Ghanem Younes, Khalid Al-Tamimi and Mohammad Abu Alhuda, Award Winner 2016

Ghanem was born and raised in Kuwait before coming to the UAE to study architecture. He is interested in the intersection between art, architecture and technology as a means to communicate emotion and tackle architectural problems in a way to produce playful, meaningful and context driven ideas.

Born and raised in the UAE, and in his fifth year as an architecture student, Khalid is working towards a deeper understanding of the impact of the built environment and its phenomenological aspects on people.

Mohammad is interested in analyzing organic forms and recreating them in a contemporary style, emphasizing the superiority of the natural order over the human race and the essential return to it.

Artist’s Statement

The form of the artwork is derived from three different types of an essential element of Islamic architecture. Profiles that can be found in temples, mosques and houses throughout the region. These forms are common in three of the cities that linked the Silk Road. For centuries, the Silk Road journeys linked the Islamic culture to trade, prosperity, danger & safety. As a construct, these three profiles are placed in line with a one another and lofted with a unifying skin to create a “new” recognition of architectural shelter, one that is new to the eyes, yet born from ancient forms.

These shapes are the same ones that once welcomed traders home and allowed them shelter on the road. Inside, the form is lined with intricately printed fabric which acts as a translation to the core trade of textiles throughout the deserts and sand dunes of the Arabian Peninsula. The artwork acts as an homage to the architectural forms of Islam, a reminder to the fruits and perils that this region has faced, and the resultant beauty that helped define our culture, a constant timeline of “leaving” and “returning” home.