EULOGY — KHALED ASFOUR

Early Departure | Perpetual Legacy

Ashraf M. Salama, PhD.

Professor of Architecture,

University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, United Kingdom 

Professor Khaled Asfour with children of a vernacular settlement in El Qasr, ad-Dakhla Oasis, Western Desert, Egypt, 2006 -- Photography: Mohab Abo Taleb.

On Sunday 14th March 2021, I woke up to a very heavy and shocking social media notification: Professor Khaled Asfour passed away (1). Just three weeks ahead of his 61st birthday marks an early departure for an intellectual, an influential pedagogue and an exceptional critic. A huge void in architectural education in Egypt and an emptiness in the architectural community in the wider Middle East are undoubtedly created.

A full professor of architecture and criticism at Misr International University (MIU), Cairo, Egypt, Khaled left a legacy of body of writings, distinctive approaches to teaching and learning, passionate commitment to mentoring and support, and most importantly, countless cohorts of architects in Egypt (1998-2020) and earlier in Saudi Arabia (1991/92-1998). Under his teachings, graduates have acquired critical abilities to become agents of development of architectural knowledge, stewards of reliable and honest criticism in architecture, and guardians of environmentally and socially responsive design approaches.

It is with great sadness that I write this eulogy for Khaled Asfour, a great friend for twenty-five years and a work colleague for four years; it is hard to process his passing. There is no intention to consider this tribute to Khaled Asfour as a coverage or analysis of all his works. Rather, it offers glimpses of our interactions and presents short reflections on a selection of his works.

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La U. de Chile y la destrucción de Vicuña MacKenna 20: Conversación con el Arquitecto Miguel Lawner

The following article (in Spanish) discusses a controversial situation around the proposed demolition of a building of historic value (yet not declared heritage). This building belongs to the University of Chile, the most important public university in the country that as one of its principles, claims to be custodian of the history and heritage of the nation. Nevertheless, under the thin justification of "progress" and the satisfaction of the need for more space, the university is ready to demolish. The issue goes beyond the future of the building. It touches on values, it is about knowledge and understanding the importance of heritage and raises the question about to whom these buildings belong to (particularly when the "owner" is itself publicly owned).

La discusión en torno al nuevo proyecto para Vicuña Mackenna 20 (VM20), donde se propone la demolición del antiguo edificio, se ha manipulado al punto de crear la impresión de que solo pueden existen dos miradas, excluyentes la una de la otra.

El problema se nos presenta en la forma de dos bandos, o de una dicotomía artificial e intencionalmente impulsada. Por un lado, quienes están por la demolición, justifican esta en pos del "progreso" y de la necesidad de edificaciones para institutos y alumnos de la Universidad de Chile, hacia quienes la Universidad tiene deudas infraestructurales pendientes. Por otro lado, a quienes intentan salvar este edificio patrimonial (reconocido o no) se los demoniza haciéndolos parecer poco solidarios con las necesidades de los demás. Detrás de este discurso, existe otro incluso más perverso—un discurso ideológico y mutuamente excluyente con el que se supone que cada una de estas dos miradas se alinearían—. 

Fig. 1: uno de los patios de la Facultad de Arquitectura y Urbanismo. Edificios que Miguel Lawner rescató de ser demolidos.

Por supuesto que ni una ni otra posición puede ser tan estrecha. Extraña además que sea la Universidad, o sus representantes, los que en forma directa o indirecta utilicen este tipo de simplificaciones, las que son notorias por promover la ignorancia y la descalificación de quienes piensan en forma distinta.

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Passionate architect who lived his values through practice

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Regional Associates project: Kyambura Lodge, Kyambura, Uganda.

www.regionalassociates.eu 

It is with sadness that we at Architects for Peace express our shock at the tragic death of Ross Langdon and partner Elif Yavuz, and all lives lost in the Nairobi mall siege that began on Saturday.

Ross made contact with us at the beginning of the year to express interest in undertaking a pro bono project in Uganda, which brought his work with Regional Associates to our attention, including the pro bono design of an HIV Education Centre and Health Clinic in Uganda. We regret that we never had the opportunity to meet Ross in person, but his work in Africa is evidence of a talented and passionate architect who lived his values through his practice, and his death is a tragic loss to the architecture community and the wider world.

Our condolences to Ross’s family, colleagues and friends. 

La belleza como instrumento de identidad, complejidad y resilencia

Luciano Kulczewski García (Chile, 1896-1972) y la importancia de crear ambientes sustentables, en el ámbito social, económico y medio ambiental.

Vivienda social: one of many examples of social housing in Barrio Madrid, Santiago, Chile. Fuente propia.

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Archinect Interviews George Brugmans, IABR - Part 1, Making City

This article was first published in Archinect and has been republished with the permission of its author Orhan Ayyüce, member of the editorial board of Architects for Peace.

“I do not believe in throwing good stuff away. Every IABR edition builds on earlier editions. We refocus, change perspective, pick up new elements; we re-use and reconfigure, and then we scramble and stir. Compared to most other Biennales, we’re poor and small, so we have to be smart, not waste what we have, choose our battles, break rules, find shortcuts, work with good people, make friends and truly commit ourselves.” - George Brugmans

IABR, International Architecture Biennale Rotterdam is the most engaged urban Biennale in the world. Supported by the Dutch Government, the city of Rotterdam, the municipalities where the IABR runs test sites and the collaborators from NGO's, this urban biennale continues to discuss, engage, make, critique and invent solutions for pressing problems regarding the present and the future of the cities in this so called urban century with rapidly growing megalopolises and populations.
IABR holds that when we would all be living in better-made cities our future would be more sustainable, socially as well as economically. It therefore considers Making City to be the principal imperative of our times.
This is my second interview for Archinect with the Executive Director of IABR, George Brugmans, and the conversation continues from where we left it two years ago.

by Orhan Ayyüce

PART 1 Making City

A short introduction to the 5th IABR: Making City (Courtesy of IABRfilm)

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At 104 years of age Oscar Niemeyer dies

At 104 years of age Oscar Niemeyer has left us. He was the architect of Brasilia and of iconic architecture around the world. But, as important as the form of his buildings are the ideals that gave those buildings form.

"It is important that the architect think not only of architecture but of how architecture can solve the problems of the world. The architect's role is to fight for a better world, where he can produce an architecture that serves everyone and not just a group of privileged people." 

Niemeyer received the Pritzker Architecture Prize in 1988.

Thanks for the inspiration Oscar Niemeyer, your legacy will live with us.

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Instigating Change with Common Ground

By John Southern

This article was originally published on Archinect and has been re-published with the consent of its author.

In the age where cultural production has usurped industrial production as the driver for Western economies, the Venice Architecture Biennale represents a special kind of affair. This three month-long bonanza of architecture and urban design represents a collection of diverse principles produced under a unified curatorial umbrella. Despite the trash-talk that has proliferated in certain circles since the opening of the event in late August, this year’s Biennale doesn’t have much to be cynical, negative, or nasty about.

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On Koolhaas's Defense of Generic Architecture

When I read Rem Koolhaas I can't help thinking of Groucho Marx's words when he says: "Those are my principles. If you don't like them I have others."

I question whether a city with a 40% or more of foreign workers, particularly those in many African cities where Koolhass asserts his architectural power-- people who have no right to vote, many of whom don't have their family with them and where creating a community is pointless--can ever be really free. Richard Sennett discussing 'flexibility' (a work approach in capitalist societies) claims that, "Once people used to come to the city in search of anonymity, diversity and the freedom to meet others. Cities were also places of collective struggle and solidarity. Now, just as the workplace is affected by a new system of flexible working, so the city, too, risks losing its charm as businesses and architecture become standardised and impersonal." (Richard Sennett's "A flexible city of strangers").

Koolhaas believes the generic city is also the freest. Liberated from the codes and rules of the old city center, it’s a free zone, a safe haven for the migrant workers who make up (in Amsterdam’s case) 40 percent of the city’s population. Generic plug-in waterfronts (like the Baltimore Inner Harbor, New York's East River Waterfront and, yes, HafenCity) are the product of a simple equation between developers and city governments.

In these scenarios, architecture is "icing on the cake," a broken, out-dated profession, validated at random by an "unstable ideological environment" that changes according to the whims of an ever-evolving bureaucracy.

Find "Koolhaas's Defense of Generic Architecture" by Kelsey Campbell-Dollaghan here.

Architects for Peace partners with Fatin Historico

Fatin Historico iha Timor Lorosae

Fatin Historico is a youth led and initiated project with a focus on documenting historical places and architecture of East Timor. We try to cover places that are historically significant including traditional, Portuguese, Chinese, Japanese and Indonesian architecture, and other significant (non-architecture) places. This project strongly involves the participation of Timorese youth in the production of materials.

We are very pleased to have partnered with Architects for Peace as we are expanding our scope and engagement, and we hope that we can learn from and share with the organisation and the network!

If you would like to be involved, please contact fatin.historico@gmail.com or afp@architectsforpeace.org.

Pritzker Prize 2011 to Eduardo Souto de Moura: acknowledging local context

By Beatriz C. Maturana

According to the words of the Pritzker Prize jury, in the 80’s and at the height of post-modernism, Souto de Moura buildings were “intensely out of fashion”.[1] Souto de Moura deliberately did not give in to the pressure to conform to architectural fashion or fads. Working with and within his own architectural national context has provided Souto de Moura with an abundance of meaningful references to build upon. The jury referred to Souto de Moura’s architectural work in terms of the “echoes of architectural traditions”, “mindful of its context” that reinforces history while, “expanding the range of contemporary expression”.[1] His most challenging, innovative and unconventional trait is that Souto de Moura’s architecture is bravely local.

Braga Municipal Stadium. Photograph by Luís Ferreira Alves. Image source: The Pritzker Architecture Prize. © The Hyatt Foundation

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Cardboard for Haiti

Shigeru Ban has been in Port-au-Prince building prototype cardboard shelters and has plans to build many for a small community who've slipped through the cracks. It's not his first venture into disaster relief

Ban has been active in disaster relief for many years, and has worked in Rwanda, Kobe, Sri Lanka, Gujarat, Sichuan, and l’Aquila. "I thought it was really important for us to do something for society, not just to build monuments or help developers make money." How does he do it?

"From experience, I know I just have to go there, even without any connections, to find out who needs what. Then one thing leads to another."

He's taking donations for Haiti now: LINK

The Auschwitz plans

Architectural plans of the Auschwitz conentration camp were found in East Berlin recently. They have just been handed over to Israel. (view plans at NPR )

This might be the time to name, shame, blame the architects guilty of designing buildings for killing, but there are not mentioned in this week's news articles. It is noted by NPR that one of the draftsmen of at least one of the drawings was a prisoner, identified by a number on the drawings, "Nr. 471."

Some background on the construction of the Auschwitz - Birkenau death camps.

Note: this information is sourced from the compilation of essays, "Anatomy of the Auschwitz Death Camp", available at Google Books.

The architects responsible for designing Auschwitz were Karl Bischoff and young Bauhaus graduate Fritz Ertl. They had thought they were designing a prisoner of war camp for 97,000 Russians, which was Aushwitz's initial function.


The standard 4,176 square foot hut was nominated on the drawings to hold 550 prisoners, but at the last minute, Bischoff crossed this out and replaced it with "744". The private space allotted to each prisoner was reduced to 1 square metre. The density was much tighter than the contemporary Nazi standards for concentration camps. The authors reason that the lack of latines and high density was partly due to the architects' assumption that the prisoners would be away working for most of the day. The prisoners were to reconstruct the town of Auschwitz.


Construction was a humanitarian disaster. Under pressure from Himmler to speed up the process, and with a lack of building materials, Bischoff ordered the surrounding villages to be cannabalised of their bricks, which the unhoused Russian prisoners proceeded to do, with their bare hands. 8,000 of the 10,000 early arrivals died during the first few months of construction.


In early 1942 the camps lost their reason for being, as prisoners of war were now required in armaments factories. The population had dwindled to 3,000 from a maximum 15,000. Soon after, 150,000 jews arrived to take their place. Over 1,000,000 were to die there over the next three years.


via archinect
image: AP

Anatol Kagan 1913 to 2009

Anatol Kagan died this month aged 95. A modernist architect resident in Melbourne in the '40s and '50s, he had been living in Sydney since the early Sixties.

At the age of 4, he remembers the panic during the Bolshevik Revolution, the epicentre of which was in his Moscow neighbourhood. The Russian Jewish Kagan family quickly moved to Berlin, where Anatol studied architecture and converted to Trotskyism at the age of 17. In 1938 the family fled Nazi germany to Melbourne via London.

According to The Age, for 40 years Kagan was an active member of both the Labour and Greens parties, and received messages of condolence from Rudd, Hawke, and Keating.

Kagan never gave up on his dream of a better world. Right to the end this gentle Marxist democrat attended his Labor Party branch meetings armed with resolutions or his latest letter to the prime minister about the need for genuine action to tackle the climate crisis.

His obituary at The Age is worth a read for more on his architectural career.

Architects, why?

Are foreign architects needed in developing countries context for international aid projects?

I got once this interesting, however repetitive, question. My answer was based on my little but intensive experience.

Before going through some points I will mention what a friend in RW said: "I thought architects only did big projects for money" (roughly translated).

The points to mention are:

1. Architects are required not only for technical skills but also for the project's amount of mone -for managerial reasons.
   
2. A construction project or program management can be so time-consuming that exploring alternatives becomes a constraint to effectiveness.
   
3. A project management position does not require design activities -making it extra job.
   
4. There are organizations exploring these "alternatives" but sharing initiatives is not so common yet.
   
5. Depending on the relationship Gov't-UN, it can block or pass the use of these options.
   
6. Millions and millions moving around, and organizations can have very limited capacity (architects) at high-level offices.
   
7. Agencies need to show good results; failures must to be avoided.
   
8. The same way we can criticize Gov'ts for not undertaking measures to reduce CO emissions, we can also criticize big development agencies ( UN) for preferring concrete and iron bars.

Foreign, or better, experienced architects are needed in developing countries for testing reasons, to explore these "alternatives". [Sometimes we don't see the options because we are too close to see them.] Moreover, in certain countries, foreign architects are needed for managerial reasons -sometimes you have only 20 experienced architects in one country.

Therefore, architects are needed for these tasks. But the role or impact will depend on the assignment and the context's support.

The question is valid, and I recognize its validity better in the broad UN context.

Architect Teacher Trainer in Mongolia; Working for Small Change

Following a year working with the Mongolian Construction Technology College in a Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO) project, I was asked to report on any 'significant change' which may have occurred during the year. I have written extensively elsewhere about the year, but in this article for arch-peace, I describe some of the small changes which I think occurred.

As possibly the first architect teacher trainer volunteer in Mongolia (or anywhere), I was consulted independently by the Mongolian Construction Ministry, the Mongolian Wheelchair Citizens (МТИХ), and in the neighbourhood of my workplace, by World Vision (Bayankhoshuu sub-branch), and the Gender Centre for Sustainable Development in the 8th Khoroo. Each led to useful outcomes even if my suggestions involved intervening less, or differently. But the two live architectural projects we undertook collaboratively in the college, in Sanzai and Yarmag, provided the most concrete opportunities for training architect teachers. The live project work can potentially have a long term impact with the existing teachers there - named Bolormaa, Tsenguune, Ariunaa, and Hashbayar - and two newly graduated students who will become teachers, Lhagva and Gursed. We also began training the next generation, students Delger-Dalai, Tumen-Od, Tumen-Gerel and Uyanga.

The former group developed an better understanding about accessible and energy-efficient construction, and about principles of Project Management, like time management and team planning, which are culturally quite unfamiliar. Most importantly and specifically for the architecture discipline, we worked with processes of Site Analysis and Architectural Project Planning, on how to organise client meetings and briefings, and how to research and write architectural programme briefs for projects.

Looking back, I have some confidence that with support from the college, these established teachers, Bolormaa, Tsenguune, Ariunaa, and Hashbayar will be able to continue the training we commenced over the past year; including; research for teaching, languages for internationalisation, Staff and Student CV clinics, and using internet based tools (flickr, blogging, google earth, wikipedia), all applied to architectural and construction education.

Two teachers, Bolormaa and Tsengel-Oyun, met colleagues Suvdmaa (English teacher) and Bolortsetseg (Architect teacher) from the neighbouring Technical and Technology College (TTC), for the first time, and assisted in some training. All together, we comparatively mapped the architecture degree curricula respectively of the two previously unacquainted colleges, MCTC and TTC. I believe that the exercise will develop staff ownership of architecture degree curricula in Ulaanbaatar, curricula which will need major recasting in the coming years. The latter college, TTC, has recently applied to work with VSO, and I strongly encouraged these people to continue to work together on professional development, and in future to extend their knowledge to develop the Mongolian Association of Architects.

New teachers have now been recruited to expand MCTC and these will need guidance and encouragement in their professional development from trained teachers. I recommended staff continue to work with VSO and that new consultants or volunteers should continue the professional development work for which the college and teachers should have ownership and be proud.

The college began this year building a new five storey classroom building in the 21st district, with students labouring as practical trainees. Work is currently suspended due to winter, which is usually -20 to -30 celcius, making outdoor work difficult. The directors and architects consulted me with the architectural drawings, and agreed in January - among other suggested design and safety improvements - to make the basement and first (ground) levels wheelchair/barrow accessible by ramps. Access to construction and architectural education will not only be physically improved in this case, but also a process has begun for more participative and inclusive building design and college management.

New: featured AARCHITECTURE journal no. 7 (collect free from AA School reception)

Laurie Baker: Pokharan II and After

This article, until now unpublished, was contributed by Sundar Ramanathaiyer. Sundar stresses that "Laurie Baker was an anti-nuclear activist who has drawn several anti-nuclear cartoons [yes, cartoons]". Here is what he wrote 8 years ago.


Pokharan II and After

I believe it is wrong to kill people. It is wrong to steal - but you can give back or repay. It is wrong to tell a lie - but you can confess and tell the truth. You can kill - but you cannot bring that life back.

As far as I am concerned these thoughts cover most of my feelings about the Pokharan Tests. These tests and all the wonderful scientific work that preceded them, were not done to produce a fireworks displays nor just to make a big bang to frighten those whom we think are our enemies. They were made to test a Bomb that can be used - either if over-provoked, or to use as an imagined defences or retaliation.

I don't think I need to bring my religion, or any other religion, into it. Non-violence is my way of life, and at 82 I am not persuaded or tempted to change my beliefs.

I was born during the first `Great' World War and I `went through' the Second `Great' World War. I refused to join the armed forces but within a week of the declaration of the War II `joined up' with an organisation whose main work was to retrieve a care for and nurse those injured by bombing. I was doing this in a hospital on the South Coast of England when it was bombed from the air, this work also took me to China and later to India. In England, China and Burma, I experienced bomb raids and even `got used to them' - but there was one thing that I never got used to and will never I forget - helping to dig people out of bombed buildings and finding that what we had just dug out - a bloody mangled body - was that of a child - who, probably less than an hour before, had been lively, happily playing.

I went to keep on telling everyone that a bomb does not know how to distinguish between a soldier and a small child, let alone women and elderly people who can't get to a shelter quickly enough. Perhaps even worse is to find people and again worse still children, who have been wounded or blinded - never to walk, or see, again.

I know I will be called a sentimental old fool - but this is what War is and this is precisely what bombs do. I am also old enough to remember my own shock - and the shock waves that flew round the whole world, when we heard of the so called `Atom Bomb' that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Again I want you never to forget that those bombs not only killed thousands, blinded thousands, mained for life thousands - not to mention that they destroyed the greater part of a city - not only its buildings but its water, its power, its sanitation, its transport systems - but that the first one was timed to fall and kill and blind at a time when all were out on the streets to enjoy the annual cherry blossom festival! Ane, the Scientists to whom the nation cheered and honoured under the impression that our bombs will only drop on "an enemy" and will not tough children? That it will only destroy military and government targets and not tough food supplies or playgrounds - or cherry blossom?

I would now like to turn to another aspect of these tests and bombs. Apparently it means nothing to those whom we elect to govern us that we have living with us as fellow citizens well over forty million families who are to all intents and purposes homeless! There are uncomfortable millions who don't get a really square meal every day. There are tens of thousands of villages with no proper permanent drinking water system, no sanitation, no power or electricity, almost no transportation. Does it mean nothing to those who allow thousands of crores to be spent on these `tests' that for two crores we could have built a thousand homes for our homeless ones - or we could have given 10,000 people - a square meal every day for a whole year and so on.

Finally I want to remind you of the Father of Nation - we seem to have forgotten him and his belief in non-violence - wish enabled us to get rid of a dominating foreign power. I fell we must ask ourselves a question - if we ever do have to use this bomb - will you be proud to have approved of killing thousands of simple, helpless, lovable children and their parents destroyed their homes?

The time to stop this wickedness, this nonsense, is now.


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[Pokhran is the test site for India's nuclear program. The Atomic Energy Commission of India detonated its first underground nuclear weapon there on May 18, 1974. The Indian government, however, declared that it was not going to make nuclear weapons even though it had acquired the capacity to do so. It claimed that the Pokhran explosion was an effort to harness atomic energy for peaceful purposes and to make India self-reliant in nuclear technology, but subsequently, India conducted five nuclear tests on May 11 and May 13, 1998. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pokhran]

Here is a Frontline magazine article (part of the same work):
http://www.hinduonnet.com/fline/fl2407/stories/20070420005013000.htm


Note: Beatriz C. Maturana and the Architects for Peace Team would like to thank and acknowledge Sundar Ramanathaiyer for this important contribution.