Qatar Museums opened the second edition of "Frame and Focus" on September 5 at Al Hosh Gallery in Doha, presenting work by more than 12 photographers from Qatar, the Gulf, North Africa and West Asia. The exhibition runs through October 5 as part of the Qatar Creates Fall/Winter 2026-27 season.

The show is the public outcome of an advanced photography training course run by the Tasweer Photography Festival in partnership with the Qatar Preparatory School (QPS), The VII Foundation and Al Hosh Gallery. Khalifa Al Obaidly, Director of Tasweer, told the Qatar News Agency that "Frame and Focus" comes after "14 weeks of study, exploration, and engagement with international experiences and expertise in photography." The course aimed to deepen participants' technical knowledge and develop their artistic practices under international mentorship — a pedagogical model that positions the exhibition less as a standalone event than as the culmination of a sustained educational process.

Ziyah Gafic, Director of The VII Foundation in Sarajevo, framed the project's stakes in uncompromising terms. "Frame and Focus affirms our firm belief that telling your own story is a fundamental human right," he said. "At a time marked by turmoil and competing narratives, these artists enrich discussions around belonging, memory, and resilience through work characterized by rigor, empathy, and deeply personal perspectives."

The projects on view circle questions of identity, memory, heritage, migration and belonging, working across portraiture, documentary photography and experimental visual storytelling. Several series anchor those themes in sharply specific subjects. Maja Bacic's I SEA, Fatima Ahmad Al Doh's I, Myself, Am a Country and Abdullatif Ahmad Al Nuaimi's The First Chalk Line draw on personal histories and attachments to place. Abdullatif Al Jaidah's The House of God considers the mosque as a space of prayer, a place of hope and a symbol of continuity, while Al Waleed Al Khaja's And This, Too, Shall Pass and Burair Ali Al Kishri's The Rose examine how traditions, rituals and community shape everyday life and collective memory.

Christophe Buffet's Basateen Al-Freej (Gardens of the Neighbourhood) documents the transformation of a historic educational site into a vibrant community space — one of several works tracing how physical places carry social meaning across generations. Alongside it, Jhenny Marian Laya Perez's FULAN and Jaili Hajo's We Too Have Wings extend the exhibition's range, revealing, in the organizers' framing, the many dimensions through which belonging is experienced, remembered and reimagined.

Al Nuaimi, speaking to QNA, explained the personal root of his project. The First Chalk Line is an expression of gratitude to teachers, inspired by old school buildings in Qatar and by his father, who taught in the 1970s. Through the series, he said, he wants to thank all teachers for what they have given and devoted to students across their years of education, and to recognize earlier generations for their role in building and educating individuals. The work gives the exhibition's broader themes of heritage and continuity a concrete, domestic anchor: a chalk line drawn between a father's classroom and his son's camera.

The exhibition's regional scope matters. By bringing together photographers from Qatar, the Gulf countries, North Africa and West Asia — and by grounding the show in an extended training period rather than an open call — Tasweer and The VII Foundation are building an institutional framework for photography education in a region where such sustained mentorship remains rare. The partnership with a Sarajevo-based foundation also signals the festival's outward orientation, consistent with the stated aim of cultural exchange and global connection within the Qatar Creates programme.

The programme continues immediately. Tasweer will host a guided tour of "Frame and Focus" on Sunday, September 7, followed by a discussion session with participating artists at Al Hosh Gallery. The conversation will address photography education and the role of artistic practice in expressing personal experience, cultural narrative and contemporary issues — extending the exhibition's emphasis from showing work to interrogating how that work gets made.