Here is My Secret

Much of Qatar appears to be desert stretching in all directions – a seemingly lifeless landscape of low, barren sand plains and rolling dunes. Yet within this desolateness are signs of life and things of beauty which Al-Thani – who has perhaps examined the Qatari landscape more closely than any other photographer – reveals for the first time to an international audience. The photos in Here is My Secret were taken in 2008 and 2009, when Al-Thani traversed Qatar, his only companions a Toyota four-wheel drive and his Leica camera. Eschewing human change on the landscape, Here is My Secret is a poetic contemplation on nature and an illustration of the larger cultural transformation that Qatar is currently undergoing.

Khalid Bin Hamad Bin Ahmad Al-Thani, born in 1980 in Doha, describes photography as a “language without subtitles” and his project is to establish a unique and authentic Qatari photographic language. With a degree in business from Qatar University, Al-Thani has now focused his attention on the Qatari desert, his ambition to reveal its unacknowledged beauty to the general public.