National Assembly for East Pakistan: Dhaka Art Summit 2016

A modern house with a lot of wood elements, from windows and doors, the decking beside a small pool to the right, to the paneling on the walls.

’Architecture in Bangladesh’, part of the second edition of the Dhaka Art Summit, looks at the legacy of modernist architects Muzharul Islam and Louis Kahn, alongside the role of architecture in building national identity. Pictured: SA Residence in Dhaka, 2010, designed by Shatotto.

(Image credit: Daniele Domenicani)

By Nick Compton

last updated 6 October 2022

In the wake of partition, the Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru enlisted Le Corbusier to build a new Punjab capital. The result, of course, was Chandigarh. A decade or so later, the Pakistani government invited their own super-star architect to built a new National Assembly for East Pakistan in Dhaka. Louis Kahn got the gig, though Le Corbusier and Alvar Aalto were apparently also considered.

Work started on Kahn’s complex in 1964 but it would take two decades to complete, by which time East Pakistan was Bangladesh and Kahn was eight-years dead. It is, though, his finest building; massive and seemingly out of the past and out of the future all at once.

From a western standpoint, it is easy to imagine that Kahn’s modernism was a complete novelty in the country. But 'Architecture in Bangladesh' – part of the third edition of the Dhaka Art Summit and curated by the Pompidou’s Aurélien Lemonier – makes clear that the country had already developed a domestic ‘humanist modernity’, particularly in the work of Muzharul Islam.

Islam had already designed a number of public buildings before the call went out to Khan. Indeed, it was Islam who had initially been tasked with the designing the National Assembly building and it was his idea to enlist Kahn, who had taught him at Yale (he would also bring Richard Neutra, Stanley Tigerman, Paul Rudolph, Robert Boughey and Constantinos Doxiadis to Bangladesh).

Lemonier’s exhibition looks at the legacy of Islam and Kahn, the role of architecture in building national identity and the later attempt to integrate culture, history and archeology to year-zero modernism. Crucially for Lemonier though, the exhibition is more than anything a showcase for a new generation of Bangladeshi architects whose concern is less the ‘horizontal axis of history’, as he puts it, than the ‘vertical axis of geography’. And Lemonier insists that architects in Europe and the US have a lot to learn from their response to the geography, in terms of sustainability, water management, and urban development.

A modern house with a large green pool, concrete walls, and terraces, and wood elements for decking and doors. — Completed in 2010, the SA Residence is a modernist private home.

National Assembly Building of Bangladesh. Tall and wide concrete building that has a yellow tint to it. There are openings in the building through which we see many windows to the rooms inside. Two openings are in a triangle shape and they're above two square openings. — The exhibition, which is curated by the Pompidou’s Aurélien Lemonie, also takes a closer look at Louis Kahn’s landmark National Assembly for East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) in Dhaka. Pictured: National Assembly Building of Bangladesh, 1961–1982, by Louis Kahn Architects

National Assembly Building of Bangladesh. A rectangle building with a facade of red bricks. There is a huge tree almost leaning on the building. — National Assembly Building of Bangladesh, 1961–1982, by Louis Kahn Architects

The photo to the left shows the interior of the Baitur Rauf Jame Mosque. It's built out of concrete rectangular blocks and bricks, the floors are covered in beige tiles. The facade of the exterior is in red brick. — Baitur Rauf Jame Mosque, completed 2010, by Marina Tabassum Architects

The facade of the Baitur Rauf Jame Mosque is built out of red brick. The Mosque is rectangle-shaped with multiple openings through which people are coming through. — Baitur Rauf Jame Mosque, completed 2010, by Marina Tabassum Architects

Interior of the Museum of Independence, Dhaka. The photo is black & white. The photo shows a man standing next to a column of water that's cascading from the ceiling. The room is circular. — Column of water, Museum of Independence, Dhaka, by URBANA (Kashef Chowdhury and Marina Tabassum).

The exterior of the Chittagong University. White facade, that's been weathered by natural elements. The lowest part of the building is the longest, while each floor above it is pulled in. — Chittagong University, 1968–1971, by Muzharul Islam

Red brick, square buildings have grass on top of their flat roofs. — Roofscape of the Friendship Centre, 2011, by Kashef Chowdhury.

The pavilions are made out of red brick, with a pool in between them. — Pavilions and pools within the Friendship Centre, 2011, by Kashef Chowdhury.

The interior of the Mosque within Chittagong University. We see the top of the Mosque, which has beams connected in an asymmetrical shape, through which the light comes in. — Mosque within Chittagong University, by URBANA

INFORMATION

For more information, visit the Dhaka Art Summit’s website

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