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THE AGA KHAN PROGRAM FOR ISLAMIC ARCHITECTURE & THE AGA KHAN TRUST FOR CULTURE AKPIA Based at Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, The Aga Khan Program for Islamic Architecture (AKPIA) is dedicated to the study of Islamic art and architecture, urbanism, landscape design, and conservation - and the application of that knowledge to contemporary design projects. The goals of the program are to improve the teaching of Islamic art and architecture - to promote excellence in advanced research - to enhance the understanding of Islamic architecture, urbanism, and visual culture in light of contemporary theoretical, historical, critical, and developmental issues - and to increase the visibility of Islamic cultural heritage in the modern Muslim world. Established in 1979, AKPIA is supported by an endowment from His Highness the Aga Khan. AKPIA’s faculty, students, and alumni have played a substantial role in advancing the practice, analysis, and understanding of Islamic architecture as a discipline and cultural force. AKDN The Aga Khan Trust for Culture (AKTC) focuses on the physical, social, cultural and economic revitalization of communities in the Muslim world. It includes the Aga Khan Award for Architecture, the Historic Cities Support Programme, and Education and Culture initiatives.The Trust is an agency of the Aga Khan Development Network (AKDN), a group of agencies founded by His Highness the Aga Khan that work in the poorest parts of Asia and Africa. The Aga Khan Development Network focuses on health, education, culture, rural develop- ment, institution-building and the promo- tion of economic development. It is dedicat- ed to improving living conditions and oppor- tunities for the poor, without regard to their faith, origin or gender.Though their spheres of activity and expertise differ—ranging from social development, to economic devel- opment, to culture—AKDN institutions share at least three principles that guide their work. The first is a dedication to self- sustaining development that can contribute to long-term economic advancement and social harmony.The second is a commit- ment to the vigorous participation of local communities in all development efforts. Finally, all Network institutions seek shared responsibility for positive change. akpia aktc october 2005 features: Lecture Series p.2 Aga Khan Program MIT p.4 Aga Khan Program Harvard p.13 Aga Khan Program GSD p.23 Aga Khan Trust for Culture p.25 ArchNet p.30 2 1 issue

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Page 1: akpia aktc · Ottoman Art/Architecture in Early Republican Nationalist Texts” Zeynep Celik, New Jersey Institute of Technology, discussant Ahmet Ersoy, Bogaziçi University,“Architecture

THE AG

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AKPIA

Based at Harvard University and theMassachusetts Institute of Technology,The Aga Khan Program for IslamicArchitecture (AKPIA) is dedicated to thestudy of Islamic art and architecture,urbanism, landscape design, and conservation - and the application ofthat knowledge to contemporary designprojects. The goals of the program are toimprove the teaching of Islamic art andarchitecture - to promote excellence inadvanced research - to enhance theunderstanding of Islamic architecture,urbanism, and visual culture in light ofcontemporary theoretical, historical,critical, and developmental issues - and to increase the visibility of Islamiccultural heritage in the modern Muslimworld. Established in 1979, AKPIA is supported by an endowment from HisHighness the Aga Khan.

AKPIA’s faculty, students, and alumnihave played a substantial role in advancing the practice, analysis, andunderstanding of Islamic architecture as a discipline and cultural force.

AKDN

The Aga Khan Trust for Culture (AKTC)focuses on the physical, social, cultural andeconomic revitalization of communities inthe Muslim world. It includes the Aga KhanAward for Architecture, the Historic CitiesSupport Programme, and Education andCulture initiatives.The Trust is an agency ofthe Aga Khan Development Network(AKDN), a group of agencies founded by HisHighness the Aga Khan that work in thepoorest parts of Asia and Africa.The AgaKhan Development Network focuses onhealth, education, culture, rural develop-ment, institution-building and the promo-tion of economic development. It is dedicat-ed to improving living conditions and oppor-tunities for the poor, without regard to theirfaith, origin or gender.Though their spheresof activity and expertise differ—rangingfrom social development, to economic devel-opment, to culture—AKDN institutionsshare at least three principles that guidetheir work.The first is a dedication to self-sustaining development that can contributeto long-term economic advancement andsocial harmony.The second is a commit-ment to the vigorous participation of localcommunities in all development efforts.Finally, all Network institutions seek sharedresponsibility for positive change.

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features:

Lecture Series p.2

Aga Khan Program MIT p.4

Aga Khan Program Harvard p.13

Aga Khan Program GSD p.23

Aga Khan Trust for Culture p.25

ArchNet p.30

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AGA KHAN PROGRAMFOR ISLAMIC ARCHITECTURE

2005-2006 AKP Harvard LectureSeries: A Forum for Islamic Art& Architecture

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 3“The Allure of Luxury: The Kashmir Shawl in Persia”Jeff Spurr, Islamic and Middle East SpecialistAga Khan Program for Islamic Architecture:Documentation CenterFine Arts Library, Harvard University

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 17“Battles of the Blind: The Babri MasjidDemolition, Media and Political Art in India”Arindam Dutta, Associate Professor of theHistory of Architecture, M.I.T., Department ofArchitecture

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 8“Of Castles and Crops: The Agricultural Estatein the Early Islamic Arabian Peninsula andBilad al-Sham”Rebecca Foote, Former Director, The Islamic ArtSociety (London) , Post-doctoral Fellow,Harvard Aga Khan Program

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The Fall 2005 “AN EVENING WITH...”MIT Lecture Series

OCTOBER 3“The Politics of Pleasure: The Strategic Use ofUmayyad Bath Complexes”Lara Tohme, Knafel, Assistant Professor in theHumanities, Wellesley College

November 14“Rethinking the Pleasure Garden in the Munyasof Cordoba”Glaire Anderson, College Art Association,Professional Development Fellow

Special Event October 2910 am to 5 pm MIT 6-120Workshop: “The Mamluk Domes of Cairo”This workshop will gather a group of scholarsworking on the Mamluk domes of Cairoalongside a number of MIT faculty andresearchers interested in domical structures.

For further information, please consult:http://web.mit.edu/akpia/www/page002.htm

All events are free and open to the public.All events are on Mondays from 5:30to 7:30pm in room MIT 3-133

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 9“Defining Islamic Archaeology”Marcus Milwright, Assistant Professor,Department of History in Art, University ofVictoria, B.C., Post-doctoral Fellow, Harvard AgaKhan Program

THURSDAY, MARCH 2“Manuscript Illumination and Illuminators inSafavid Iran”Sheila Canby, Assistant Keeper and Curator,Islamic Art and Antiquities, British Museum

THURSDAY, APRIL 20“Ivory Carving in Medieval Islam”Anthony Cutler, Evan Pugh Professor of ArtHistory, Pennsylvania State University, Post-doctoral Fellow, Harvard Aga Khan Program

The AKP Harvard Lecture Series takes place at Harvard University’s Sackler Museum,485 Broadway, Room 318 Cambridge,MA.

Lectures are held on Thursdays at 5:30pm and are open to the public. For further information, contact the Aga Khan Program at Harvard University.

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Barry Flood, New York University, “Lost inTranslation? Architectural Historiographies ofthe Eastern ‘Turks’”

Shirine Hamadeh, Rice University,“Westernization, Decadence, and the OttomanBaroque: Modern Constructions of theEighteenth Century”

Cemal Kafadar, Harvard University, “StateBuilding, Globalization, and History in theLands of Rum”

Wendy Meryem Shaw, Kadir Has University,“Preservation/Projection: Museums andNational Identity in the Republic of Turkey”

Gülru Necipoglu, Harvard University, “TheCreation of a National Genius: Sinan and theHistoriography of ‘Classical’ OttomanArchitecture”

Oya Pancaroglu, Oriental Institute, OxfordUniversity, “Gateways to Medieval Anatolia:Crossing the Impasses of ArchitecturalHistoriography”

Scott Redford, Georgetown University and KoçUniversity, “Islamic Archaeology in Turkey”

AKP Harvard Symposium

SYMPOSIUM MAY 11-13 2006“Historiography and Ideology: ArchitecturalHeritage of the Lands of Rum”To be held at the American Academy of Arts &Sciences in Cambridge, Massachusetts

Organized by Professor Gulru Necipoglu ofHarvard University and Dr. Sibel Bozdogan ofthe Boston Architectural Center

Speakers and discussants will include:

Nur Altınyıldız, Yıldız University,“Contextualizing the Byzantine and OttomanArchitectural Legacy: Istanbul in the 1920s and 1950s”

Can Bilsel, University of San Diego, “‘OurAnatolia’”: the Making of the ‘HumanistCulture’ in Turkey”

Sibel Bozdogan, Boston Architectural Center,“Reading History through Modernist Lenses:Ottoman Art/Architecture in Early RepublicanNationalist Texts”

Zeynep Celik, New Jersey Institute ofTechnology, discussant

Ahmet Ersoy, Bogaziçi University, “Architectureand the Search for Ottoman Origins in theLate Tanzimat Period”

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Kishwar Rizvi, Barnard College, “Arthur UphamPope and the Survey of Persian Art: Exploringthe Discourses on Iranian Art and Architecturein the Early Twentieth Century”

David Roxburgh, Harvard University,discussant

Heghnar Watenpaugh, MIT, “The Legacy of Ottoman Architecture in the Former Arab Provinces”

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al-Adab including: Arabism in the Heart ofExpatriate Life, In Defense of Criticism: A Call toArab Critics, and two short stories Abdo andRaqsat al-Tannura (The Dance of Tannura).

Nasser is currently working on an edited bookof essays on the courtyard house to be published by Ashgate in 2006, and anotherbook of collected essays on Islamic art inFrench, originally delivered at the Institut dumonde arabe (IMA) in Paris in 2003.

In May 2005, Nasser organized an internationalconference, Islamic Cities in the Classical Age, at MIT. During the year, he gave the following lectures: Toward an InterculturalHistoriography of Islamic Architecture at theConference Changing Boundaries: ArchitecturalHistory in Transition, in Paris; The Dead Cities inSyria and the Question of Heritage in Aleppo,Syria; Writing History in Mamluk Cairo, at theUniversity of Chicago, and Toward a CriticalHistoriography of Islamic Architecture, at theInstitute for the Study of Muslim Civilisationsin London. He delivered the keynote lecture,The Urban Character of Mamluk Architecturein Cairo: The Example of al-Darb al-Ahmar, atthe American Research Center in Egypt, 2005Annual Meeting in Cambridge, MA.

Five Ph.D. dissertations he advised or co-advised were completed in 2005: ZaydeAntrim, Department of History, Harvard

University, Sense of Place: Local Loyalty andUrban Identities in Early Mamluk Syria, StacyHolden, Department of History, BostonUniversity, Colonial Romance and MoroccanResponses: Historic Preservation in Fez (1912-37),Lara Tohme, MIT, HTC/AKPIA, A Re-evaluationof Umayyad Art and Architecture, GlaireAnderson MIT, HTC/AKPIA, Umayyad CourtlyCulture & the Rise of the Cordoban CountryEstate (756-1002), and Stephen Wolf, GraduateSchool of Design, Harvard University, UrbanPlanning in Early Ottoman Aleppo. Nasser alsoserved as external examiner of six architecturaldoctorate dissertations at the Politecnico deBari, Dipartimento di Scienze dell’IngegneriaCivile e dell'Architettura, Bari, Italy.

Beside his ongoing collaboration with the cultural section at the Institut du mondearabe in Paris, Professor Rabbat is currentlyinvolved in a three-year joint project in Cairobetween the IFAO (Institut Françaisd’Archéologie Orientale) and the AmericanResearch Center in Egypt. He is also designinga long-term collaboration with the new director of the Islamic and Coptic studies section at the IFAO, Sylvie Denoix, in Cairo,in addition to various short-term projects with several MIT architectural faculty.

In 2004-2005, Nasser Rabbat, Aga KhanProfessor of Islamic Architecture at MIT,taught the following courses: ReligiousArchitecture and Islamic Cultures; TheArchitecture of Cairo; Orientalism andRepresentation, and Historiography of IslamicArchitecture. In his teaching, Nasser tries toinstill in his students an open-mindedmethod that focuses on cultural hybridity inunderstanding architecture.

A book he co-edited with Nezar AlSayyad andIrene Bierman Making Cairo Medieval, waspublished by Lexington Press in the summerof 2005. Nasser also published these scholarlyarticles: The Medieval Link: Maqrizi's Khitat andModern Narratives of Cairo, in Making CairoMedieval; Documenting Buildings in the WaqfSystem, in Thresholds 28); and IslamicArchitecture as a Field of Historical Inquiry, inAD Architectural Design, Special IssueIslam+Architecture. Other publicationsinclude A Mosque and an Imperial Dream, inal-Ahram Weekly, (18-24 August 2005);“Foreword,” to Adonis, A Time between Ashesand Roses, translated from the Arabic byShawkat M. Toorawa. He also published anumber of essays in Arabic in Majallat

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Heghnar spent time in Syria, Lebanon, Jordan,France, Italy and Egypt participating in confer-ences and conducting research. Her essay,Deviant Dervishes: Space, Gender and theConstruction of Antinomian Piety in OttomanAleppo, will appear in the InternationalJournal of Middle East Studies 37:4 (November2005). In Fall 2005, Heghnar is teaching aseminar on “Histories and Theories ofArchitectural Preservation.” This graduateseminar addresses the critical issues involvedin the practice of preserving architecturalforms from the past. Concepts such as“Tradition,”“Heritage,”“Patrimony,” and“Monument” are examined in the context ofdebates on memory, the historical imagina-tion, the variable meaning of the visible past,imperial and national identities. These issuesare considered in relation to the contemporaryglobal tourist industry and its implications forthe conceptualization and the commodifica-tion of “traditional” environments.

Heghnar is the Aga Khan Career DevelopmentProfessor in the History, Theory and Criticismsection of the Department of Architecture atthe Massachusetts Institute of Technology. InJuly 2005, she was promoted to AssociateProfessor of the History of Architecture. Inaddition to early modern Islamic architecturalhistory, her research addresses the preserva-tion and commodification of architecture, andtheir relationship to modernity, colonialism,and nationalism in the modern Islamic world.

Heghnar was awarded a National Endowmentfor the Humanities Grant as well as a J. PaulGetty Post-doctoral Fellowship in the Historyof Art and the Humanities, which allowed herto go on leave in 2004-2005 to work on hersecond book, Ruins into Monuments:Preservation, Nationalism and the Constructionof Heritage in the Modern Middle East. Thisproject engages in the contentious debateabout cultural heritage and nationalism inthe modern Middle East by focusing on thepolitics of architectural preservation in Syriaunder French colonial rule, 1920-1946.

Heghnar Watenpaugh

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Azra is an artist and architect based inCambridge, Massachusetts. She has been anAKP Ph.D. student since the fall of 2004. Bornin Sarajevo in 1976,Azra graduated from theFaulty of Architecture at the TechnicalUniversity in Graz, Austria, in 2001 and fromPrinceton University in 2004. Her work hasbeen widely published and exhibited in suchvenues as the Generali Foundation Vienna(2002), the Valencia Biennial (2003), the BerlinArt Fair (2003), the Graz Biennial of Media andArchitecture (2003), the Gallery forContemporary Art Leipzig (2003), and theLiverpool Biennial (2004).

She is currently working on her pre-disserta-tion research about the contemporary Islamicarchitecture of post-war Bosnia-Herzegovinaand the communication of Islam in WesternEurope and the United States.

Paolo Girardelli is an assistant professor in theHistory Department of Bogaziçi (Bosphorus)University, Istanbul, Turkey. He received his Ph.D.in History of Architecture from the University ofNaples Federico II, with a thesis focusing on theItalian presence in the architecture and urbanstructure of late Ottoman Istanbul. His publica-tions include articles and proceedings on west-ern perceptions of Ottoman architecture, on themulticultural environments of Istanbul andAlexandria in the 19th and early 20th century, aswell as on the contribution of Italian andLevantine architects and patrons to the trans-formation of Istanbul on the eve of modernity.

Paolo’s forthcoming article on Muqarnas XXII,based largely on materials from the archives ofPropaganda Fide, is a contextual reading ofcross-cultural influences, including the role ofArmenian converts to Catholicism in the archi-tecture of the Catholic establishments inIstanbul. His graduate courses at BogaziçiUniversity focus on issues of identity and spaceproduction in the eastern Mediterranean regionduring the past two centuries, while hisresearch at MIT will be a critical evaluation ofthe role of diplomacy in shaping the builtenvironment of Istanbul, in the context of theso-called “Eastern Question”.

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Post-doctoral Fellows Students

Paolo Girardelli Azra Aksamija

Dr. Hawari has joined AKPIA as a postdoctoralfellow for the academic year 2005-06. He justcompleted the first year of the 3-yearAbduljawad Fellowship at the Khalili ResearchCentre for the Art and Material Culture of theMiddle East, University of Oxford. Currently,Dr. Hawari is working on a research project:The Citadel of Jerusalem, and Archaeologicaland Architectural Study. His previous research(Ph.D. thesis) dealt with the architecture ofAyyubid Jerusalem (1187-1250).

Mahmoud Hawari

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Dalia is a first year SMArchS student. Her inter-ests lie in exploring cultural and social factors,their effect on the built environment, and theirrole in providing more responsive and viablesolutions within urban contexts, particularlywithin the context of contemporary Islamic society and community development.

She graduated with a Bachelor of Science inArchitecture from the University of Jordan in2001, and completed internship work with KEOInternational Consultants in Kuwait. She held aresearch position at the Building Research Center of the Royal Scientific Society in Jordan,where she worked on the Jerusalem DatabaseProject. For the past three years she served as aresearch and coordination officer at the Centerfor the Study of the Built Environment inAmman, Jordan.

Glaire D. Anderson recently completed her Ph.D. in the History, Theory and Criticism ofArchitecture at MIT. Her dissertation, TheSuburban Villa (munya) and Court Culture inUmayyad Cordoba: 756-976 CE, explores thevilla culture of tenth-century al-Andalus fromarchitectural, landscape, and social history per-spectives. Anderson is interested in the histori-ography of Islamic art, links between antiquityand Islam, non-Muslim perceptions of Islamicarchitecture, and the Islamic architecture of thePhilippines. She has received awards from theCollege Art Association, the Society ofArchitectural Historians, the Samuel H. KressFoundation, and the Barakat Foundation.Anderson has taught at Dartmouth Collegeand Brandeis University and contributed toThresholds, the Chicago Art Journal, andRoutledge’s Medieval Islamic Civilization:An Encyclopedia.

She is currently writing a book based on her dissertation and co-editing New Researchon the Art and Archaeology of al-Andalus with Mariam Rosser-Owen of the Victoria andAlbert Museum.

Saima is a first year SMArchS student whosemajor focus lies in using the Islamically influ-enced areas of Spain as a model of the cross-roads between the East and West. Her particu-lar interest is in studying the cultural syncretismthat was established by the Moors in the 8thcentury, and how this relatively pluralistic society became a great resource for passing onIslamic traditions to modern day Spanish culture and architecture.

Saima graduated from the University ofMichigan with Bachelor of Science degrees in both Architecture and Psychology in 2003.Upon graduation, she conducted research with the Academy of Neuroscience forArchitecture in Washington, D.C., and worked in a residential architecture firm shortly thereafter. The tentative year of completion for her current degree is 2007.

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Students

Saima Akhtar Dalia al-Husseini Glaire D. Anderson

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Mohamed is a SMArchS student who is interestedin the role of nostalgia and historicism in contemporary Egyptian culture and architecture.Other interests include the role of tourism inchanging the urban experience of the MiddleEast. He completed his Bachelor of Architecturefrom the New Jersey Institute of Technologywhere he took numerous courses focusing on history, theory and criticism of architecture,including a course by Zeynep Celik, for which he conducted a semester-long research focusingon Port Said, Ismailia and Suez in the late nineteenth century. After studying in Siena,Italy, for one semester, he returned to Italy towork on the restoration project in Calabria led by Legambiante.

Mohamed has a wide variety of experiencesincluding working for the Jersey City HousingAuthority on community housing and recently for the artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude on theirwork the Gates in Central Park, New York City.

Razan Francis is an architect and a beginningPh.D. candidate at MIT. She obtained her under-graduate degree in architecture at the Technion– Israel Institute of Technology- Haifa. Shereceived a Fulbright scholarship in 2001-2003and completed her Master’s in ArchitecturalDesign at Cornell University. Her thesisexplored the relation between architecture andavant-garde music. In 2004 she obtained herMaster’s degree in Architectural History andTheory at McGill University.

Her dissertation research aims to explore the dramatic shift that architecture and the role of the architect underwent during theRenaissance by retracing its deep and hiddenorigins within Arabic Medieval thinking thatemerged in Andalusian Spain, particularly during the eleventh and twelfth centuries.This is especially true of that thoughtconcerning itself with the imagination and itsacquisition of a new influential dimension pertinent to architectural discourse and leadingto a view of the architect as magus –one whoconveys knowledge through conjunction andalignment with the divine world and the magical imagination.

Barbara graduated with a Master of Science inArchitecture, in June 2005. She is interested inthe assessment, conservation and masterplanning of cultural heritage sites. In pursuitof these interests, Barbara completed twosemesters of Arabic language at Harvard. Herprevious professional degree was in architec-ture from the University Institute ofArchitecture in Venice, Italy, focused on the re-planning and upgrading of a dense urban set-tlement in Beirut, Lebanon.

Barbara’s final thesis at AKPIA entitled TheEsthetic Aims behind the Development ofConstruction Techniques in Cairene MamlukMausolea will focus on the Mamluk mausleacomplexes in Cairo. She will analyse the aes-thetic aims behind the evolution of the con-struction techniques in Mamluk times and,through this understanding, will investigatethe correct ways of preserving, valorizing andpresenting such buildings, both for the bene-fit of the local inhabitants and also for a bet-ter understanding by foreigners. Barbaraspent a summer internship in the CulturalHeritage Unit of an Italian consulting firm inRome working on projects responding toWorld Bank bids for the revitalization of WorldHeritage Sites.

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Students

Barbara Cipriani Mohamed Elshahed Razan Francis

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Pamela Karimi is a third-year Ph.D. student inAKPIA@MIT. Her major focus is on Modern Iranianarchitecture as it relates to issues of gender andsexuality and to political processes. Since spring2004, several travel grants from the Aga Khan,Avelon, Kelly-Douglas, and Hyzen Foundationshave allowed her to do primary archival researchfor her dissertation project. She has taught sum-mer courses at the Hagop Kevorkian Center inNew York University and led seminars and lectureson the history of art and architecture in Jerusalemand the Middle East at the 2004 and 2005 NewJersey Scholars Programs.

Pamela has also initiated several Middle Easternfilm series and served as the student councilmember of the Society for Iranian Studies. Herrecent publications include Policymaking andHousekeeping: President Truman’s Point IV Programand Making of the Modern Iranian House, inThresholds,Vol. 30. Her expected graduation dateis fall of 2009.

In the final year of the Ph.D program, Micheleis an architect (U. C. Berkeley, 1991) with a B.A.in Near Eastern Studies (Princeton, 1983). Herinterests in history, architecture, and buildingpractice led her to focus on conservation atMIT. She supplemented her program inHistory, Theory and Criticism with courseworkin the Graduate Program for HistoricPreservation, University of Pennsylvania.

Michele spent last year in Yemen conducting fieldwork for her dissertation, which is entitledConservation and Building Practice in a WorldHeritage City: the Case of Sana’a. Her metholodogydraws from architecture, history, anthropology,and conservation; the interdisciplinary nature ofthe study is reflected in the composition of hercommittee, which includes an anthropologist anda conservator. Her fieldwork in Yemen was sup-ported by Fulbright-Hays and the Social SciencesResearch Council.This year she has been writingthe dissertation, and also conducted additionalresearch in Sana’a and Paris, at UNESCO and theWorld Heritage Center. She has been supportedthis year by grants from the American Associationof University Women,the Graham Foundation,andthe Barakat Foundation.An article based on her dissertation was recently published in TraditionalDwellings and Settlements Review (spring 2005).

Talinn Grigor received her Ph.D., Cultivat(ing)Modernities: the Society for National Heritage,Political Propaganda, and Public Architecture inTwentieth-Century Iran, in February 2005.Currently she is the Andrew Mellon PostdoctoralFellow at Cornell University where she is revising her dissertation for publication. During2003-05, she was the Ittleson PredoctoralFellow at the Center for Advanced Study in theVisual Arts, National Gallery of Art.

Her recent publications include Preserving theModern Antique: Persepolis ‘71, Future Anterior:Journal of Historical Preservation HistoryTheory Criticism, Columbia University 2/1(Summer 2005): 22-29; (re)FramingModernit(ies): American Historians of IranianArchitecture, Phyllis Ackerman and ArthurPope, ARRIS: Journal of the Southeast Chapterof the Society of Architectural Historians 15(September 2004): 38-54; and reCultivating“Good Taste”: the early Pahlavi Modernists andtheir Society for National Heritage, Journal of Iranian Studies 37/1 (March 2004): 17-45.She will be chairing the panel on ‘Race andArchitecture in the Colonial Non-West’ duringthe upcoming SAH annual meeting.

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Students

Talinn Grigor Pamela Karimi Michele Lamprakos

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Omar Rabie graduated in 2000 from theDepartment of Architecture of the Faculty of FineArts in Cairo. He is currently a degree candidate inthe Master of Science in Architecture program atMIT. As an architect he has participated in a fewinternational design competitions and won thegrand prize in the International Union ofArchitects (UIA) “Architecture and Water” compe-tition. His design for The Grand EgyptianMuseum was selected as a distinctive designand was featured in the competition’s officialpublication. His design for the World TradeCenter Memorial International Competition wasselected as one of ten designs to be shown inthe New York Times. He has been a jury memberin a few international competitions organized bythe UIA, including urban plans for a sustainableresidential complex in Guanajuato in Mexico(2002), Hagar Qim and Najdra Heritage ParkDevelopment in Malta (2004), and Extreme inIstanbul (2005).

While at MIT, Omar is focusing on the contribu-tion of architecture to the life of the majority, thepoor. Along with other students, he representedMIT in USAID, after the MIT/GSD workshop:TheTsunami Challenge: After the Tent. He also partic-ipated in a project about environmental andaffordable alternative construction techniquesusing rammed earth.

Philippe graduated with a masters of Sciencein Architecture from the Aga Khan Program atthe Departmentof Architecture atMIT in May2003. His thesis investigated the tradition oflooking at Alexandria, Egypt with classicaleyes. He studied the city’s classical heritagedescriptions and engravings made by 18thcentury European travelers, while attenuatingthe importance of eleven centuries of Islamicrule and commercial prosperity.

Before joining the Aga Program at MIT,Philippe earned his Bachelor of Architecturefrom the American University in Beirut in2000 and graduated as valedictorian. Heworked for three years in a leading architec-tural firm in Lebanon where he coordinatedseveral design project teams and supervisedconstruction sites. Alongside A.U.B.facultymembers, Philippe researched the city ofTripoli and the Mamluk architecture ofLebanon. He also studied traditional architec-tural elements in contemporary buildings inBeirut. Philippe currently works as a designerin a Boston based architecture firm. He contin-ues his research on the problems of housing inhistoric cities, and 19th and 20th century pictorial and literary representations of cities.

Melanie Michailidis is a Ph.D. candidate whosemain research focuses on the early Islamic funer-ary architecture of Iran and Central Asia.Melanie's dissertation, Landmarks of the PersianRenaissance: Monumental Funerary Architecturein Iran and Central Asia,Tenth to EleventhCenturies, studies the sudden proliferation ofmausolea for secular rulers of Iranian descent inthe 10-11th centuries. It addresses how they drewon the pre-Islamic past in new and specific waysreflecting the different historical circumstancesof Iran and Central Asia. Historians of architec-ture have often noted that certain features seenin these mausolea have some vague connectionwith the pre-Islamic past, but this connectionhas never been precisely defined or explained;this dissertation argues that the cultural dynam-ics which resulted in particular architecturalforms were very different in these two regions.

Melanie has conducted fieldwork in Iran in sum-mer 2003 with an Aga Khan Travel Grant, and inUzbekistan with a Fulbright-IIE Grant in 2005.She is currently in her first year of the IttlesonFellowship from the Center for Advanced Studiesin the Visual Arts. Melanie expects to completeher dissertation by spring 2007.

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Melanie Michailidis Omar Rabie Philippe Saad

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Deniz Turker begins the SMArchS AKPIA pro-gram this year, immediately after receiving aB.A. in the History of Art from Yale College, Shewill continue researching and writing on theshared architectonics between AndreaPalladio and Mimar Sinan. She spent the pasttwo summers in Venice, Vicenza, Padua,Istanbul, Edirne, and Iznik comparing thebuildings of Palladio and Sinan. There, she wasable to do archival research in the MuseumCorrer, to learn how cristallo was made in theisland of Murano and to mix pigments for theunderglazed tiles in Iznik, which were to beused in the restoration of Sinan’s RustemPasha Mosque in Istanbul. These travels,which were supported through the RichterTraveling Fellowship and the Marshall-Allisonfellowship, formed the core of her Senior Essayon Palladio and Sinan’s use of light as animmaterial architectonic device titled MaterialSpaces in Sinan and Palladio.

Lara Tohme completed her Ph.D. dissertation,Out of Antiquity: Umayyad Baths in Context,in August 2005. She is currently the KnafelAssistant Professor in the Humanities in theArt Department at Wellesley College whereshe teaches courses on both MedievalEuropean and Islamic Art and Architecture.

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Lara Tohme Deniz Turker

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Guide to Arabic, Persian, Turkish and UrduManuscripts in India, will be published inDecember 2005. Omar’s professional interests are in the scholarship of Islamicarchitecture, Orientalism, and Occidentalism.email: [email protected] | tel: 617-258-5597

Johanna joined MIT Libraries in August 2003 asthe Islamic Architecture Image CollectionSpecialist. She is responsible for reference, collec-tion development, and cataloging for images ofthe Islamic world in Rotch Visual Collections andfor administering the Aga Khan Visual Archive.Johanna has a BA in History of Art from YaleUniversity and a MLS in Library and InformationScience from Simmons College. She also didgraduate work at the Ecole du Louvre and theEcole Superieur d’Interpretes et Traducteurs, bothin Paris. She has worked in museums, galleries,and artists’ studios in the US and abroad, and,most recently, in the corporate world conductingresearch and managing publication projects. Sheis particularly interested in access issues for digi-tal image collections and in data standards andspecialized vocabularies, especially as theserelate to non-Western cultural objects.

The Aga Khan Visual Archive is a rich resourceconsisting of more than 100,000 images

donated by scholars, architectural firms, andgraduate students.The collection reflects a greatdiversity of research interests and, because itspans nearly twenty-five years, documents signifi-cant changes in the cultural and political land-scape of many regions of the Islamic world. Manyof the images in the Archive document monu-ments, sites, and cities that one cannot find inpublished works or that have sadly deteriorated orhave been destroyed. Recent efforts to re-organizeand catalog the Archive images have improvedaccess to the collection and resulted in quickerreplies to research and permissions inquiries.email: [email protected] | tel: 617-253-6209

Ophelia joined the MIT Libraries in January 2004,assisting Johanna Woll with the Aga Khan VisualArchive.Within the Archive, she is responsible forphysical preservation, the accessioning of newmaterials, and reference. She also cataloguesimages of the Islamic world and supervises thein-house digitization of the Rotch Visual slide collection. Ophelia holds a BA in Latin AmericanStudies and an M.Arch., both from the Universityof Texas at Austin. She has been involved inarchitectural and monument conservation projects in the US, India, and Croatia. Her maininterests are languages and stone conservation.email: [email protected] | tel: 617-253-6129

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AKP MIT Librarians

Omar Khalidi, Collections/Reference Librarian atMIT’s Rotch Library, has a Master of LibraryScience from Emporia State University, Emporia,Kansas. He selects books about architecture andplanning in the Islamic world. Omar is alsoresponsible for library collection building inregional planning and development in Africa,Asia, and Latin America. In addition to selectingbooks and periodicals, Omar helps faculty,students and anyone in the MIT community findliterature appropriate for their research andteaching. Refer to his Islamic architecture webpages for resources on the regional planning and development:

libraries.mit.edu/guides/subjects/islamicarchitecture/

index.html

baron-ochs.mit.edu/agakhan/usmosques/index.html

libraries.mit.edu/guides/subjects/development/

In 2005, Omar edited a book An IndianPassage to Europe: The Travels of Mahdi HasanFath Nawaz Jang, to be published in Octoberby Oxford University Press. In April 2006, hewill be organizing a symposium on Mosque inNorth America and Western Europe at MIT,sponsored by AKPIA. Omar traveled toCambridge University in July 2005 to attend aconference on digitization of Islamic manu-scripts. A revised edition of his electronic

Omar Khalidi

Johanna Woll

Ophelia Richter

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Autobiographies: A Critical Edition of FiveSixteenth-Century Texts (critical edition andtranslation by Howard Crane and Esra Akın,Supplements to Muqarnas, forthcoming2006). Her recent short articles include Sinan:Poet of Proportion, Royal Academy of ArtsMagazine (Special Issue: Turks), Winter 2004;Religious Inscriptions on the Great Mosques ofthe Ottoman, Safavid, and Mughal EmpiresHadeeth Ad-Dar, forthcoming, (Dar al-Atharal-Islamiyah, Kuwait National Museum). InMarch and April 2006 Gülru will be deliveringthe keynote lectures in two symposia affiliat-ed with the exhibition “Bellini and the East,” tobe held at the Isabella Stewart GardenerMuseum, Boston, and the British Museum,London. She is also teaching a spring-semesterseminar in conjunction with that exhibition.

Under the auspices of the Aga Khan Programat Harvard, Gülru and Sibel Bozdogan haveorganized an international symposium to beheld at the American Academy of Arts andSciences, May 11–13, 2006: “Historiography andIdeology: Architectural Heritage of the ‘Landsof Rum.’” The proceedings of this symposiumwill be published as Muqarnas XXIV (2007).

Gülru is the Aga Khan Professor of Islamic Artand the editor of Muqarnas and its supple-ments. She has just returned from her sabbat-ical leave (2004–5) during which she conduct-ed research trips in Iran, Kuwait, Bulgaria,Greece, and Turkey and held a two-week visit-ing fellowship at the Villa I Tatti in Florence.She delivered public lectures at the KuwaitDar al-Athar al-Islamiya Museum, the RoyalAcademy of Arts in London, VirginiaCommonwealth University, Bilkent University,and Bogaziçi University and presented thekeynote evening lecture, titled “Cross-CulturalArchitectural Dialogues across theMediterranean World,” at the Society ofArchitectural Historians Annual Conference inVancouver. She also lectured on “VirtualArchaeology: A New Archival Document onthe Topkapı Palace (ca. 1511)” at theInternational Symposium in Honor of Dr. FilizÇagman: The Topkapı Palace and Ottoman Art(to be published in the symposium proceedings).

Meanwhile, Gülru’s book The Age of Sinan:Architectural Culture in the Ottoman Empirewas co-published in 2005 by Reaktion Books,London, and Princeton University Press. Duringher sabbatical leave, she also edited and contributed the preface to Sinan’s

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Faculty

Gülru Necipoglu˘ David Roxburgh

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The Age of Sinan:

Architectural Culture in

the Ottoman Empire

David J. Roxburgh is Professor of the History ofArt and Architecture. In the fall semester of2004, David presented lectures in London atthe Royal Academy of Arts and in Washington,D.C., at the National Gallery of Art on “PersianPicture Making and Chinese Manner.” In thespring semester of 2005, he returned to bothcities, speaking in London about Timurid artand architecture in connection with Turks: AJourney of a Thousand Years 600–1600, theexhibition that he co-curated with FilizCagman and Nazan Olcer. The lecture inWashington, D.C., titled “Concepts of thePortrait in the Islamic Lands,” was presentedat a two-day symposium to celebrate thetwenty-fifth anniversary of the Center forAdvanced Studies in the Visual Arts, NationalGallery of Art. Later in the spring, David trav-eled to the University of California at Irvine toparticipate in a workshop on current directionsin Persian studies today and also visitedNantucket to speak at the Nantucket Atheneum.

The winter of 2004–5 was mostly absorbed byediting the exhibition catalogue for the Royal Academy of Arts, now in its third printing, and overseeing the production of his latest book The Persian Album, 1400–1600: From Dispersal

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Dr. Askarov is extending his temporary leavefrom Tashkent Architectural Institute inUzbekistan, where he is a professor of archi-tecture, to join the Aga Khan Program as aFellow during this academic year, funded by agrant from the Soros Foundation, New York.

He received a doctoral degree in architecturein Saint Petersburg in 1990; his thesis wastitled Regional Identity of Central Asian Cities.Dr. Askarov was also a Fellow in the Aga KhanProgram during the spring semester of 2005.He is the recipient of two grants from theSoros Foundation: one awarded in 2000–2towards research titled Transformations ofTimurid Architecture, and another awarded in2005 for the research he will be conducting atHarvard. In 2003 he was also awarded a grantby the European Commission TempusProgram to research and create a course onthe subject of the Italian link with Timuridarchitecture. At Harvard he will continue tofocus on architecture of the Timurid period.

Following six articles on artistic relationsbetween Byzantium and Islam, ProfessorCutler is currently completing a monographon gift exchange between the Byzantine andMuslim worlds, to be published by theUniversity of Chicago Press. He is on researchleave from Penn State University, where he isthe Evan Pugh Professor of Art History, andcomes to us most recently from the Sorbonne(Université de Paris I), where he was professeur invité. He has previously held fel-lowships from the John Simon GuggenheimFoundation; the Institute for Advanced Study,Princeton; and Dumbarton Oaks.

Professor Cutler’s main field of interest is inivory carving, on which topic he published TheCraft of Ivory (Dumbarton Oaks, 1985), fol-lowed by The Hand of the Master:Craftsmanship, Ivory and Society in Byzantium,9th–11th Centuries (Princeton, 1994). At theSackler he will pursue the research onmedieval Islamic ivory carving that he under-took at the State Hermitage Museum in St.Petersburg, the Louvre, the Victoria and AlbertMuseum in London, and the MetropolitanMuseum of Art.

to Collection (New Haven: Yale University Press,2005). He also participated in the exhibition’sinstallation and press-preview day (the exhibi-tion was a great success; in its three-month runit had close to 300,000 visitors). David has sincecompleted several book reviews and encyclope-dia entries for Medieval Islamic Civilization: AnEncyclopaedia, ed. Josef Meri, and is now begin-ning research for his next book. He is currentlyon a one-semester leave and will also use his time away from teaching and committee workto travel.

David is offering one new course at Harvardthis year when he returns from his leave: inthe Spring semester, 2006, he will teachHAA224m, Drawing in the Pre-Modern IslamicWorld, a graduate seminar, which will coincidewith an exhibition on drawing—“The Tabletand the Pen” — at the Sackler Museum, HarvardUniversity Art Museums, jointly curated byChanchal Dadlani and Ladan Akbarnia.

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>Shukur Djuraevich Askarov Anthony Cutler

Post-doctoral Fellows

The Persian

Album 1400-1600:

From Dispersal to

Collection

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Dr. Marcus Milwright is assistant professor inthe Department of History in Art, University ofVictoria. He received his doctorate in 1999from the Oriental Institute, University ofOxford, and has held fellowships with theWingate Foundation, the Warburg Institute(University of London), and the BritishAcademy. He will spend his time at the AgaKhan Program working on a book entitled TheArchaeology of the Islamic World: AnIntroduction. The book will appear as part ofthe New Edinburgh Islamic Surveys series.

Dr. Milwright has written articles on Islamicceramics and architecture as well as the histo-ry of medicine. His forthcoming publicationsinclude the chapter on Islamic art and archi-tecture for volume 4 of the New CambridgeHistory of Islam and studies of the representa-tions of Tamerlane in European printed booksfor Muqarnas XXIII and of the Ayyubid periodin Jordan for the Journal of the Royal AsiaticSociety. He is currently completing a book onthe history and archaeology of the Jordaniantown of Karak, entitled The Citadel of theRaven: Karak in the Middle Islamic Period. He isalso working on the publication of ceramicsexcavated at Raqqa, Syria, and Mudaybi, Jordan.

Steven Wolf, The Construction of Ottoman Aleppo:Modes and Meanings of Urban (Re-) Organization,Ph.D. 2005

Emine Fetvaci, Viziers to Eunuchs: Transitions inOttoman Manuscript Patronage, 1566–1617, Ph.D. 2005

Kristina VanDyke, The Oral-Visual Nexus: RethinkingVisuality in Mali, Ph.D. 2005

Zeynep Yürekli Görkay, Bektashi Architecture and theTurcoman Forces in Classical Ottoman Society, Ph.D. 2005

Mark Dike DeLancey, Fulbe Palatial Architecture:Negotiating Cultural Identity in Northern Cameroun,Ph.D. 2004

Susan Spinale, The Portrait Medals of Ottoman SultanMehmed II (r.1451-1481), Ph.D. 2003

Persis Berlekamp, Wonder and Its Images in LateMedieval Islamic Culture: The Wonders of Creation fromthe Euphrates to the Oxus, 1258-1502, Ph.D. 2003

Kay Ebel, Images of Empire: Cartography and the VisualCulture of Urban Space in the Sixteenth-CenturyOttoman Empire, Ph.D. 2002

David Joshua Drogin, Representations of BentivoglioAuthority: Fifteenth-Century Painting and Sculpture in theBentivoglio Chapel, San Giacomo Maggiore, Bologna,Ph.D. 2002

May Farhat, Displaying Piety: The Shrine of Imam Ali al-Rida in Mashhad under the Safavids, Ph.D. 2002

Barry Wood, Shah Isma'il in Myth and Memory,Ph.D. 2002

Rebecca returns to academia and Harvard thisyear to spend six months as an AKPPostdoctoral Visiting Fellow. Her project focus-es on the early Islamic qusur in Bilad al-Sham.In particular, she will be analyzing the qusurwith respect to the development of agricul-ture both in the region during the precedingByzantine period and in the Arabian Peninsuladuring the pre- and early Islamic periods. Alsoawarded an NEH Senior Scholar fellowship bythe American Center of Oriental Research inAmman, Rebecca will spend four months ofthe academic year in Jordan, Syria, Palestine,and Israel carrying out fieldwork related tothe topic.

In 1999 Rebecca received her Ph.D. fromHarvard in the History of Art and ArchitectureDepartment, writing a dissertation titledUmayyad Markets and Manufacturing:Evidence for a Commercialized andIndustrializing Economy in Early Islamic Bilad al-Sham, and she taught a course entitled “IslamicArt and Culture” at Wellesley College. From early2000 until spring 2005 Rebecca was director ofthe Islamic Art Society in London, contributingto the State of Qatar's project to develop itsMuseum of Islamic Art in Doha.

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Rebecca Foote Marcus Milwright

Post-doctoral Fellows Recent Ph.D. Alumni

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Last summer, an Aga Khan Travel Grant sentErin Bauer to Middlebury, Vermont for anintense and productive summer of full-timeArabic study. Now at the beginning of herthird year of graduate study, she is finishingher qualifying paper and getting ready for thegeneral examination. Erin is very happy to findherself on the other side of the classroom as a teaching fellow for the first time, and shehopes to follow in the footsteps of the inspiring teaching assistants she studied with as an undergraduate.

Chanchal Dadlani spent the 2004–5 academicyear in residence at Harvard studyingadvanced Persian as the recipient of a FLASfellowship and serving as a teaching fellow inthe History of Art and ArchitectureDepartment. Chanchal spent this summer co-curating an exhibition of Islamic drawings,scheduled to open in February 2006, with fellow AKPIA student Ladan Akbarnia. Sheplans to conduct dissertation research duringthe 2005–6 academic year, and will travel toSouth Asia and the United Kingdom with the support of a Frederick Sheldon TravelingFellowship. Her dissertation is entitledTwilight in Delhi? Architecture and Urbanism in the Late Mughal Empire.

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Ladan Akbarnia Erin Bauer Chanchal Dadlani

Ladan’s research focuses on the Chinese influ-ences on the art and architectural decorationof Iran and Central Asia during the Mongolperiod. She is presently writing her disserta-tion, entitled, Chinoiserie in Iran and CentralAsia: The Making of Artistic Ideals and CulturalMemory under the Mongol Patrons. In the lastyear, she taught survey courses on Islamic artand architecture at Smith and WheatonColleges, then spent the summer doingresearch in Turkey and Iran. Most of her timein Turkey was spent looking at manuscripts inthe Topkapı Sarayı Museum Library inIstanbul, where she also saw Professor GülruNecipoglu as well as other Harvard and AgaKhan students. A trip to eastern Anatolia withSuzan Yalman became one of the highlightsof the summer.

This fall, Ladan will continue working on herdissertation and on an exhibition of Islamicdrawings. She is co-curating the exhibition, toopen in February 2006 at Harvard's SacklerMuseum, with Chanchal Dadlani. She willteach at Smith College again in spring 2006.

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In 1996 Yasmine received her B.A. in philoso-phy from Bryn Mawr College, where she wroteher senior thesis on Foucault, gender, andMuslim identity. After working for four yearsat an educational institute in her home coun-try, Kuwait, she studied art history at theUniversity of Pennsylvania, from which shereceived her M.A. in 2002, with a focus onIslamic material and visual culture. Havingcompleted her first year at Harvard, Yasminespent this past summer in Istanbul, learningTurkish at Ankara University’s TÖMER and visiting monuments and museums.

This fall, she plans to continue working on herTurkish and begin pursuing Ottoman Turkish.Her academic goals for the year includeexpanding her knowledge of the OttomanEmpire along with exploring themes relatedto the production of objects and their inter-section with devotional literature.

The title of Alexis’s dissertation isArchitectural Culture in Early Modern India(1526–1857): The Building Workshop of theKachawaha Court of Amber and Jaipur,supervised by Professors Gülru Necipoglu and David Roxburgh. Alexis studied orientallanguages and art history in Paris beforeworking for a few years in South Asia and theMiddle East. He is currently working as theAssociate Head of the Study Centre at theCanadian Centre for Architecture while hecompletes his Ph.D. degree in the Departmentof History of Art and Architecture.

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Jennifer Pruitt Yasmine al-Saleh Alexis Sornin

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Jennifer’s research focuses on the medievalMediterranean. Her dissertation, A Tale of TwoCities: Locating the Courtly and the Urban inFatimid Art, will examine eleventh-and-twelfth-century Egyptian visual culture in thecontext of both “high” (caliphal) and “low”(popular urban) culture. Her research consid-ers not only the Islamic art of the period butalso the syncretic visual conversation thattook place between the court and non-Islamicpopulations, particularly Coptic Christians.Jennifer has received a Fulbright IIE Grant for2005–6, which she will use to conduct disser-tation research in Egypt.

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Suzan is spending the 2005–6 academic yearas an ARIT-Samuel H. Kress Fellow in Turkey,conducting research for her dissertation,A Civilizing Mission? Religion, Urbanism, andIdentity in the Architectural Patronage ofSultan Alaeddin Keykubad (r. 1220–37). As partof her project in Turkey this year, Suzan isexamining Seljuq architecture in its localAnatolian multicultural context. She hasrecently traveled through parts of central andeastern Anatolia, including Ankara, Kırsehir,Cappadocia, Amasya, Sivas, Divrigi, Erzurum,and Ani, where she surveyed architecturalmonuments. During this year, Suzan will alsobe conducting research in various institutionsin Istanbul as well as in regional archives andlibraries in Turkey.

Leslie PoeLeslie is currently finishing his dissertation,Mudejar Sevilla.

Leslie SchickLeslie’s dissertation in progress is entitledSixteenth- and Seventeenth-Century OttomanCostume Albums: European and LocalProductions and Their Markets.

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Steven Wolf Suzan Yalman

Steven Wolf has just completed his disserta-tion, The Construction of Ottoman Aleppo:Modes and Meanings of Urban (Re-)Organization. He has been appointed VisitingProfessor at Fordham University in New YorkCity for the 2005-6 school year and is teaching courses on Islamic art and architec-tural history and the history of urbanism. Thedissertation focuses on the radical architec-tural and urban interventions made under theOttomans in Aleppo over the course of thesixteenth century, and places this into a com-parative perspective with functionally similarbut formally diverse Mamluk projects of thefifteenth century. It examines the consistenturban ramifications that resulted from differ-ing patterns of architectural composition,suggesting that implicit but coherent urbannotions underlay the architecture of bothperiods. Having a master’s degree in Italianmedieval and Renaissance art history,Steve also is concerned with exploringMediterranean cultural interactions across a divide ordinarily conceived to persistbetween “East” and “West.”

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As the Program Coordinator at the Aga KhanProgram at Harvard, Ruth oversees all operations of the program including the lecture series and postdoctoral fellowships.She also assists the program’s director,Professor Necipoglu, with research towardsher lectures, classes, and publications.

Ruth initially became drawn to Middle Easterncultures during a trip to Adana, Turkey in 1997.After attending the intensive Turkish languageand culture course at Bogaziçi University inIstanbul this summer, Ruth will be continuingthe study of Turkish at Harvard University thisacademic year. She is actively researching anddeveloping her interests in global politics andhistory with a focus on the Middle East.

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Julia Bailey Ruth MacQuiddy

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Julia has been Managing Editor of Muqarnas:An Annual on the Visual Culture of the IslamicWorld since 2002. She received her M.A. in arthistory from the University of Massachusetts,Amherst, and was enrolled in the Ph.D. pro-gram in fine arts at Harvard before becomingAssistant Curator of Islamic and Later IndianArt at the Arthur M. Sackler Museum,Cambridge, and then Assistant Curator in theAsian and Textile Departments of theMuseum of Fine Arts, Boston.

Julia is currently finishing the twenty-secondvolume of Muqarnas, due to be published inNovember 2005, and editing the subsequentvolume. She is also overseeing publication inearly 2006 of the eleventh volume in theseries Supplements to Muqarnas, Sinan’sAutobiographies: Five Sixteenth-Century Texts,by Howard Crane and Esra Akın, with a preface by Gülru Necipoglu, which will complement Professor Necipoglu’s The Age of Sinan.

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Andras is the Bibliographer in Islamic Artand Architecture, at the DocumentationCenter of the Aga Khan Program for IslamicArchitecture at Harvard’s Fine Arts Library.Andras is a specialist in the history and cul-ture of the Balkans. He has spent much ofthe past decade documenting the destruc-tion of archives, libraries and other culturalheritage during the wars in Bosnia-Herzegovina (1992-1995) and Kosovo (1998-1999). He has testified about his findings as an expert witness before the U.N. warcrimes tribunal in The Hague, in the trial ofSlobodan Milosevic. He is also a co-founderof the Bosnian Manuscript IngatheringProject, an effort to trace and recover still-extant microfilms and photocopies —“shadows of lost originals” — representingsome of the thousands of archival docu-ments and manuscripts that were destroyedwhen archives and libraries in Bosnia wereburned by nationalist extremists during the 1990s.

In 2005, Andras was invited to present an in-class slide lecture on diversity in mosquesand religious architecture in the Islamicworld, and to assist in constructing an

interactive course website for a course inHarvard's study of religions program entitled, "For the Love of God and HisProphet: Literature and the Arts in MuslimDevotional Life." In the spring semester, hewas asked to give a presentation on architec-ture and art and the laws of war for a coursein art law taught at the Harvard Law School.

Also in 2005, Andras and Jeffrey Spurr gavepresentations at an Alumni College session,sponsored by the Harvard University ArtMuseums, on “Art in the Islamic World andthe Cultural Implications of War.” In March2005, Andras was invited to give a inauguraladdress, entitled Crimes against Culture: Warand the Destruction of Heritage in Bosnia andIraq, for the Lawyers’ Committee for CulturalHeritage Preservation, a new national organization.

Andras’ article, The Bosnian ManuscriptIngathering Project, was published last fall inthe volume Ottoman Bosnia: A History inPeril), edited by Markus Koller and Kemal H.Karpat (Madison: Univ. of Wisconsin Press,2004), pp. 27-38; also reprinted in theInternational Journal of Turkish Studies, 10(2004), pp. 27-38.

He spent several years engaged in researchand travel in the Middle East and theBalkans as a Fulbright Scholar in the 1970s,

working in archives and manuscript libraries.He has published articles dealing withOttoman history, Islamic architecture, andthe study of manuscript sources, in journalssuch as Muqarnas: An Annual of Islamic Artand Architecture, Art Libraries Journal, TheTurkish Studies Association Bulletin, MiddleEast Studies Association Bulletin andHarvard Ukrainian Studies.

Andras is a member of the board, TurkishStudies Association; Co-founder, BosnianManuscripts Ingathering Project; Co-founder,International Justice Watch (JUSTWATCH-L);and, Member of the editorial board of H-TURK since its foundation.email: [email protected]: 617-495-3372

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University (Binghamton, New York). In her dissertation, Planned Grandeur: A ComparativeStudy of Urban Expansion in Early Modern Italyand Mamluk Egypt (anticipated completionspring 2005), she explores a similar trajectoryin cultural milieus through an examination ofthe conscious redefinition of urban space dur-ing the late fifteenth century. Sharon has alsoattended institutes in Florence, Italy, andMonterey, California.

At Binghamton University, Sharon developedand taught courses in Persian art and architec-ture; Istanbul before and after the Ottomanconquest; Byzantium and the Mediterraneanworld; and Islamic painting. Additionally, she hasguest lectured on these, and other topics inMiddle Eastern art and architecture, at severaluniversities and colleges.

For the post-9/11 initiative on Arab Cultureand Civilization, sponsored by the NationalInstitute for Technology and Liberal Education(NITLE) with funds from the Andrew W.Mellon Foundation, Sharon served as contentconsultant and contributor for Arab art andarchitecture (see http://arabworld.nitle.org).

Sharon is available in the Documentation Center of the Aga Khan Program for IslamicArchitecture, Fine Arts Library, Harvard University.email: [email protected]: 617-495-3372

Sharon C. Smith joined the Aga Khan Programfor Islamic Architecture at Harvard Universityin August 2003 as the Visual MaterialsCataloger for Islamic Art. In this capacity, sheis responsible for researching, establishingauthority records, and cataloguing theapproximately 100,000 slides that constitutethe program’s collection to date, encompass-ing all aspects of Islamic art and architecture.A primary goal of her project is the digitiza-tion of the collection, with the incorporationof all images and data into Harvard UniversityLibraries’ public catalog of visual materials,VIA (available at http://lib.harvard.edu/). Overthe course of her first year, Sharon’s work hascovered a variety of areas including Islamicarchitecture in Alexandria, Ottoman portableobjects, Persian ceramics, Mamluk glass, andthe Tahmasp Shahnama. In addition to hercatalog work, Sharon helps faculty, students,visiting scholars, and anyone else seekinginformation in her field of study.

Sharon received her MA in Art History fromSan Jose State University (San Jose, California)and is currently a Ph.D. candidate in theGraduate Program for History and Theory ofArt and Architecture at Binghamton

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hours a day for the rest of the siege. He alsoexperienced his Warholian moment, appearingthree times on Bosnian television.

He published the article: Glimpses of an EclipsedHeritage: Photography of Afghanistan in theCollections of the Fine Arts Library at Harvard,Visual Resources, XXI(1), March 2005. Jeff has alsoposted Indispensable yet Vulnerable:The Library inDangerous Times. A Report on the Status of IraqiAcademic Libraries and Efforts to Assist Them,with Historical Introduction on the Middle EastLibrarians Association Committee on IraqiLibraries website, sponsored by the OrientalInstitute of the U. of Chicago,at:http://oi.uchicago.edu/OI/IRAQ/mela/indispensable.html

He has co-curated the exhibition, Silver & Shawls:India, Europe, and the Colonial Art Market,presently on view (through 29 January 2006) at Harvard’s Sackler Museum:

http://www.artmuseums.harvard.edu/exhibitions/sackler/silver_and_shawls.html

He also presented the following papers: TheAllure of Luxury: the Presence of the KashmirShawl in Persia and its Impact on 19th CenturyPersian and Caucasian Rug Design, at the TextileMuseum conference, Indian Textile Traditions:Exchange & Transformation; Burned Books andBlasted Shrines: Cultural Genocide and itsAftermath in Bosnia, given at a Harvard Alumni

Association College; War and Recovery: One initiative to Help Bosnia's Libraries Rebuild,presented at the First International Conferenceof Slavicist Librarians, Sarajevo; Bosnia 1996, Iraq2003: Destruction of Libraries in Wartime, andEfforts to Rehabilitate them, a talk given at theannual Harvard Librarians' Assembly; and, FromScholars to Missionaries:The Origins, History andOrganization of Photograph CollectionsDocumenting the Middle East at Harvard's FineArts Library, at the Society for AmericanArchivists conference.

Photograph acquisitions have included a raregroup of 30 large late 19th c. photographs ofBosnia, specifically of Sarajevo and Jajce, the former including a series of superb panoramicviews, and fine views of the Vijecnica (whichbecame the National and University Library), ayear or two after its construction, and of the GaziHüsrev Begova Dzamija. Also acquired were 46snapshots of Marsh Arabs from the 1920s. Thecollection also received a gift of over 1900 photographs and negatives, principally ofAfghanistan and Iran, taken in the 1940s and1950s by Prof. Richard Frye. Among acquisitionsof historical photographs of the Middle East are130 early (1860s-1870s) stereographs, largely ofPalestine, Syria, Lebanon, and Egypt. Finally,among many additions to our slide collections,are a fine group of slides of Libya by Clive Foss.email: [email protected]: 617-495-3372

2004-2005 was a busy year for Jeff Spurr,Islamic and Middle East Specialist of theDocumentation Center of the Aga KhanProgram for Islamic Architecture at Harvard'sFine Arts Library. After coordinating the BosniaLibrary Project, dedicated to assisting in therebuilding of destroyed and damaged librarycollections in Bosnia-Herzegovina, for nineyears, he brought it to a close in Spring 2005.The final shipment left for Sarajevo thisSeptember. His Final Report is available at:http://www.openbook.ba/news/blp.htm

This process culminated with a visit to Sarajevoin April-May of 2005, a chance to see oldfriends and correspondents, participate in aconference and other events, visit institutions,particularly the National and University Library,and spend many days exploring the city, andother parts of the country. Perhaps the mostmoving moment was a visit to the TunnelMuseum, which preserves the 30 remainingmeters of Sarajevo’s 900-meter lifeline duringthe siege, running under the airport. Before itsconstruction, 800 people had died trying to tra-verse the airport on their way out of thebesieged city toward government-held territoryin Central Bosnia; afterwards, it operated 24

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ActivitiesIn 2005, Hashim Sarkis, curated the Lebanonsection in the Rotterdam Architectural Biennale.He also won third place in the Martyrs SquareIdeas Competition in Downtown Beirut. TheBalloon Landing Park in Beirut, designed by hisoffice, opened in February 2005 and a house he designed in Cambridge was also completed.The practice is also currently involved in severalurban and rural projects in Lebanon. The work was featured in several publicationsincluding Architectural Design and the HarvardDesign Review.

PapersSarkis has also written several papers including:

“Civic Pride,” in Aleppo, The Rehabilitation ofthe Old City, The Veronica Green Rudge Prize2005, edited by Joan Busquets, (Cambridge:Harvard Design School, 2005)

“Dubai: The City of Many Cities,” with NasserAbulhasan, in The Arab City: Amman, Beirut,and Dubai edited by George Arbid, (Beirut:UNESCWA Publications, 2005)

“Society of Forms: On the Recent Work ofVincent James Architects Associates,”

Introduction to monograph on VJAA, (New York:Princeton Architectural Press, forthcoming)

Sarkis has also delivered the following public lectures:

“Recent Work,” Harvard GSD Public Lecture,November 4, 2005

“Two Squares,” Rhode Island School of DesignPublic Lecture Series, May 5, 2005

“Flexibilization,” Urban Age, London School ofEconomics conference in New York, February23, 2005. Sarkis is also participating as one ofthe “urban experts” in the Urban Age confer-ence series held in different cities between2005 and 2007.

Keynote Address, Conference on Public Sphere,American University of Beirut, October 24, 2004

“Developing Worlds,” The Center for UrbanResearch and Policy, Columbia University,October 24, 2004.

PublicationsThe Aga Khan Program at the GSD has agreedwith Harvard University Press to distribute thepublications of the Program. Forthcomingpublications in the spring of 2006 areTurkish Triangle, Ankara, Izmir, and Istanbul atthe Gates of Europe, (Aga Khan Program, HGSD,

Hashim Sarkis

Faculty

Lebanon section of the Rotterdam Biennale,

May 2005. Photo by Evy Pappas>

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Two Squares: Martyrs Square Downtown Beirutand Sirkeci Square, Istanbul, co-editor withMark Dwyer and Pars Kibarer(Cambridge, MA:Harvard Graduate School of Design, 2005)

“Intermodal Istanbul: On the Possible intersec-tions between an underground train, a ferryterminal, a train station, an archaeologicalpark, and a public square in Sirkeci Square,”option studio, Harvard Graduate School ofDesign, spring 2005

“The Mediterranean Cityscape: The Case ofIzmir,” workshop, Harvard Graduate School ofDesign, fall 2004

Dubai Studio, taught by Rodolfo Machado,spring 2006

“Developing Worlds: The Challenges ofDevelopment to Urban Planning and Designin Latin American and the Middle Easternfrom the Truman Doctrine to the Present,” lec-ture course on the impact of developmentpolicies on Latin American and Middle Easternarchitecture and urban planning, HarvardGraduate School of Design, 2pring 2006

forthcoming 2006) edited by Hashim SarkisHan Tumertekin, Recent Work, (Aga KhanProgram, HGSD, forthcoming 2006)

Two Squares: Martyrs Square Downtown Beirutand Sirkeci Square, Istanbul, edited by HashimSarkis with Mark Dwyer and ParsKibarer(Cambridge, MA: Harvard GraduateSchool of Design, 2005)

In preparation is also Landscapes ofDevelopment, edited by Panaiyota Pyla,Associate Professor at University of Illinois,Urbana-Champaign.

Sponsored Events, Research and Studios The Aga Khan Program at the GSD has sponsored the following conferences:

The Mediterranean Cityscape, October 24, 2004

Aleppo: New Perspectives on the Old City,April 13, 2005

A Turkish Triangle, Istanbul, Ankara, and Izmirat the Gates of Europe, April 24-25 2005

The Aga Khan Public Lecture at the GSD for2005 was delivered by Han Tumertekin

In the spring of 2006, Mona Harb, assistantprofessor from the American University ofBeirut, will be visiting fellow, working on com-munity based planning initiatives.

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Detail view of the Balloon Landing Park,

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Karimabad and Ganish, and projects inBaltistan, were completed in subsequent years.While the Trust provided the technical expert-ise, the communities themselves providedmuch of the labor and material. In addition torestoration efforts, the Trust also focused onreviving traditional skills, generating newemployment opportunities and providing train-ing in the jobs needed for a changing economy.

This lesson has not been lost on other commu-nities. The rehabilitation movement has nowspread to other parts of the Northern Areas, andmany historic villages, such as Altit, Shigar andKhaplu, have been or are being upgraded withassistance from the Aga Khan Trust for Culture.

In the Hunza Valley, the Aga Khan DevelopmentNetwork (AKDN) has implemented or support-ed a variety of community-based projects.These include the restoration and re-use ofBaltit Fort; rehabilitation of the historic villagesof Karimabad, Ganish and Altit; constructionand running of schools, including a higher sec-ondary school for girls; branches of the FirstMicroFinance Bank; health units; safe waterand sanitation projects for greater Karimabad,Ganish, Altit and other communities; supportfor the Karimabad Town Management Societyand other organisations dedicated to sustain-able development; mini-hydroelectric plantsthat supply electricity in remote villages;tourism facilities including the Baltit Inn and

Gilgit Serena Inn; income-generating activitiesand savings programmes; and kilometers ofnew or repaired irrigation canals, bridges andother infrastructure. In addition, AKDN institu-tions have planted over 10 million trees andbrought 33,000 new hectares of agriculturalland under cultivation in Gilgit.

Project briefhttp://akdn.org/hcsp/pakistan/PakistanBrief.0505.pdf

The Aga Khan Trust for Culture (AKTC) is thecultural agency of the Aga Khan DevelopmentNetwork. It was formally established in 1988in Geneva as a private philanthropic founda-tion to integrate and co-ordinate the variousinitiatives of His Highness the Aga Khanregarding the improvement of cultural life -and in particular of the built environment,which is the most complex and tangibleexpression of cultural development -in societieswhere Muslims have a significant presence.

Baltitstan and HunzaConservation and Development Projects

When it began working in the Northern Areasof Pakistan, in 1992, the Aga Khan Trust forCulture’s restoration and revitalization activitiesbecame the most visible part of a broad areadevelopment program undertaken by agenciesof the Aga Khan Development Network(AKDN). Encompassing cultural, economic andsocial development, the program includedmicrofinance, agricultural programs, health,education, the introduction of clean-water sup-plies and sanitation facilities, construction ofmini hydro-electric plants, the improvement ofpublic open spaces, community-driven villagerehabilitation and house renovation. Baltit Fort,the Trust’s first project (undertaken by theHistoric Cities Support Programme), was com-pleted in 1996. The Hunza Valley settlements of

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Shirgar Fort, Northern Areas, Pakistan

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for Culture. The mosque, which was built inthe traditional Sudanese style between 1936and 1943 on the site of an earlier mosque dating from 1908, was at serious risk of collapse until the Aga Khan Trust for Culturecommenced restoration work. It is expected to be fully restored by 2006.

“Mopti’s mosque is an outstanding exampleof the traditional Muslim architecture of theSahel,” said the Aga Khan. “We hope that ourrestoration efforts, which include an impor-tant training component, will develop appro-priate restoration guidelines and solutionsthat will be used in other projects in Mali and in the region.”

New Activities and Projects in Mali

His Highness the Aga Khan visited Mali inAugust 2005, and signed an agreement ofcooperation between the Republic of Mali and the Aga Khan Development Network.The agreement will expand cooperation insocial, cultural and economic developmentin the country.

“I would like to emphasise that economic initiatives are only one part of the AKDN initiatives in Mali,” said the Aga Khan, at theceremony which marked the signing of theagreement. “We firmly believe that our socialand cultural activities are just as important,and intend to have them expand substantiallyin the future,” he said.

“An immediate initiative will be to establish anot-for-profit microfinance agency, which willoperate in the northern part of the country.We believe that microfinance is an importantvehicle in the fight against poverty and economic exclusion,” said the Aga Khan.“We hope that our program will bring stability and improved living conditions tomany poor women and men in this country.”

During his visit to Mali, the Aga Khanreviewed restoration efforts undertaken onMopti’s Grand Mosque by the Aga Khan Trust

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(Left) The exposed parapet pillars following

removal of the cement.

(Right) the northeast corner of the mosque

during the removal process.

The completed scaffolding system along the

east façade and central minaret. A chute,

visible to the right of the minaret, was

installed to facilitate the removal of debris

from the roof of the mosque.

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Conservation and RestorationProjects in Afghanistan

Afghanistan harbors an age-old and verydiverse cultural heritage, the last layer ofwhich has a Muslim imprint. In terms ofIslamic architecture, Afghanistan occupies apivotal position, being an offshoot of Persianculture and a springboard for the Mughalaccomplishments in India. AKTC has beeninvolved in the city of Kabul since the end ofthe war and is now spreading its activities tothe city of Heart. Projects in Kabul include:

Timur Shah MausoleumAfter the end of the war, an agreement wasconcluded between AKTC and the InterimAdministration to restore, rehabilitate andupgrade a number of significant historicbuildings and public open spaces in the city ofKabul. The first building selected was theTimur Shah Mausoleum, now in the heart ofthe busy bazaar district. The objective was torestore the broken dome (works completed in2004), to consolidate the building and toreclaim and enhance the former public gar-den in front of it by providing alternativepremises for the squatting tradesmen.

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Baghe-I BaburThe second site is the “Bagh-i Babur” (BaburGardens), originally laid out by the founder ofthe Mughal dynasty. This garden is one of themost important public open spaces of Kabuland its rehabilitation has re-established thehistoric character of the site with its waterchannels, planted terraces and pavilions, butalso provided a much appreciated space forleisure, meetings, celebrations, open-air recep-tions and cultural events.

Asheqan–I Arefan NeighbourhoodThe Asheqan-i Arefan neighbourhood stillcontains an important cluster of historichouses (some of them 200-300 years old)around a well-known Sufi shrine. Residentsare being assisted in urgent house repair,debris has been removed from the streets,drainage has been re-established and a num-ber of significant community spaces, such asthe Uzbeka Mosque, have been restored.

Timur Shah Mausoleum, Kabul, Afghanistan

Baghe-I Babur, Kabul, Afghanistan

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AKTC Fora and Lecture Series

In 2005, the Education Programme of the AgaKhan Trust for Culture conducted a series ofarchitectural fora; presentations taking placeinternationally, which aim to bring awarenessabout issues raised by the 2004 Aga KhanAward for Architecture Master Jury to thewider architecture profession and students.These issues are:

• How the complexity of history and of historical memory can be expressed in architecture.

• How private initiatives are integrated intothe emerging public sphere.

• How to express individuality in complexsocial settings.

• How power and authority in the globaldomains of technology, culture and economicsmight be addressed through architecture.

The fora are taking place in Alexandria,Amman, Beirut, Cairo, Istanbul, Karachi andSharjah, in cooperation and partnership withvarious universities. Accompanying the fora,the Education Programme is also sponsoring alectures series at the universities. The lecturesfeature young, talented architects presenting

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their methodology and approach to design.The featured lecturers are:

Farshid Mousavi, Foreign Office Architects, London

Arriz Hassam, 3rd Uncle design, TorontoSahel Al-Hiyari, Sahel Al-Hiyari

Architecture, AmmanHashim Sarkis, Hashim Sarkis

Architecture, Landscape, UrbanDesign, Beirut and Cambridge, MA

The Education Programme, partnering theUniversity of Toronto’s Faculty of Architecture,Landscape and Design, conducted a four-partlecture series in Toronto during the month ofSeptember. The series featured one lecture aweek by a world-renowned architect. Openingwith a presentation on AKTC by Luis Monreal,General Manager, Aga Khan Trust for Culture,the series featured:

Charles Correa, architect, Charles Correa and Associates, Mumbai

Fuhimiko Maki, architect, Fuhimiko Maki and Associates, Tokyo

Farshid Mousavi, architect, Foreign Office Architects, London

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Video frame, 3rd Uncle design

Yokohama Terminal, Japan,

Foreign Office Architects

Tsi Spa, Amman, Jordan,

Sahel Al Hiyari Architect

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have been filmed over the last years and thismaterial will find its place in our collections.

One of the main sources for the developmentof the Library collections, the Aga Khan Awardfor Architecture has begun its 10th cyclewhich will culminate in the selection andpresentation of Awards in 2007. All individualswho wish to submit a completed architecturalproject that meets the current eligibility crite-ria can do so via the website www.akdn.org.Further information is available on the“Architecture” section of the website.email: [email protected]: 41-22-909-7241

AKTC Library and Collections

The Library in Geneva has continued toacquire visual materials generated throughthe activities of the programmmes of the AgaKhan Trust for Culture. Through the HistoricCities Support Programme, we have receivedimages from professional photographic mis-sions undertaken in Lahore, as well as in theNorthern Areas of Pakistan. The library hasbeen the source of many images in the pro-duction of Karakoram: Hidden Treaures in theNorthern Areas of Pakistan, edited by StefanoBianca and published by Allemandi. Newimages of the completed Al-Azhar Park inCairo and of continuing work in the adjacentneighbourhood allow the library to provide arich documentation of the project from startto finish.

The Aga Khan Music Initiative for Central Asiarecently commissioned, Sebastian Schutyser, aBelgian photographer known for his stark andbeautiful images of Mali, to travel to CentralAsia to record the musical activities takingplace. His images are being catalogued intothe collections. Many concerts and performances

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William O’Reilly

Academy of Shashmaqam,

Dushanbe, Tajikistan

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Afghanistan and in Cairo over the course ofthe twentieth century. Byron’s Iran andAfghanistan presents black and white imagestaken by art historian Robert Byron (1905-1941) during his trip across the region in 1933-34, which he chronicled in his famous trave-logue The Road to Oxiana. In it, he writes vivid-ly about the Islamic monuments, particularlythose of the Timurids, which he took greatpains to locate and examine. His photographsoffer a rich visual companion to his writingsand comprise an invaluable resource in theirown right, documenting structures that arenow lost or altered. Caroline and JohnWilliams Collection, upcoming next month,contains 372 detailed photographs of Cairenemonuments taken in the 1970s that offer agreat contemporary counterpoint to the 1314K.A.C. Creswell images that largely illustratethe Cairo section of the ArchNet DigitalLibrary. The Williams Collection includes 207more images documenting Sayyid, Lodi,Sharqi, Mughal and Suri period architectureon the Indian subcontinent and 70 images ofYemeni monuments that were added earlierlast year.

New donations of images and publicationshave been secured for the Digital Library froma wide range of scholars and institutions,

A Site for Sore Eyes

Since September 2004, ArchNet Digital Libraryhas greatly enlarged its scope, adding hundredsof new historic and contemporary sites withthousands of new images, including uniquehistorical views. Our membership has reached28,000+ members, including many studentswho pursue university courses or participate incollaborative projects conducted using thenewly re-designed Group Workspaces.

Among the new additions to the DigitalLibrary are detailed architectural descriptionsof core Islamic monuments in Turkey, Iran,Syria, Ukraine and Azerbaijan; with upcomingdocumentation of monuments in Central Asiaand the Arabian Peninsula, due to appear onthe website later this fall. The historic sites areillustrated with over 1500 photographs,including early black and white photographsdigitized from collections at the Fine ArtsLibrary of Harvard College. 3000 new imageswere added and 4700 more are scheduled to be added to 380 recently built works in 47 countries*; bringing ArchNet's searchableonline archive to a total of 48,000 images.

While work continues of images constitutingthe Blair and Bloom Collection, two newSpecial Collections were introduced to theDigital Library this summer, to allow for astudy of the life of monuments in Iran and

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Friday Mosque of Isfahan, Iran, photograph by

Robert Byron

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Complex, Al Azhar Mosque and the Taj Mahaland hand-drawn perspective drawings fromGulru Necipoglu’s newly released tome onMimar Sinan.

* A listing of the contemporary projects is avail-able by request from [email protected].

Robert Hillenbrand, Lisa Golombek, TheArchitectural Review, Museum of Siyasa inSpain, Indus Valley School of Art &Architecture; among them is a unique collec-tion of 500+ color images of the original Izniktiles decorating the Dome of the Rock, takenby John Carswell in the 1960s and exclusiveimages of the mosque under restoration.The complete anthology of writings by OlegGrabar is due to appear in the publicationssection of the Digital Library in 2007.

To make existing material in the DigitalLibrary more readily accessible to the generalpublic, ArchNet is looking forward to imple-menting an improved search engine, and tonew modules that will allow the ArchNetteam, invited scholars and registered mem-bers to create and share their own themedselections of images from the library's collec-tions in “Spotlight”" exhibitions. In anticipa-tion of this new mode of presentation,ArchNet is currently assembling all plans,cross-sections and building elevations in itslibrary into A Fine Collection of ArchitecturalDrawings, which can be viewed by type ofdrawing and by city and country. Core to thecollection are 37 newly added architecturaldrawings by K.A.C. Creswell from the Fine ArtsLibrary, CAD plans of landmark structuressuch as the Topkapi Palace, Shah-i Zinda

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Floor plan of the Al-Azhar Mosque

(b. 970-972) in Cairo, Egypt

ArchNet team (From left to right, front row: Research

Assistant Rana Amirtahmasebi (S.M.Arch.S.)

and Project Coordinator Özgür Basak Alkan.

Back row: Research Assistants Gena Peditto (M.C.P.),

Olga Touloumi (S.M.Arch.S.), Mohamed Elshahed

(S.M.Arch.S.), Marta Morais (M.Arch.) and

Onur Yüce Gün (S.M.Arch.S.).)

Newsletter compiled by Jose Arguello

and Ruth MacQuiddy,

designed by Ink Design

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