In the form of a lexicon, New York based artist Mariam Ghani ( 1978) describes, together with her father, Ashraf Ghani ( 1949) presidential candidate in Afghanistan in 2009 and regular participant in the rebuilding of the country the cycle of collapse and recovery that Afghanistan has undergone over the course of the twentieth century. The lexicon comprises seventy-one mostly illustrated terms that include central figures and places, words that carry a specific (political) meaning in the Afghan context, and entries on recurring events and defining themes. The notebook s point of departure is a detailed reflection on the reign of King Amanullah Khan (1919 - 29), whose successes and failures yielded a model for reformers who succeeded him. These thoughts are followed by a series of terms related to, among other things, the now-destroyed Dar ul-Aman Palace, which was part of Amanullah s design for a new city, and which characterized as a space of exception, a center of conflict, a prototype for future plans, and a symbol of past failures twentieth-century Afghan planning policy Skryť popis