Les Mosquées de Djerba

du Professeur Stanley Ira Hallet

In 1989, architectural students from The Catholic University of America (CUA) and three students from l’Institut Technologique d’Art, d’Architecture et d’Urbanism de Tunis (ITAAUT) traveled to the Island of Djerba in Southern Tunisia with Professor Stanley Ira Hallet. With the assistance of Professor Ali Djerbi, they documented the extraordinary white mosques that dot the landscape of Djerba, thought to be the mysterious island of the lotus-eaters in the tales of the Odyssey.  While on the island, they selected five mosques to record. The resulting hand drawings document these complexes where the profane, poetic and sacred exist side by side.  These neighborhood mosques sit in the middle of carefully irrigated gardens with their minarets reaching up over the surrounding palm trees.  Constructed of humble materials, the monolithic forms melt to form a single undulating surface containing the traditional prayer spaces and raised platform that defines the outdoor sacred space. 

En 1989, les étudiants de  CUA et trois étudiants de ITAAUT firent un voyage dans l’île de Djerba sous la direction du professeur Stanley Ira Hallet, assisté du Professeur Ali Djerbi ; ils passèrent une semaine à rassembler des documents sur les admirables mosquées blanches qui ponctuent le paysage de Djerba,  île qui selon la légende serait l’île mystérieuse des Lotophages de l’Odyssée. Les étudiants choisirent  de faire les relevés de cinq mosquées. Les dessins réalisés rendent bien compte de la profonde complexité de cette architecture où cohabite harmonieusement le sacré et le profane. Les mosquées sont situées au beau milieu de jardins soigneusement irrigués. Leurs minarets dominent les palmeraies.  Des matériaux pauvres ayant servi à la construction, il résulte des formes monolithiques lesquelles combinées créent un espace abritant les traditionnels lieux de prière et la plateforme qui délimite  l’espace ouvert du lieu sacré.

Exhibits and Lectures at Club Taher Haddad 2014 supported by American Embassy Tunis, Tunisia, at Université Tunis Carthage, Tunis, Tunisia 2015 and at the Musée du Patrimone de Houmt Souk, Djerba, Tunisia April - May 2015

Architectura e film

Palazzo d’Aumale. Museo Regionale di Storia Naturale e Mostra Permanente del Carretto Sicilano Sicilia, Italia

Stanley Ira Hallet, Lavinia Pasquina and Giuseppi Da Nicola

In response to a request from the Piazza d’Aumale to prepare an exhibition exploring the relationships between Cinema and Architecture developed during discussions with Assistant Professor Lavinia Pasquina of the Catholic University of America and her friend and colleague Dirittore Valeria Patrizia Li Vigni of the Palazzo d'Aumale, Terrassini, Sicily, a special architectural studio was proposed originally based upon seminars given by Professor Stanley Ira Hallet. The resulting studio, entitled Architecture and the Moving Image, was a collaborative effort between Professor Pasquina and Professor Hallet.  Professor Pasquina provided both her expertise in architecture design as well as her passion for digital media, while Professor Hallet provided a long experience in architectural studio pedagogy as well as an equally passionate interest in architecture/film theory.

The studio was composed of nineteen students fulfilling their last or fourth year of undergraduate study.  From the start, the studio was considered an ambitious undertaking, given the students relatively short exposure to architectural theory as well as limited experience in digital media.

Architects and builders have historically framed dramatic views of external landscapes, as well as personal views of special places and private intimate spaces. Walls and openings, street edges and arcades continue the architectural act of framing at the urban scale. The Muslim architects of Alhambra, the Japanese designers of Katsura all knew the power of the architectural frame to focus ones’ attention.  In these explorations, the student found many of the same issues driving film.

Students compared film space and architectural space, film frame and architectural frame, the architecture of settings versus the architecture of the set, the movement of the frame and the architecture of the shot. They also studied the assemblage of frames, the architecture or choreography of the montage, especially when compared to understanding spatial sequence, movement, or narrative in architecture. Thus the very acts of framing, cutting and sequencing images join an exploration of film space, film scenography or set design and film memory as themes that can inform our own deliberations if not effect our architectural proposals.