghanistan. Note that the sculpture began as gray steel when installed in 2011 but has begun to oxidize, taking on a rusty orange color.
Richard Serra is an American artist whose sculptures appear at MoMA in New York and the Guggenheim in Bilbao, Spain. While in Qatar, see another of his symbolic works about a 90-minute drive west of Doha. The sculpture East-West/West-East consists of four tall steel plates separately mounted in a row in the Brouq Nature Reserve. Stand anywhere along the 0.6-mile (1-kilometer) stretch of the installation and view all four monoliths at once.
Find the 7 sculpture in MIA Park. Walk here from the Museum of Islamic Art in less than 15 minutes, enjoying views of the peaceful park, the Persian Gulf and the skyline of Doha as you stroll along the waterfront.
After pondering the meaning of the sculpture, take a ride across the bay on a traditional dhow to see the impressive city from a unique viewpoint.
