Project Native Informant
Art Basel in Miami Beach 2015

Inspired by nation-state branding campaigns, A Wonderful World Under Construction imagines a reality in which a government body provides branding as an essential public service.

A state's investment in public diplomacy and expensive nation branding campaigns are often disseminated as seemingly benign efforts to promote tourism, trade and foreign direct investment. These outward facing tactics emerge out of opaque dealings with strategic communications experts, public relations and consulting companies that often obscure a government’s negative qualities to secure influence on the international stage.

Through these soft power strategies a nation can pursue ambitious international and domestic policy objectives, while at the same time their internal PR strategies capture the public imagination on a national scale.

This project serves as the launch for a fictional smartphone app that offers branding as an essential public service by the government. By existing in the interstitial space between idea and implementation, we invite audiences to consider the pervasive role of government in the day to day management of our hyper-mediated lives.

About GCC:
GCC is a collective based in the Arabian Gulf. Their name is taken from the English abbreviation for the Gulf Cooperation Council, a transnational, political and economic union. GCC engages in a multi-disciplinary practice that explores the construction of identities and systems across the purview of contemporary Gulf society, including its bureaucratic, cultural and diplomatic arenas.

The delegates are: Nanu Al-Hamad, Khalid Al Gharaballi, Abdullah Al-Mutairi, Fatima Al Qadiri, Monira Al Qadiri, Aziz Al Qatami, Barrak Alzaid and Amal Khalaf.

Solo exhibitions include Ceremonial Achievements at Kraupa-Tuskany Zeidler, Berlin (2013), A Space for National Achievement at Sultan Gallery, Kuwait (2013) Achievements in Swiss Summit at Project Native Informant, London (2013), and GCC: Achievements in Retrospective at MoMA PS1 (New York, 2014) and at the Sharjah Art Foundation (Sharjah, 2014). Upcoming are participation in the Berlin Biennial (2016) and a solo exhibition at Mitchell-Innes Nash, New York (2016).