Global Energy Cultures: How Energy Shapes Our Everyday Lives

Nouf Al-Thani (Moderator)

Nouf Mubarak bin Saif Al-Thani is a museum professional with extensive experience at Qatar Museums. She has held several leadership positions at QM, including Head of Memberships, Head of Partnerships, and is currently the Head of Strategic Insights at the Chairperson’s Office. She is a member of Phi Alpha Theta, the American National History Honor Society, and Pi Sigma Alpha, the American Political Science Association.

---

Hafiz Ali Abdulla

Hafiz Ali Ali Abdulla is a communications executive who has made significant contributions to the field of corporate communications, strategy development, and management within various organisations. He has a consistent track record of delivering effective cultural and educational projects for government, education and cultural institutions. He  is also recognised for his ability to develop and nurture large, diverse, and multi-disciplinary teams with his thoughtful and intentional management style. His appointment as Board Member of the Qatar National Committee of ICOM (ICOM Qatar) reinforces Qatar’s influence and presence within the international museum community. He is also a prolific Qatari filmmaker with extensive experience in the fine arts. His films include Cab Driver (2004), The Oryx Return (2007), and Scent of Shadows (2009), which explores cinema in Qatar. He continues to take an active interest in promoting and contributing to national efforts across several initiatives aimed at achieving UN’s Sustainable Development Goals in education; coalition development; implementation of multi-stakeholder initiatives; community development; mentoring and coaching teams to lead; project management; film producing and directing; story development; curating narrative exhibitions and developing multinational projects utilising the latest technologies that leads to sustainable business models.

---

Astrid Kensinger

Astrid Kensinger is an Associate Professor and the Chair of Graphic Design at Virginia Commonwealth University of the Arts in Qatar where she leads the (IN)>Tangible Lab, a multidisciplinary research cluster that activates Qatar’s Intangible Cultural Heritage through art & design. She has pursued her art and design practice internationally, spending much time in Japan, Singapore, Australia, and Qatar. She uses her personal practice to inform her multidisciplinary research collaborations. She has exhibited and presented her work internationally in solo and group shows, in juried exhibitions and conferences. Her most recent multidisciplinary research collaborations have included facilitating, through co-design, Dengue fever outbreak solutions (Skoll Foundation, Epihack Colombo, Sri Lanka), visualizing the research methodologies of linguists mapping and preserving endangered languages of South East (DIHA: Digital Intangible Heritage of Asia), and is currently leading the multidisciplinary creative research project, Mapping Migration Memories, based in Qatar.

---

Hiroki Shin

Hiroki Shin is a Vice-chancellor’s Fellow in the School of History, Anthropology, Philosophy and Politics at Queen’s University Belfast, Northern Ireland, UK. He was a co-investigator of the AHRC research project ‘Material Cultures of Energy’ (2015–2017) and principal investigator of its follow-on project (2018–2019). His ongoing project examines the role of cultural and heritage institutions—museums, science centres, archives, and heritage sites—across the United Kingdom, Europe, America, and Asia in response to the climate crisis. He is currently working on a monograph on the history of energy consumption in 20th-century Japan.