LOWERING THE VEIL - 2003-11-01

The Aga Khan Award for Architecture plays a critical role in helping Muslim countries connect to the West. 'The Aga Khan Award often goes to spaces with humanitarian connotations,' says Diba, a member of the 2001 jury. 'These are spaces of freedom, dialogue, gathering. They are almost always antidogmatic, and very often antigovernment. In many ways Bagh-e Ferdowsi is like Tehran with its twelve million people: simply too big for the government to control.'