It could be the largest art installation of all time: an immersive 10-kilometre route spanning an area of over one million square metres in the Margham desert, just a few kilometres from Dubai.
Clio — the name of this project, somewhere between architecture, land art and infrastructure — was presented in Dubai in recent days and bears the signature of Agron Hoti, a visual artist born in Albania and based in Italy for the past twenty years, in Verona.
But what exactly will Clio be? From the renderings released so far, it appears to consist of two large circular volumes from which a network of paths and installations branches out, set to cut across the desert landscape.
The installation will be built using 25,000 authenticated modules, each measuring two by two metres, and will feature at its centre the Clio House, a cultural arena designed to host exhibitions, conferences and events, within a programme already planned to unfold over six years. The project’s website states that the aim is to “celebrate human excellence in all its forms — from art to sport, from politics to science.”
Construction is scheduled to begin in 2026, with a partial opening planned for 2027: “partial” because completion of the full intervention is set for 2033.
Hoti is an artist who works with monumentality — and monumentality, as we know, appeals to the star system.
In the biography published on his website, Agron Hoti describes himself as “a child with an extraordinary artistic sensitivity.” He began his career as a restorer of Byzantine icons and later, in the early 2000s, moved to Italy, to Verona, where he founded the Hoti Gallery. Since then, he has worked on large — and extremely large — formats, drawing on the tools of Pollock-style action painting (brushes, spatulas, rollers) and applying them to overtly contemporary themes: inclusivity, freedom, trauma, and memory.
Hoti is an artist who works with monumentality — and monumentality, as we know, appeals to the star system. Among his collectors are Cristiano Ronaldo and Francesco Totti, along with other Italian and international athletes who accompany him to events and openings. The most recent was the presentation of the Clio Desert Park in Dubai.
His media breakthrough came in 2023, when with Everflow he occupied the stadium in Tirana for one hundred days, painting 7,600 square metres of canvas — the largest surface ever painted by a single artist in history. In Italy, some may remember him for a monumental live painting performance inside an empty Arena di Verona during the pandemic.
In both cases, the works were later divided and sold — much like NFTs in 2020 — in the form of modules. Clio follows the same mechanism.
The Clio Desert Park is funded by Shamal Holding, a Dubai-based investment company active in real estate, hospitality and leisure. Shamal also owns the Margham desert area where the project will be built — a stretch of the Arabian Desert already used as an experiential infrastructure, from desert skydiving to jeep safaris — which the holding now aims to turn into a cultural destination as well.
Partners in the initiative also include XDubai, supporting the project’s digital communication strategy, and Skydive Dubai, which will oversee the development of experiential packages enabling visitors to “interact” with the installation.
All images: Rendering of the Clio project, a 10-kilometre-long immersive installation in the Margham desert near Dubai, conceived by artist Agron Hoti.