No abstract

The neoliberal restructuring of the “arts and culture” sphere currently occurring in Abu Dhabi through the cultural project of Saadiyat Island is characterized by two major phenomena, namely the commodification of the past and the segregation of consumer types. First, undesirable or non‑modern images and styles are replaced with updated, cosmopolitan ones. This appears most prominently in the project’s construction of a distinguished and civilized cultural genealogy for the city of Abu Dhabi and in the appropriation of architectural vernaculars, whereby major Western architects modify and incorporate local forms to both situate the city on a cosmopolitan grid as well as anchor these cultural spaces in a distinctively Arab Gulf tradition. Secondly, the spatial organization of Saadiyat’s cultural and consumption spaces is designed to facilitate the flow to specific and distinct zones of consumption, segregate classes of consumers from one another by inhibiting movement between zones, and render invisible these inequalities.