Principal Investigator Azra Aksamija
Co-investigator Joel Lamere
Project Website http://architecture.mit.edu/art-culture-and-technology/project/unity-textile-mu…
Unity” is a textile structure based on Islamic “muqarnas” (stalactite-like decorative three-dimensional elements) designed by Azra Akšamija and Joel Lamere for the exhibition "Interior View SOUTHEAST: Investigations of Backyard Mosques" at the Architecture Forum Upper-Austria, Linz (AT) 30 June - 27 October 2012. The structure is hung from then Neo-Gothic archway of the exhibition's entrance. The traditional modular structure of the muqarnas has been sewn into a complex whole -- unity of forms -- signalizing the need for a new aesthetic of "Islam in the West" characterized by a mutual enrichment though cultural interactions.
The piece was produced with a group of MIT undergraduate and graduate students and alumni: Juanita Ballesteros, Angela Chu, Daniela Covarrubias, Tara Ebsworth, Emily Tow, and Jegan Vincent de Paul. Other collaborators in Austria included Indira Adilović, Azra, Munira und Ibrahim Akšamija, Ewald Elmecker, Katharina Anna Loidl. The project was produced with the generous support by the Council for the Arts at MIT.