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In the AKPIA Lecture Series, SMArchS Urbanism hosts Civil Architecture for a book talk on Two Thousand Years of Non-Urban History on Monday, September 28, 2026 at 6:00pm in W41-1216, the Sidara Auditorium in MIT SA+P’s newly opened Metropolitan Storage Warehouse.

The book is a primer on the landscapes and environments of the Arabian Peninsula, exploring how architecture and planning existed in the region prior to the discovery of oil. The book is structured around four chapters - desert kites, fish traps, agricultural planning, and seasonality.

Civil Architecture is a cultural practice based between Bahrain and Kuwait. It was founded by Ali Ismail Karimi and Hamed Bukhamseen. The work of Civil asks what it means to produce architecture in a decidedly un-civil time, presenting a new civic character for a global condition and offers alternate futures for the Gulf region.

The book is published by Kaph Books and supported by Bahrain Authority for Culture and Antiquities and Graham Foundation.

📍 134 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge

@mitarchitecture
@mitsap
@civilarchitectureorg
@aikarimi
@hamedbukhamseen
@kaph.books
@culturebah
@grahamfoundation

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I am honoured and humbled to be assisting Professor Nasser Rabbat for this course this fall. More relevant today than ever: from Shahjahanabad to Cairo, if we don’t know what an Islamic city is, how do we reclaim it?
#islamicheritage #islamicarchitecture

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Later this week, MIT hosts a symposium honoring the scholarly legacy of Nasser Rabbat (@nasserrabbat), the Aga Khan Professor and Director of the Aga Khan Program for Islamic Architecture at MIT. Over more than 35 years, his work has critically challenged methodologies inherited from the study of Western art and architecture.

Critical Historiography as Method brings together contributors to a Festschrift being organized in Rabbat's honor. The day-long program gathers students, mentees, and close colleagues whose own research reflects the critical and historiographical orientation he has modeled throughout his career, presenting papers organized around four themes: self-reflexivity and the field's future, the city as a scale of inquiry, the reception of art, and new frontiers for a new world.

Contributors include Nancy Demerdash, Talinn Grigor, Heghnar Watenpaugh, Pamela Karimi, and many others. Registration is required. A recording will be made available online in the days following the event.

📍 Dreyfoos Lecture Hall (E14-633), MIT Media Lab
🗓 Saturday, May 23, 2026, 9am–5pm
🔗 Register at the link in bio.

📸 Drawings of Rabbat's 1982 project at UCLA for a monument in Beverly Hills. An early testament to Rabbat's interest in Islamic architecture.

@mit @mitsap @akpiamit @mitarchitecture Early architectural drawings by Nasser Rabbat depict a chapel plan and section, showing geometric layouts, circulation, and spatial organization through precise hand-rendered forms and muted tones.

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So looking forward to returning to MIT and reuniting with friends old and new to celebrate the launch of a collective book, Reconstruction as VIolence In Assad's Syria, edited by Nasser Rabbat and Deen Sharp. Monday Nov. 17 at 6 pm.

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Join us live tomorrow, Saturday, October 18, from 9 AM to 5 PM (EST), for the International Symposium: Grassroots Initiatives in Cultural Heritage Preservation at MIT

https://web.mit.edu/webcast/lib/f25/2/

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مع انطلاق العام الدراسي 2025–2026، تشرفت جائزة المصلى بتلقي دعوة للمشاركة في سلسلة المحاضرات العامة لكل من برنامج الآغا خان للعمارة الإسلامية بمعهد ماساتشوستس للتكنولوجيا، وكلية الدراسات العليا للهندسة المعمارية بجامعة كولومبيا.
تمحورت المشاركتان حول كتاب “عابر متجذر”، الذي يوثق الدورة الأولى للجائزة، حيث قُدِّم المصلى كنموذج معماري مرن ومتعدد الأوجه، يزخر بإمكانات واعدة لإثراء الخطاب المعماري المعاصر عالمياً.
شارك رئيس لجنة تحكيم الجائزة، سمو الأمير نواف بن عيّاف، والمحرر المشارك للكتاب فيصل طبارة، رؤى وأفكاراً مستخلصة من الأبحاث التي مثلت حجرالأساس لكل من الجائزة
والكتاب. يستكشف الكتاب شكل وفلسفة المصلى بوصفه مساحة مؤقتة للصلاةفي الثقافات الإسلامية، وهيكلاً معمارياً عابراً ينشأ حيثما وجدت الحاجة للصلاة. كما يبحث المصلى في فكرة التكيف والزوال، ويتحدى المفهوم التقليدي للثبات في العمارة، مقدماً نموذجاً ملهماً للمرونة في الإطار المكاني والثقافي.
كتاب “عابر متجذر” متوفر عبر الإنترنت من خلال حساب @KaphBooks

As the 2025-26 academic year kicks off, the AlMusalla Prize was pleased to be invited to feature in the public lecture series at MIT AKPIA and Columbia GSAPP.
Through the publication Rooted Transience, which marks and celebrates the inaugural edition of the AlMusalla Prize, the musalla was presented as a versatile architectural typology—one that holds immense potential to shape contemporary architectural discourse at large.
‏Prize Chair @NawafBinAyyaf and book co-editor @FaysalTabbarah shared insights from the research underpinning both the prize and the publication. Rooted Transience delves into the form and philosophy of the musallaas a temporary prayer space within Islamic cultures—an ephemeral structure that emerges wherever the need for prayer arises. By embracing adaptability and impermanence, the musalla challenges conventional notions of permanence in architecture, offering a profound model for spatial and cultural resilience.
Rooted Transience can now be purchased online through @KaphBooks

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We’re excited to share the program and speakers for next Saturday’s International Symposium: Grassroots Initiatives in Cultural Heritage Preservation — October 18, 2025, at MIT and online.

This event brings together scholars, practitioners, and community leaders to Explore the importance of local contributions to preservation efforts, with presentations on Syria, Palestine, Iraq, Yemen, Libya, Sudan, and Kosovo.

Join us for a day of insightful dialogue and exchange. You still have the chance to register and attend in person or virtually: https://calendar.mit.edu/event/grassroots-initiatives-in-cultural-heritage-preservation

Program
Opening Remarks
Émilie Songolo — Head of Distinctive Collections, MIT Libraries
Rami Alafandi — Collections Curator, Aga Khan Documentation Center, MIT Libraries

Session I
• Preserving Heritage in Times of Crisis: A Legacy of Community Response — Kristin Parker, Boston Public Library
• Culture at the Core of Recovery: Insights into the Community Role in Preserving Aleppo’s Cultural Heritage — Ruba Tamim Kasmo, Fatih Sultan Mehmet Vakif University

Session II
• Academic Contribution to Cultural Heritage Preservation in Kosovo — Florina Jerliu, University of Prishtina
• From Conflict to Conservation: The MaLiCH Project’s Approach to Protecting Libya’s Heritage — Hiba Alkhalaf, King’s College London
• Reconstruction, Recovery and Rebuilding Projects for Yemen’s Cultural Heritage — Zaydoon Zaid, Council of American Overseas Research Centers

Session III
• RIWAQ’s Role in the Protection of Cultural Heritage in Palestine — Shatha Safi & Hiba Omari, RIWAQ
• Cultural Heritage and Change in Iraq — Mehiyar Kathem, Liwan for Culture and Development NGO
• A Quest for Beauty Amongst Rubbles — Suha Hasan, AA School of Architecture

Discussion Panel
Nasser Rabbat, Professor and Director of the Aga Khan Program for Islamic Architecture, MIT
Stephennie Mulder, Associate Professor, Art History, UT Austin
Nada Al Hassan, Cultural heritage expert

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After nearly a year and a half of preparation, together with the academic committee—Professor Nasser Rabbat and Professor Ruba Kasmo—and our brilliant speakers who will cover diverse countries, I am delighted to invite you to join us for this symposium.

You are warmly welcome to attend either in person or online. Register here:
https://calendar.mit.edu/event/grassroots-initiatives-in-cultural-heritage-preservation

بعد ما يقارب العام والنصف من التحضير، وبالتعاون مع اللجنة الأكاديمية الموقرة المكوّنة من الأستاذ الدكتور ناصر رباط والأستاذة الدكتورة رُبى قاسمو، ومع مجموعة من المتحدثين المتميزين الذين سيغطّون تجارب من دول مختلفة، يسعدني أن أدعوكم لحضور هذا المؤتمر.

يسرّنا حضوركم شخصيًا أو متابعتكم عبر الإنترنت.
يمكنكم التسجيل عبر الرابط:
https://calendar.mit.edu/event/grassroots-initiatives-in-cultural-heritage-preservation

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Streetschool Prototype 1.1, Everything—in your love—becomes easy (2019/2024)
Multimedia installation

Conceived as part of an ongoing proposal for another Arab world, Streetschool invites individuals with diverse skills to learn from one another, drawing from the urban environments they inhabit. Adapted for Sharjah Biennial 16 after iterations in Tripoli, Beirut, Amman and Abu Dhabi, Streetschool Prototype 1.1, Everything—in your love—becomes easy repurposes architectural elements salvaged from 1970s buildings under renovation in Sharjah.

Continuing the communal spirit initiated in the first prototype—built and filmed in 2019 between Tripoli and Beirut during Lebanon’s garbage crisis—this new iteration embodies a methodology of collective construction, improvisation, and reuse. Through an open-ended, iterative process that adapts to the material and intangible resources of each site, Streetschool highlights the mobility of embodied knowledge-sharing practices and their capacity to transform the contexts they inhabit.

—
Check out my conversation with @actmit @mlfriedman16 on the ACT website!

Photo credit: Shanavas Jamaluddin. Courtesy of Sharjah Art Foundation.

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Join us next Monday for our third HTC Forum lecture of the semester! Anneka Lenssen (Associate Professor of Global Modern Art, UC Berkeley) presents “Untimely Collaborations: Rabbia Sukkarieh’s Performance Art on Television (Beirut, 1988)” on March 31 at 6pm.

ABSTRACT: Who was the cameraperson for artist Rabbia Sukkarieh’s surviving 26 seconds of video documentation of her performance on the green line in Beirut in 1988, involving convincing snipers along the edge of Khorsh Beirut to hold their fire while the artist wrapped the bullet-riddled trees in green fabrics? No one can recall. The pressures of a civil war and forced economic migration have scattered the moment into other formats of perception. In this talk, I offer an account of my attempt to research Sukkarieh’s performance work in 1988, a time of siege that presages our current ever expanding wars, through the recovery of a few seconds of footage aired on national television – a site of “untimely collaboration” with the thoughts and visions of others. I explore in particular Sukkarieh’s interest in the fugitivity of resistance actions that are spun out to other viewers. “Third World problems sleep between my eyelids,” Sukkarieh wrote in 1988, invoking the discontinuous story-telling of Scheherazade (a feminist hero as well as an Orientalist cliche) as a tactic of survival and a repository of shared experiences of dispossession. In a world constituted by too much documentation of violence, how can artists bear witness? And under what conditions can an art historian participate in this task?

Anneka Lenssen is Associate Professor of Global Modern Art in the Department of History of Art at the University of California, Berkeley. She specializes in modern painting and contemporary visual practices, with a focus on the cultural politics of the Middle East.

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Save these dates! 🌷 HTC Forum is back for the spring semester with four great lectures (and one new poster). Over the break, we worked with MIT’s Morningside Academy of Design to add a final speaker to our spring line-up – we look forward to welcoming Alison J. Clarke (University of Applied Arts Vienna) in April!

This year also marks the 50th anniversary of the History, Theory + Criticism program at MIT, so these four special Forum lectures are part of our calendar of celebrations. Our first spring lecture is in exactly one week: on Tues Feb 18, we’re so excited to hear from Siobhan Angus (Carleton University). Stay tuned for another post with more information about our brilliant speaker…

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