Thursday, 16th October 2014 | 7:00 pm

Join us at T2F for an evening of storytelling featuring Belgian social worker Martin Van Camp.

Martin Van Camp is a Belgian-born social worker. He is currently the director of Time-out Brussels, an organization that works with dropout children, empowering them to tap in to innate talents and qualities and reintegrate them into schools.

Martin is on an endless journey and bounces between Europe and Asia, on a quest to balance Western modernity with his family’s roots and culture. He grew up seeing pictures of Duarte Villa, the family home in N.I. Lines, Saint Patrick’s Cathedral, and McLeod Road and listening to pre-partition stories. His family eventually moved to Belgium in 1962. For Martin, any mention of “Karachi” unlocked visions of a magical world, wonderful architecture and tempting, mysterious music.

Photo Credit: Nefer Sehgel/Express

In 1995, Martin came to Karachi for four months and immediately fell in love with the city. The Herald 1995 map “Karachi: City of Death” did not deter him and in fact, encouraged him to immerse himself in Karachi life. Martin is now returning to the city, not to revisit landmarks that his great grandparents left behind, but to connect two disparate worlds that are an integral part of his identity.

Date: Thursday, 16th October, 2014
Time: 7:00 pm
Suggested Donation: Anything you like. Please support our vision of intellectual poverty alleviation by donating generously.
Venue: PeaceNiche | T2F
Address | Map

Seats are limited and will be available on a ‘first come, first served’ basis. No reservations.

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Saturday, 11th October 2014 | 7:00 pm

Join us at T2F for a talk by Noha Sadek as she explores the role of women as creators and patrons of the arts in pre-modern Islamic societies.

In most cultures and political settings, women have been influential patrons of the arts, and recent studies have shown that Islamic societies are no exception. Islamic law’s provision for women’s ownership of personal resources was an important factor which allowed some of them freedom to dispose of their wealth as they deemed fit, a considerable part of which was used for the construction of pious foundations.

In this lecture, Noha Sadek will examine the role of women as patrons of the arts, as well as creators of art objects in pre-modern Islamic societies.

Outstanding examples from different parts of the Islamic world, such as Yemen, Syria, Central Asia and Ottoman Turkey, will be presented to show the nature of patronage which brought this architecture into existence. The rank and status of women patrons and the structural or ornamental peculiarities which characterized the architecture sponsored by women will also be discussed.

About the Speaker

A specialist in Yemeni art and architecture, Noha Sadek received her Ph.D. in Middle East and Islamic Studies from the University of Toronto in 1990. She has taught courses on Islamic art at the University of Saint-Joseph and the American University in Beirut, Lebanon, and has participated in exhibition projects at the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery in Washington DC, the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, the Institut du Monde Arabe in Paris, and the National Museum of Lebanon in Beirut. She was director of the American Institute for Yemeni Studies in Sanaa, Yemen from 1995–1997. She has published articles on the medieval architecture of Yemen, and served as editor of Studies on Medieval Yemen (2003) and Studies in the Archaeology of Yemen (2002), both in Arabic. Noha Sadek is currently writing a book entitled Rasulid Architecture in Yemen: Legitimacy and Power and is co-editing a book entitled Taizz Capital of Yemen (1229-1454).

Date: Saturday, 11th October, 2014
Time: 7:00 pm
Suggested Donation: Anything you like. Please support our vision of intellectual poverty alleviation by donating generously.
Venue: PeaceNiche | T2F
Address | Map

Seats are limited and will be available on a ‘first come, first served’ basis. No reservations.

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