Dezeen School Shows: artwork informed by the work of artist Marcel Duchamp is among the projects being exhibited at Virginia Commonwealth University School of the Arts in Qatar's New Exhibition Ghūl.

Also set to be exhibited is a series of biodegradable lamps and a satirical installation outlining the future of AI and its application to water access.

Virginia Commonwealth University School of the Arts in Qatar

Institution: Virginia Commonwealth University School of the Arts in Qatar
School: School of the Arts
Course: New Exhibition Ghūl, Ars Electronica Festival 2025
Tutors: Meriem Aiouna, Dina Alkhateeb, Chase Westfal and Joshua Rodenbergl

School statement:

"VCUarts Qatar present Ghūl, an immersive exhibition that reflects on the systems that govern our lives, through technology, economics and ecology, and how they shape the way we experience the world.

"The exhibition takes its cue from the popular 'ghoul' or ghūl (غُولْ), the shapeshifting trickster or a mischievous malevolent creature of Arabian folklore.

"The exhibition uses the figure as a metaphor to investigate how human-made systems ensnare, influence and linger in our daily existence.

"Ghūl invites visitors to question how these structures embody collective values and transform lived realities. These projects reflect the urgency of rethinking the systems that condition everyday life.

"Through poetic, critical and playful engagements, they invite viewers to navigate the visible and invisible forces shaping the present – and to imagine alternatives beyond them.

"Ghūl brings together a diverse set of works developed by faculty, students, alumni and collaborators across the VCUarts Qatar and Richmond campuses."

HydroGAN by Fariha Ahmed, Fatima Nazir, Alice Aslem, Selma Fejzullaj, Jood Elbeshti and Shawky Abdalla

"HydroGAN is a satirical installation critiquing the commodification of water and identity in an AI-driven age.

"Framed as the corporate launch of 'AI-generated' water, it exposes the environmental and ethical costs masked by the rhetoric of technological progress.

"Through performance, biometric entry, and persuasive branding, the work stages a spectacle of desire, revealing how belief is manufactured and consumption engineered.

"HydroGAN asks audiences to confront the systems they trust and the silent trade-offs they have learned to accept."

Students: Fariha Ahmed, Fatima Nazir, Alice Aslem, Selma Fejzullaj, Jood Elbeshti and Shawky Abdalla
Course: Master of Fine Arts in Design
Tutor: Joshua Rodenberg (project advisor)

Group project: Apparitions 

"Apparitions invites participants into a virtual cave where a sculptural keyboard becomes the medium for summoning swirling digital 'apparitions'.

"Through playful feedback loops between body, gesture and code, the work explores how embodied interaction shapes perception and experience within chaotic virtual spaces.

"Each of the works showcased will align with the exhibition's central theme: making visible the hidden forces that shape contemporary life and inviting alternative futures through engagement, critique and play.

"This transcontinental collaboration exemplifies VCUarts Qatar's dedication to creative research that spans disciplines, cultures and technologies."

Students: Ryan Browning, Sarah Khankan, Ameena Darwish, Martin Juras, Moom Thahinah, Lana Selo, Maha Alnaimi, Aljohara Almeraikhi, Fatima Al Muftah, Abdelrahman Moustafa, Nada Hijawi and Essa Al Mahmoud

Self-Reflexive Worlds: Ideal Home by ShanMu Sun

"In adaptive virtual environments, the user becomes both subject and object, cause and effect, figure and ground.

"Responsive technologies reflect back our images and desires, drawing us into a hall of shifting mirrors that is not always easy to escape.

"Ideal Home is an XR narrative that reimagines immigrant experiences and the meaning of home through emerging technologies.

"An archive of texts written by immigrants and rooted in memory and displacement was reworked into a unified script by a fine-tuned GPT-4 model.

"Brought into a game engine, this script unsettles the boundary between oral history and generative storytelling.

"Guided by a spectral AI avatar, players move through layered landscapes, fleeting memories, and cultural symbols, co-authoring with the system a new language of belonging."

Student: ShanMu Sun

Self-Reflexive Worlds: Text Textures by Sirena Pearl

"Text Textures transforms live webcam feeds into shifting ASCII streams, inscribing the player's movements directly into the game world.

"This uncanny mirroring produces a state of simultaneous observation and self-surveillance, exposing the tension between control and submission.

"Progress in the game requires players to actively code elements, a process that confronts them with their own digital identity, as fragments, abstractions and algorithmically parsed data.

"The work asks: do we author our digital presence, or are we authored as consumable data points within systems of computation?"

Student: Sirena Pearl
Tutor: Peter Baldes (project advisor)

Group project: Roto Riso 

"Roto Riso is a modular kinetic installation inspired by Duchamp's Rotoreliefs and Op Art, reimagined through contemporary media practices.

"The project invites students to explore motion, illusion and cultural patterns through riso-printed spinning discs.

"With adjustable speed, direction and swappable parts, Roto-Riso is an interactive and participatory experience that merges art history, design, kinetic imaging, and printmaking in an interdisciplinary intro to time-based media."

Students: Varvara Guljajeva, Liyan Abu Taleb, Alghalya Al-Emadi, Haya Al-Emadi, Amna Aljaber, Alya Al-Jamal, Alreem Al-Moslamani, Nouf Al-Kuwari, Noor Al-Shareef, Maryam AlKuwari, Alya Altamimi, Talia El Zein, Alfajer Ghanem, Ifrah Khan, Sumaiya Rawothapillai, Adnan Abdul Ghaffar, Douha Al Hiraky, Shaikha Al-Maadhadi, Dima Al-Marri, Mooza Al-Mohannadi, Maryam Al-Mulla, Fatima Al-Sumaiti, Eman Ba Hakam, Kristen DSilva, Abeeha Fawad Khan, Malika Hashem, Haya Kandakji, Lamis Khalid, Kaela Pablo, Syed Abdul Rasheed and Noof Al-Ahbabi
Tutors: Rhassan Rachdi (teaching assistant), Eman Makk (riso print), Shankar Padmanabhan (woodwork)

Food Waste Renaissance by Yasamin Shaikhi

"Food Waste Renaissance (FWR) explores how food excess and byproducts can be transformed into sustainable design materials.

"Rather than claiming to solve large-scale waste issues, it reframes perception, inviting individuals, designers and communities to see waste having a huge potential.

"Working with rice and date byproducts, FWR creates biodegradable lamps that return material from the table to the table.

"In a world where systems often mask harm as progress, FWR proposes an alternative path, reinvention through design."

Student: Yasamin Shaikhi
Course: Master of Fine Arts in Design

Partnership content

This school show is a partnership between Dezeen and Virginia Commonwealth University School of the Arts in Qatar. Find out more about Dezeen partnership content here.

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