About AKTC

Programmes
In addition to the Aga Khan Award for Architecture (AKAA), the Trust conducts other major programmes: the Aga Khan Historic Cities Programme (AKHCP), the Aga Khan Music Initiative (AKMI), the Aga Khan Museum (AKM) in Toronto, Canada and the on-line resource Archnet.org.  It also supports the Aga Khan Program for Islamic Architecture (AKPIA) at Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.  All programmes address the Trust's essential purpose but do so in ways that are distinct, have their own geographical coverages, and have different, though overlapping, target audiences.  All make use of workshops, seminars, publications, and the media to stimulate thinking and disseminate outcomes, although the form as well as the content varies according to the needs of each programme.

They are the Aga Khan Award for Architecture, established in 1977, the world's largest prize for architecture, and the Aga Khan Program for Islamic Architecture at Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a specialised programme of professional and graduate studies and research established in 1979 with the support of His Highness the Aga Khan. 

Their activities have generated knowledge about contemporary and historic buildings, professional education, the cultural and economic dimensions of built environments, and a network of architectural professionals, scholars, and administrators specialising in the Muslim world.  This wealth of information documents the pluralism and diversity of Muslim societies and of their current circumstances.  It also allows for the identification of critical challenges they share in the present period of rapid economic and cultural change.  Among the more prominent are the needs to:

• Meet fundamental aspirations for practical and meaningful architecture.  The quantity, distribution, and quality of the existing stock of buildings falls short of needs and desirable professional standards.  Historic buildings and public spaces of practical and cultural importance are especially vulnerable to destruction from pressures on urban areas;
• Increase local and national capacity to improve building conditions.  Training and institutional mechanisms for the effective use of manpower and materials at the community level need to be improved.  This is especially urgent in rural areas, where most people in developing countries still live, and in the core areas of historic cities, which are generally inhabited by poorer and less influential segments of societies;
• Promote the education, training and retraining of architects, planners, and conservators to support long-term maintenance of built environments.  Professional practices responsive to the economic, social, and cultural issues of Muslim communities are essential to the sustained vitality of built environments; and
• Engage the creative thought and practice of the world architectural community and of key opinion and decision makers.  This calls for concerted investigation, problem solving, dialogue, and the free and open exchange of ideas to understand and address the distinctive conditions, opportunities, and values in the diverse societies in the Muslim world more effectively.

AKHCP undertakes urban conservation and development projects which may include a cluster of buildings, public spaces between and around buildings, a district, or a complete plan for a historic town.  These efforts can move from study and planning through funding and implementation with the help of local institutions, governments, and other funding partners.  All such projects aim at restoring and maintaining the socio-economic and cultural fabric of a designated area. Undertaking selected conservation and re-use projects.  AKHCP periodically engages in restoring specific historic sites and buildings.  These may be elements of urban landscape or single structures, for which appropriate new functions are developed to meet the social and economic needs of the respective communities.  Cultural initiatives are planned in most sites to support the long-term viability of conservation projects through the re-animation of historic structures in a context of ongoing social and economic change, rather than as an isolated process.

All enabling development factors - community support, innovative institutional structures, and commercial potential - are harnessed, whenever possible, to make conservation sustainable.  To date, the Trust has undertaken restoration, urban conservation, and development projects in Granada, Baltit-Karimabad, Zanzibar, Cairo, and Samarkand.  Restoration of the Zafra House in Granada was completed in 1991.  In 1996, AKHCP completed the conservation of the Baltit Fort and the stabilisation of the historic core of the village of Karimabad in the Hunza Valley.  The restoration of the Old Dispensary in Zanzibar as the new Stone Town Cultural Centre was completed in early 1997.  Special documentation kits on these projects and a monograph on the planning and conservation of the Zanzibar Stone Town have been published.

Through its work, the Initiative strives to support exceptional artistic talent; promote the revival of historical connections among artists from Central Asia, South Asia, the Middle East and North Africa by organising creative collaborations among artistic communities from these regions; and disseminate results of this work through a global network of partnerships with educational institutions, arts presenters, and music distributors.  To this end, musicians in the Music Initiative’s artist roster participate in diverse kinds of performances that range from concerts of traditional repertory to contemporary expressions of tradition-based art to interregional collaborations that feature talented artists from different countries in the Music Initiative’s regions of activity.  Education is at the centre of the Music Initiative’s work.

The Initiative focusses on developing and testing newly created teaching and learning methodologies, setting up teacher-training mechanisms, operating talent-support centres, and presenting performance and artist-in-residence programmes that provide students an opportunity to experience the creative challenges of intercultural music-making.  Residencies and workshops featuring musicians from the Music Initiative’s artist roster have been presented at many academic and cultural institutions throughout North America and Europe.

The Music Initiative is a programme of the Aga Khan Trust for Culture.  The Trust, in turn, serves as the cultural development agency of the Aga Khan Development Network, one of the world’s largest private development networks, and the only one that prioritises cultural development on a par with economic and social development in all of its projects and commitments.  Through an integrated multi-sector approach to cultural development, the Music Initiative mobilises the resources of the AKDN to support vibrant interlinked artistic communities devoted to creating new music rooted in but not constrained by tradition while also building audiences for such music through arts education on a mass scale.  Like other programmes of the Trust for Culture, the Music Initiative plays an active operational role in all the projects and activities into which it invests, and does not administer a grants programme for either individuals or institutions.

Education Programme
The Aga Khan Museum’s educational programme provides visitors with an understanding of the artistic, intellectual, scientific and religious heritage of communities, both Muslim and non- Muslim, which pervaded the lands of Islam.  The Museum, through its permanent and temporary exhibitions, education programmes and cultural activities, offers insights and new perspectives into Islamic civilisations, with the aim of fostering knowledge and understanding both within Muslim societies and between these societies and other cultures.  Although Muslim societies comprise a quarter of the world’s population, people in the West have a limited knowledge of the Muslim world and its faith.  This lack of understanding spans many aspects of the peoples of Islam: their pluralism, the diversity of their interpretations of the Qur’anic faith, the chronological and geographical extent of their history and culture and their ethnic, linguistic and social diversity.

Exhibitions and Cultural Programmes
Major temporary exhibitions concerning the Islamic world are presented in historic, geographic or thematic terms.  These exhibitions draw upon private collections and institutional holdings from all parts of the world.  Smaller exhibitions on specific artists and topics are also hosted in the temporary exhibition space.  A state-of-the-art auditorium (350 seats) hosts music performances and theatre productions, book launches and readings, films and conferences.  In addition to providing a platform for the Aga Khan Music Initiative, the auditorium hosts conferences with sister institutions such as the Aga Khan Program for Islamic Architecture, the Aga Khan University, and the University of Central Asia, as well as seminars and symposia in collaboration with museums and cultural institutions from within and outside Canada.  These events offer the public a varied and exciting cultural programme throughout the year.  Materials from the education programme in MadridEducation is an important part of the museum programming, as it has been during the exhibition of the collection in Europe over the last two years.  A reference library and multimedia centre, as well as classrooms and workshops for educational activities, are aimed at a broad public and all age groups.  Through these programmes, the Museum provides visitors with an understanding of the art, ideas, literature and cultures of Muslim civilisations that have had a profound impact on humanity.

Architecture
The abstract notion of light and the light of human creativity and openness were sources of inspiration for the design of the Aga Khan Museum by the renowned Japanese architect Fumihiko Maki.  Recent work by Fumihiko Maki includes the Shimane Museum of Ancient Izumo (Izumo City, Shimane, completed in 2006) and the World Trade Center Tower 4 (New York), a 72-storey skyscraper completed in 2012.  Maki’s design for the Aga Khan Museum is contained in a 10,000m² building within a simple rectilinear footprint 81 metres long by 54 metres wide.  The four primary functions (exhibition spaces, an auditorium, classrooms and workshops, and library and media-centre) revolve around a central courtyard, which act as the heart of the building and integrate the different functions into a cohesive whole while allowing each space to maintain its independence, privacy and character.  The Museum shares the site with the Ismaili Centre, designed by Charles Correa, and is surrounded by a ten-hectare landscaped park, designed by Vladimir Djurovic.  Together they constitute important landmarks and green space for the city of Toronto.

• Issues confronting the education of architectural professionals in the Muslim world;
• Broadening the understanding of the richness and pluralism of cultures in Islamic societies; and
• The examination of neglected or insufficiently studied architectural problems of particular importance in the Muslim world.