Min Turab

Contributors, Densities, Formats, Middle Density, Roger Grasas, Survey, Territory and mobility, Topics, Urban Paradigms.

Extreme environments, Globalization, New economies, Nomadic lifestyle, Photographic Atlas of the Cities, Soil, Survey, Transformation, Urban Development, Urban landscape.

In the last decades, the landscapes of the Arab Gulf region have undergone a mutation driven by increased income from the oil and globalization. These countries have seen a huge transformation, moving from the nomadic lifestyle of the desert Bedouins to a high-tech urban society.

Min Turab, taken from an Arabic expression that means “what comes from the earth,” is a visual investigation about how the oil –created very slowly under the earth- is capable of transforming the landscape on top of it in an accelerated way. Although this itinerary may be somehow a reminiscent of the 19th-century grand tour, in Min Turab the attention is not focused to the most popular sites of photographic pilgrimage. Instead, the areas to study point to the newest centers of urban development with an approach from the outskirts, the peripheries, and the back alleys.