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- Volume 2, Issue 2, 2013
International Journal of Islamic Architecture - Volume 2, Issue 2, 2013
Volume 2, Issue 2, 2013
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Architectural Conservation as a Tool for Cultural Continuity: A Focus on the Religious Built Environment of Islam
More LessAbstractArchitectural historic preservation has been used as a means to express or represent national, Islamic and even ethnic identity; and often this is linked to tourism or used to serve political ends, particularly in nation building. This article investigates agency and utility in the conservation and restoration of religious built environments in different societies in the Islamic world and its meaning to these societies today. It concludes that conservation should be interpreted more broadly than the physical continuity of historic structures; it should also enable the continuity of non-material aspects of culture and thus embody the relationship between faith and the built environment.
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Access Granted: The Phenomenology of Approach in Early Islamic Palatial Architecture
More LessAbstractEarly Islamic palatial architecture displays certain identifiable and formalized characteristics that have been extensively discussed for decades now, and scholarship is gradually moving towards a coherent understanding of the intrinsic principles behind their conceptualization.
One of the central principles in early Islamic palaces was the use of an axial approach as a structuring architectural principle. This axis was subdivided by physical demarcations that indicated increases in a given space’s social and symbolic importance. The assignment of value to space was based on proximity to the patron, and the architecture is designed to manifest this spatial hierarchy. This article explores the origin of this tradition by analysing the application and development of transitional devices in the late Umayyad palaces of Amman Citadel and Mshatta.
By considering spatial composition as a subtle yet powerful means of stimulating a cognitive recognition of social hierarchies, and the movement between them, a number of pre-Islamic complexes are gauged as possible sources of inspiration for the early Muslim patrons. This includes the identification of certain features and concepts that not only are suggested to be common, deliberate and meaningful, but indeed are key to understanding how the late Umayyad rulers formulated a sustainable materiality of Islamic rule.
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Ornamented Facades and Panoramic Views: The Impact of Tourism Development on al-Salt’s Historic Urban Landscape
By Luna KhirfanAbstractThis article discusses a series of tourism development projects for historic al-Salt in Jordan that began in the 1990s. A critical analysis of these projects reveals how their emphasis on tourism development results in superficial treatments that overlook the distinctive nature of the city’s morphology and the productive relationship between architectural elements and cultural, economic and political processes. Thus, using al-Salt in Jordan as a case study, this article reveals how preservation efforts can be rejected by a local community, particularly when the specifics of social, cultural, political and economic identity are not considered. According to the findings, these historical specificities contribute to shaping the city’s distinctive urban morphology. As such, al-Salt’s rehabilitation was reduced to superficial beautification and surface treatments that prioritize a fleeting visual experience for tourists but fail to address the fundamental aspects of rehabilitating the historic urban landscape.
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Analyzing City Hall, Villa and Tunnel in Amman: The Failures of Cultural Amalgamation at the Turn of the Twentieth Century
By Yasir SakrAbstractThis essay narrates the ‘cultural amalgamation’ of the Greater City of Amman, the capital of Jordan, undertaken by its municipality during the last two decades of the twentieth century. The study delineates the various dynamics, actors, agendas and tools that defined the amalgamation process as a ‘discourse’. Deconstructing this discourse, this study highlights the critical role of ‘monuments’ and architects in shaping the municipal endeavour in order to consolidate a civic identity and culture for the sprawling city of Amman. Particular emphasis is given to the peculiar interaction between the symbolic and the utilitarian tools of the amalgamation process, represented by the ‘City Hall’, ‘Villa’ and ‘Tunnel/Bridge intersection’, which lead to the problematic outcome investigated here.
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Abu Dhabi Forms and Fragments: Muslim Space and the Modern City
Authors: Mohamed El-Amrousi and John BilnAbstractThe urban reshaping of Abu Dhabi incorporates monumental construction projects as part of a larger government-sponsored strategy of economic and cultural development outlined in the Abu Dhabi 2030 plan. Once the salient features of several of the most important recent monuments in Abu Dhabi are understood, however, it becomes clear that their power cannot be reduced to a simple effect of an urban development policy. Indeed, these works can be interpreted as examples of a conscious semiotic strategy of ‘gathering’ identifiable architectural forms of major Muslim monuments from around the world into a single location, a new ‘centre’ of a multi-ethnic community that incorporates ‘Islamic’ arts and crafts across geographic boundaries from Moorish Spain to Mughal India. In order to appreciate the implications of this building programme, attention must be given to the history and built heritage of Abu Dhabi as an emerging modern city seeking a unique identity among neighbouring Gulf State cities. This article investigates the emergence of revived forms in selected congregational mosques in Abu Dhabi that are open for visits to both Muslims and non-Muslims. The Qubbat As-Sakhrah Mosque in Abu Dhabi, which is an exact replica of the original in Jerusalem; the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque in Abu Dhabi with undeniable references to the Taj Mahal; and the Sheikh Zayed Mosque in Fujairah, which mimics the Sultan Ahmet Mosque in Istanbul, none of which were designed by star architects, are investigated in this article as manifestations of collagist practices that serve to reinforce a projected sense of community in the United Arab Emirates.
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Reconstructing Afghanistan: An Architecture Curriculum for a ‘New Way of Life’
More LessAbstractAfghanistan is a country rich in culture and history, but also one devastated by decades of war. The destruction extends beyond cities to include the social, economic and educational constructs of life. In 2008, the University of Hartford was awarded a $1.33 million grant to help re-establish the engineering facilities at Herat University. The grant mission also facilitated the creation of a new achitectural programme to address the growing needs of contemporary Afghanistan. Over the next three years, scholars worked to forge an innovative curriculum, one that melds the historic traditions of a centuries-old city with the contemporary needs of a western-style Islamic society.
When the ideally conceived curriculum was finally taken to Herat University for approval and implementation, a new and harsher reality emerged. This article chronicles the events that reshaped the proposed curriculum. It relays how the current state of the profession, cultural traditions, gender bias and economic realities came to bear on the development of this new programme, and how western preconceptions were revised by local realities. Finally, it documents how the melding of these realities supplanted initial utopian agendas in the creation of a more viable, integrated curriculum that supports an evolving, unique and contemporary architectural identity.
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Book Reviews
Authors: Gülsüm Baydar, Jeremy Kargon, Mark Dike DeLancey, Stacy Holden and Nancy DemerdashAbstractTurkey, Modern Architectures in History Series, Sibel Bozdoğan and Esra Akcan, (2012) London: Reaktion Books, 344 pp., 226 illus., ISBN 9781861898784, $29.95 (paperback)
Architecture in Translation: Germany, Turkey, and the Modern House, Esra Akcan, (2012) Durham, NC and London: Duke University Press, 392 pp., 142 illus., ISBN 9780822353089, $24.95 (paperback)
Solomon’s Temple: Myth, Conflict, and Faith, Alan Balfour, (2012) Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, 328 pp., 58 b/w illus., 32 colour plates, ISBN 9780470674956, $84.95 (cloth)
Making and Remaking Mosques in Senegal, Islam in Africa Series, vol. 13, Cleo Cantone, (2012) Leiden and Boston: Brill, xliv + 408 pp., 122 b/w illus., 39 colour illus., 6 maps, 6 figs, ISBN 9789004203372, $182 (cloth)
The Future of Historic Cities
The Aga Khan Historic Cities Programme: Strategies for Urban Regeneration, Philip Jodidio (ed.), (2011) London and New York: Prestel, 339 pp., 300 illus., ISBN 9783791344065, $75.00 (cloth)
The Medina: The Restoration and Conservation of Historic Islamic Cities, Marcello Balbo (ed.), (2012) New York: I.B. Tauris, viii + 285 pp., ISBN 9781848857131, $100.00 (cloth)
Heritage and Sustainability in the Islamic Built Environment, Bashir A. Kazimee (ed.), (2012) Billerica, MA: WIT Press, xv + 213 pp., 300 illus., ISBN 9781845646240, $192.00 (cloth)
Fès, La Fabrication D’une Ville Nouvelle (1912–1956), Charlotte Jelidi, (2012) Lyon, France: ENS Éditions, 270 pp., 34 illus., ISBN 9782847882391, €27.00 (paperback)
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Exhibition Reviews
Authors: Maximilian Hartmuth, Corinna Forberg and Johanna Domela MovassatAbstract‘The Closing of the Zemaljski Muzej’, Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Since October 15, 2012
‘Samarra: Centre of the World. 101 Years of Archaeological Research on the Tigris Museum’ Für Islamische Kunst, Staatliche Museen Zu Berlin, January 18–May 26, 2013
‘The Jameel Prize: Art Inspired by Islamic Tradition’, Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University, December 12, 2012–March 10, 2013
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Conference Precis
Authors: Heather Madar, Joan DelPlato and Taraneh MeshkaniAbstract‘Harems Imagined and Real’, Panel at the Annual College Art Association Conference, New York, February 16, 2013
‘From Tehran to Tahrir: Public Space Redefined’, Center for Global Communication Studies at the Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania, February 8, 2013
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