To the Palace Until Victory is a research project investigating the relevance of Khartoum's Old Republican Palace in Sudanese Afro-Arab and colonial history and identity. Through forensic tools, Omer Mohamed Gorashi examines the palace's role as both a victim of colonialism and a perpetrator of post-colonial dominance.
VALERIO FRANZONE / KOOZCan you explain the title of your work, To the Palace Until Victory, and the urgency behind your research?
OMER MOHAMED GORASHI The title To the Palace Until Victory draws inspiration from Sudan's October 1964 Revolution — a pivotal moment when citizens marched to the Old Republican Palace, demanding the end of President Ibrahim Abboud's regime. The October Revolution emerged from widespread frustrations over worsening living conditions, political repression and a failing economy, with protests in Khartoum broadly driven by urban discontent rather than by larger regional concerns for the country's marginalised periphery. Although the revolution temporarily shifted dynamics, it eventually led to another power vacuum and a military coup.
History seems to echo itself; only recently did Sudan — through civilian-led activism — oust the 30-year authoritarian military junta, working under the guise of religion led by Omar Al-Bashir, once again centred around the palace. Yet, that 2019 revolution could not quite rid the country of Al Bashir’s regime: military leaders quickly formed a ‘transitional’ council that gradually yet aggressively decayed into another power vacuum, over which these same “ghosts of the old guard” have been battling for the past year and a half. The slogan "ila al-qasr hatta al-nasr"1 symbolises a deeper, ongoing struggle for liberation, not just from one dictator but from recurring cycles of power and oppression that have haunted Sudan before even colonial times. The palace itself, originally built during Ottoman-Egyptian rule and transformed under British colonisation, stands as both a seat and a political battleground for power, many times conflated for Sudanese ‘sovereignty’.
It is frustrating watching the West gaze turning only when architectural and cultural heritage is at stake — especially when it comes to the artefacts that they have somehow deemed as Sudan’s past, the Palace in particular.
My research examines the Old Republican Palace as a quiet witness to these cycles of resistance and repression. Today, the urgency is magnified by ongoing conflict leading to a humanitarian crisis of unprecedented scale — famine, displacement, and violence affecting millions. The recent burning of the palace in May and the looting of the Sudan National Museum only underscores what our (as Sudanese or human) collective memory has been trained to focus on. It is frustrating watching the West gaze turning only when architectural and cultural heritage is at stake — especially when it comes to the artefacts that they have somehow deemed as Sudan’s past, the Palace in particular.
This project aims to retrace the history of Sudan's national formation by archiving representations of the Old Republican Palace across different political eras. Serving various roles — as an administrative building, residence for rulers and their guests, museum, and stage for urban demonstration movements — the palace is central to understanding Sudan's political evolution. The output includes a reimagined photogrammetric artefact and a series of multi-exposed photomontages that collapse different historical moments. These visual tools allow us to witness how the palace's evolving representation shapes the collective memory of the Sudanese people. The recurring nature of these power struggles suggests that Sudan's liberation remains incomplete, hindered not only by external forces like colonialism and imperialism but also by internal issues we must confront. My work seeks to radically interrogate not just the overt signs of oppression but the subtle underpinnings — those locked away in archives, hidden behind cameras, or never documented at all.
While Sudan's struggles extend beyond Khartoum, affecting states like Darfur and Gezira with even greater urgency, the Old Republican Palace's central role in the nation’s political trajectory offers a lens to question not only our memory of the palace, but also the larger story of Sudanese history. To move forward, we must retrace our steps and understand how we arrived at this moment, both politically and architecturally.
To move forward, we must retrace our steps and understand how we arrived at this moment, both politically and architecturally.
KOOZWhat is the relevance of Sudan’s Republican Palace to the country’s cultural, political, and colonial history? Can you explain its specific role in Khartoum’s Sudanese — Afro-Arab and colonial — urban and social identity?
OMG The Old Republican Palace is a focal point in Sudan's cultural, political, and colonial memory. Built initially in 1825 during the Ottoman-Egyptian period, it marked the occupation of Sudan — shifting the Funj Sultanate’s capital in Wad Madani to Khartoum, the confluence of the three Niles — for better access to Egypt as well as the rest of the region. Originally known as the Hakimdariya or Governor's Palace, it became the administrative and political heart under various regimes, witnessing key historical events.
One significant historical moment was the Mahdist Revolution in 1885, when Sufi theocrat Muhammad Ahmad al-Mahdi led the Siege of Khartoum, resulting in the palace's destruction and the killing of British Governor-General Charles Gordon. For the Mahdists,2 this was a moment of triumph and self-determination, even acknowledged by British Prime Minister William Gladstone. However, it left a deep scar on British pride, fueling a second wave of imperialism. The myth of ‘Gordon's Last Stand’ became imperial propaganda, while the palace in ruins was depicted as a symbol of British martyrdom — thus legitimising further colonial ambitions. When the British reconquered Sudan in 1898, they rebuilt the palace, adding a third story and grand staircases, almost as a shrine to the Gordon myth. This reconstruction marked the beginning of Khartoum's colonial identity, with the city planned radially for pragmatic imperial control — permanently inscribing the Union Jack, as mythicised by early colonial administrators,3 onto its urban fabric, with the palace at the heart. Other remnants of Gordon's legacy, like the Gordon Memorial College and streets named after him, further entrenched colonial influence.
The palace can be considered a starting point of modern architecture in Sudan. While intended to impress and assert colonial supremacy, it also became a stage where local political and religious leaders were received, embedding it into the socio-political consciousness. Khartoum's urban planning centred around the palace, anchoring the city's identity as the colonial capital. Architecturally, the palace embodies the intersection of Afro-Islamic4 and colonial influences. Despite its foreign origins and design that disregarded local craft, it has been absorbed into Sudanese identity through constant reconstruction and memorialisation. Described as "a wedding-cake of a building in a pastiche Venetian style, no more familiar on the banks of the Blue Nile than St. Mark’s would have been."5 in Images of Empire (Daly & Hogan, Leiden: Brill, 2005), its repeated physical transformation mirrors the nation's political upheavals, making it a powerful register of Sudan's oscillation between subjugation and self-determination.
Despite its colonial roots, the palace has been the goal-post of revolutionary efforts throughout Sudan's history — from Sudan's Independence in 1956, to the 1964 and 1985 Revolutions, later the 2019 mass sit-ins and demonstrations that led to al-Bashir's ousting.
Despite its colonial roots, the palace has been the goal-post of revolutionary efforts throughout Sudan's history — from Sudan's Independence in 1956, to the 1964 and 1985 Revolutions, later the 2019 mass sit-ins and demonstrations that led to al-Bashir's ousting. These uprisings, often centred around the palace, reflect its enduring significance as a symbol of both oppression and the relentless struggle for autonomy. Today, the palace still embodies the unresolved tension in the ongoing parallelism between Sudan's colonial legacy and national identity. However, in 2015 Al-Bashir’s regime moved into a new Presidential Palace, constructed by the Chinese government — arguably a neo-colonial influence. Its significance lies not only in its historical and architectural presence but also in its role as a living testament to the nation's complex journey.
KOOZ Your research took shape within the course Reparation Architecture, led by Paulo Tavares at Columbia GSAPP. What is the aim of your work, and to what extent does it sit within a framework of reparations?
OMG My research examines reparation architecture — not as an immediate response, but as a long-term strategy, grounded in deep historical engagement. Focusing on Sudan’s Old Republican Palace, I approach the building as both a victim of colonial harm and a perpetrator of post-colonial domination. This aligns with Michael Rothberg’s concept of the “implicated subject”, which refers to those who indirectly benefit from systems of oppression without being direct perpetrators.6 The palace exemplifies this condition, as a symbol of Sudanese independence that continues to carry the legacies of colonialism, with all of its privileges — access to education, military rank, proximity to power — subsequently passed down to the post-independence leaders and Khartoum-elite, who maintained colonial structures.
Collecting the palace's memory through grassroots networks and interpersonal narratives is in itself an act of reparation, subverting institutional archives that try to regulate, restrict, and manipulate collective memory and knowledge.
In personifying the Old Republican Palace as an implicated subject, the project moves beyond simply identifying the physical reconstructions to the building works between different rulers. It also interrogates how the palace has been complicit in perpetuating post-colonial power imbalances, military violence — let alone the policies enacted under its very roof. This duality reflects Sudan’s unresolved liberation. At the same time, my research aligns with Sudanese social movements that have historically fought for justice, situating the work within a larger framework of reparations. Sudan has a rich history of grassroots movements transcending class, tribe, religion, and gender — acts of reparation in themselves, gradually yet unwaveringly dismantling the structures that the palace once represented. By juxtaposing the palace's colonial function with its role in revolutionary movements, the project highlights ongoing challenges to entrenched power systems.
Layering these histories into the palace’s narrative exposes a long-standing resistance to oppression. Collecting the palace's memory through grassroots networks and interpersonal narratives is in itself an act of reparation, subverting institutional archives that try to regulate, restrict, and manipulate collective memory and knowledge. This critical act of gathering stories from the community not only challenges dominant narratives but actively resists the erasure of marginalised voices, aligning the project with a political gesture of restoration rather than a physically constructed return to the palace’s idealised past.
KOOZ Sudan has witnessed years of civil war, which is ongoing in major cities like Khartoum, thus making any field work extremely difficult, if not impossible. How did you adapt your investigative methods and tools to this condition?
OMG The ongoing armed conflict and exodus in Sudan has made fieldwork in places like Khartoum nearly impossible. The destruction extends beyond the physical to include the loss of archives and historical memory. Investigating the Old Republican Palace under these circumstances required adapting to the impossibility of accessing key documents, hindered by both war and bureaucratic barriers. Attempts to obtain construction drawings were blocked by ‘national security’ restrictions.
Much of the palace's colonial-era documentation is held in British institutions like the Imperial Archive in London, the Sudan Archive at Durham University, and the Royal Collection, where financial and institutional gatekeeping restricts access — a phenomenon Ariella Azoulay describes as the ‘archival shutter,’ in which crimes of imperialism are locked away to be forgotten.7 Due to scarce early photographs, I extracted every possible detail from each image — who took it, where, when, and their relationship to the palace. Tracing how these images ended up in various collections helped construct a fuller picture of the palace's evolution. With official archives limited in access, I relied on alternative sources — particularly grassroots communities and social media. Facebook groups became vital for finding images and personal stories about the palace, offering photographs and narratives that institutional archives lacked. For instance, an Eastern European ‘Warriors and Military Equipment’ fandom wiki8 led me to an actual architectural model of the Ottoman version of the Palace. This community-based approach added depth, filling gaps with lived experiences missing from formal documentation.
By overlaying images from different periods, I was able to reveal how, despite regime changes, the palace's role as a symbol of power persisted. These palimpsests challenge the ‘archival shutter,’ resisting memorial erasure and reclaiming Sudan's past.
Organising this archive wasn't just about cataloguing images but reframing Sudanese history through the palace's multiple functions—administrative, ceremonial, political, and domestic. Understanding how different spaces within the palace were used helped map its political and symbolic significance across eras. Creating curatorial palimpsests organised thematically around how the palace was photographed and the roles it served allowed me to highlight parallels between colonial administration and post-independence governance. By overlaying images from different periods, I was able to reveal how, despite regime changes, the palace's role as a symbol of power persisted. These palimpsests challenge the ‘archival shutter,’ resisting memorial erasure and reclaiming Sudan's past.
To overcome the inaccessibility of the physical site, I also employed advanced technology. Using ZoeDepth — a deep learning model9 — I generated metric depth estimations from individual photographs to create a digital landscape of ‘photogrammetric ruins’. This method allowed me to reconstruct the palace's structural changes over time, juxtaposing images from different eras in three-dimensional space. The result was a layered visual representation capturing the palace's transformations across history. Ironically, while the palace was disassembled following the Mahdist Revolution in 1885 to build the bordering city of Omdurman, it was later rebuilt and revered post-independence. Songs like the Epic of October10 capture this contradiction, celebrating the palace while predicting its downfall as a site of oppression. The recent partial destruction of the palace fulfils this bittersweet prophecy, exemplifying the cycles of resistance and reconstruction defining Sudan's history.
KOOZ What is the role of representation within an architectural and forensic investigation like this one?
OMG In architectural and forensic investigations, representation is a vital tool for constructing narratives, uncovering truths, and offering new perspectives. The Old Republican Palace, deeply entwined in Sudan's colonial and national history, requires a layered approach to representation that extends beyond conventional architectural methods. In this research, representation serves not only to document the palace but to reconstruct its role as a symbol of power over time. The palace was a deliberate statement of imperial power, carefully placed along the Nile at Khartoum's centre. Rebuilt on its original foundations after the Mahdist Revolution, it became an ongoing symbol of control. Its placement and grandeur were intended to impress and assert colonial supremacy but also became a stage where local leaders were received, embedding it into the social consciousness. Photographic representation also plays a crucial role in revealing the palace's domestic and political functions during pivotal moments. For example, during the 1971 failed coup attempt, President Jaafar Nimeiry, another self-appointed despot from the military, was placed under house arrest in the palace, leading to a brutal crackdown on socialist movements. The Palace was named the ‘Guest Palace’ or al-qasr al-diyafah, alluding to the Guest House of the Kober Square prison where conspirators and allies were massacred. A decade later, Paris Match photographer Patrick Jarnoux11 attempts to humanise Nimeiry by taking quotidian yet intimate images of him within the palace, complicating the narrative of power and highlighting the palace's symbolic duality.
By layering fragments of history — photographs, drawings, newspaper clippings — I aim to challenge the official narrative and offer a more nuanced understanding of the palace's role in Sudanese history.
With scarce official documents and drawings, I moved beyond traditional forms of architectural representation. I turned to photographs, newspaper articles, memoirs, and even stamps — each becoming a form of representation providing fragmented yet powerful glimpses into the palace's historical significance. These unconventional sources reveal how deeply embedded the palace is in Sudanese memory and its geopolitical role. Forced to rely on partial records, I used digital reconstructions and thematic collages to imagine what could not be seen or retrieved. By layering fragments of history — photographs, drawings, newspaper clippings — I aim to challenge the official narrative and offer a more nuanced understanding of the palace's role in Sudanese history. Representation becomes an act of reclaiming a narrative, shifting power from institutions that guard these stories to those who have lived them.
KOOZ What are the conclusions of your project, and where might your findings lead in the future?
OMG The conclusions of my project emphasise the Old Republican Palace as a contested space where colonial domination, national resistance, and the ongoing struggle for liberation in Sudan intersect. The palace is more than just a building — it stands as both a testament to Sudanese resilience and an obstacle to fully overcoming colonial legacies. As the palace faces destruction in the current conflict, preserving its memory becomes essential, serving as a way to ensure we do not repeat past mistakes.
My research highlights the importance of architectural heritage sites like the Old Republican Palace, not just for what they symbolise but for what they have witnessed. The palace has been central to Sudan's modern history, making its preservation urgent amidst war and cultural erasure. However, traditional institutions like libraries and archives often fail to capture these histories fully. Therefore, I would advocate for a more pluralistic approach that incorporates counter-archives and community-driven narratives, prioritising local, lived experiences over official records.
The future of this work lies in exploring the paradox of the palace's dual role: both as a symbol of power and as a site that can be subverted to re-engage with traditional architectural practices that more directly reflect Sudanese culture and craft. To bring this vision to life, I envision an installation inspired by Lina Bo Bardi’s curatorial design at São Paulo’s Museum of Art (MASP), combining digital collages, 3D models, and photographic archives to showcase the layers of history embedded in the palace. Using technologies like LiDAR, AR/VR, and interactive projection, the installation would allow viewers to engage with the palace’s evolving narrative.
Ultimately, my project aims to contribute to a broader understanding of Sudan’s architectural heritage within the context of its ongoing liberation struggle. This work will serve as a foundation for future collaborations focused on preserving Sudan’s cultural memory, using new technologies and alternative archives to ensure these stories are not lost.
The palace is more than just a building — it stands as both a testament to Sudanese resilience and an obstacle to fully overcoming colonial legacies. As the palace faces destruction in the current conflict, preserving its memory becomes essential, serving as a way to ensure we do not repeat past mistakes.
KOOZ Knowing architecture is always profoundly political, how do you consider activism within pedagogy, research, and profession? Can activism be a tool to develop more responsible and just architectural practices?
OMGThe intersection of activism and architecture, whether through practice, pedagogy, or professional engagement, is challenging to navigate due to the constraints of institutional frameworks designed to reinforce existing power structures. As the late Jonathan Hill highlights in The Illegal Architect, “The contemporary manifestation of the relationship between the architect and the state is the profession.”12 Sudan’s architectural history offers a stark example: Herbert Kitchener,13 trained by the Corps of Royal Engineers, not only led the Anglo-Egyptian reconquest of Sudan (1896-1899) but also oversaw the replanning of Khartoum and the design of many colonial-era buildings still in use today. In this context, architecture becomes a tool of the state, raising the critical question: Can architecture truly be a vehicle for activism, or is it always complicit in systems of power?
Hill’s concept of the illegal architect provides a framework for architects to engage socially and elusively, operating at the level of institutional power structures to address issues of inequality, marginalisation, and justice. However, we may require more than reforming or making fugitive manoeuvres from within existing systems. Indeed, it may necessitate the creation of entirely new ones. Sandi Hilal’s response to a friend’s question at a lecture last December still drums in my mind, almost like a mantra.
“Inclusion, because including you means that you are giving (legitimacy), you are legitimising that one frame(work)...each one of us has to refuse what they understand in order to build something else… Western institutions always want to host us and I have no problem with being hosted but hosting means maintaining control…to be a guest means that you have to trust how they seat you, what they feed you and for a while, you lose control… I think for me one way that I liberated myself at least within the spaces where I began to live in Europe is to demand what I call my right to be a host right and to reject and refuse to be included”14
Moreover, activism in architecture thrives on long-term, community-centred partnerships, as opposed to top-down approaches that can easily fall into saviorist tropes of ‘improvement.’15 Elgin Cleckley’s _mpathic design praxis has been immeasurably influential for me. His work emphasises the importance of empathy in design — listening deeply to communities and responding to their lived experiences.16 Cleckley’s recent book offers ten case studies that show how empathy, rather than activism alone, can elevate both the aesthetic and ethical dimensions of architectural practice, making it more socially responsible and just.
"To the Palace Until Victory" was developed within the Architecture Studio VI: Reparation Architecture taught by Paulo Tavares and Max Goldner at the Master of Architecture at Columbia University - Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation in New York.
Bio
Omer Mohamed Gorashi is a Sudanese American designer and photographer with a Master of Architecture from Columbia University GSAPP and a pre-professional degree from the University of Virginia. Gorashi’s work has been featured in The National, Architects Newspaper, e-flux, and the Smithsonian Institution. He has held academic appointments at both alma maters in teaching and research, collaborating on various exhibitions, publications, workshops, studios, and seminar courses. While the palimpsestic nature of interests knows no specificity, his work interrogates contested landscapes, uncovering marginalized histories while addressing themes of power, memory, and disparity. Having contributed to diverse civic, residential, and educational projects with internationally acclaimed practitioners, Omer currently collaborates at Think Wilder Architecture, where the human condition is celebrated and enriched through the built environment, leveraging architecture as a tool for social and environmental justice alongside local communities and stakeholders. He is also a member of the Modern Sudan Collective/DoCoMoMo Sudan
Valerio Franzone is Managing Editor at KoozArch. He is a Ph.D. architect (IUAV Venezia) and the director of the architectural design and research studio OCHAP | Office for Cohabitation Processes. OCHAP focuses on the built environment and the relationships between natural and artificial systems, investigating architecture’s role, limits, and potential to explore possible cohabitation typologies and strategies at multiple scales. He has been a founding partner of 2A+P and 2A+P Architettura. His projects have been awarded in international competitions and shown in several exhibitions, such as the International Architecture Exhibition - La Biennale di Venezia. His projects and texts appear in magazines like Domus, Abitare, Volume, and AD Architectural Design.
Notes
1 Transliteration of the original arabic slogan, “إلى القصر حتى النصر”
2 The Mahdist Revolution, while pivotal in resisting foreign rule, also entrenched Arabisation and Islamicisation in Sudan, marginalising non-Arab, non-Muslim groups — a legacy continued by the Mahdi’s successors.
3 Marina D’Errico, The Tropical Utopia Khartoum. British Colony 1898–1910 (Terra Ferma Edizioni, 2015).
4 Suha Hasan, “The Imagination of an Aesthetic Regime in the Modern Arab City: Dissent, Redistribution of the Sensible, Poetics”, in Architectural Dissonances, ed. Corina Oprea, Alessandro Petti, Marie-Louise Richards, Tatiana Pinto, and Robert Burchardt (L’Internationale Online, 2021), 91, (online).
5 M. W. Daly and Jane R. Hogan. Images of Empire: Photographic Sources for the British in the Sudan, African Sources for African History (Leiden: Brill, 2005).
6 Michael Rothberg, The Implicated Subject (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2020).
7 Ariella Aïsha Azoulay, Potential History : Unlearning Imperialism (London: Verso, 2019).
8 Махдисты (Mahdists) | Воины и военная техника вики | Fandom (online).
9 Bhat, S., Reiner Birkl, Diana Wofk, Peter Wonka and Matthias Muller. “ZoeDepth: Zero-shot Transfer by Combining Relative and Metric Depth.” ArXiv abs/2302.12288 (2023).
10 Although frequently credited to renowned musician and composer Muhammad Al-Amin, the original poem had been written by Hashim Siddig in 1968. In the poem, Siddig states “We think of repeating the first past, the past of our grandfathers who defeated oppressors, and and demolished the castles of oppression” (online).
11 Jarnoux, Patrick. 1981. “Rendezvous With Sudanese President Gaafar El Nimeiri”. Press release. Paris Match via Getty Images. October 30, 1981. Initially discovered on Facebook (online).
12 Jonathan Hill, The Illegal Architect (London: Black Dog Publishing, 1998), 8.
13 British Field Marshal “Horatio” Herbert Kitchener had a global impact through his military campaigns in Africa, the Second Boer War, and World War I, becoming a symbol of British imperial power. His early cartographic work on the Survey of Western Palestine (1874-1874) also shaped the borders of the Levant, influencing the region's geopolitical dynamics.
14 Sandi Hilal, “AFFIRMATION 5: Decolonizations”. Zoom Presentation, Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture Planning and Preservation, November 20th, 2023. (online)
15 Paul Warde, “The Idea of Improvement, c.1520-1700”, in Custom, Improvement and the Landscape in Early Modern Britain, ed. Richard W. Hoyle (London: Routledge, 2011).
16 Elgin Cleckley, ed., Empathic Design: Perspectives on Creating Inclusive Spaces (Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 2024).
