Faces

After Disallowed Lists:
All of them were really tensed and busy today.
Here is what their faces said:

Thesis Tidbits

Process / Cinema for the Blind:

These are some discussions that I had with all my faculty during my thesis. I realized that I hardly have ANY process drawings for my thesis. While I looked into my older files lying in my cupboard today, I found this file where I had preserved neatly all the papers that I scribbled on for 2 years.

That is a lot of writing - most of which seems absolute useless. However, what I do realize is that I wrote - whether it mattered or not - i kept clarifying myself and wrote. Lot more things. But here I put mind maps with:

1. Padma Desai

2. Prasad Shetty:

3. Madhumita Nandi:

4. Myself.

Sunday Times

Sundays are best time to reflect on the self and outside oneself. I am with the newspapers at length over the morning and in my mind I keep reflecting over every piece of news that I read - subject wise, content wise, language wise and from my own position. Then carefully pondering over all of it, I channel the entire information in the way it shall make sense to me or be relevant to my interests. So there is a kind of reshuffle in the brain and restructuring of the entire news that I read. The mind becomes like a hard disk with sectors of information. Images, text, events - all are chaffed out. 


Often I make imaginary discussions in my head or smaller lectures which I could discuss with students. These are always lost. The funny part with news is that it is so generic that it always allows you to form an opinion - agree or disagree. I love rationalizing my formed opinion , because it gives me a chance to engage with my own history and reconsider my own biases. I keep refining my biases and recording them so that my opinions are consistent. I wonder how successful i have been with being consistent. 


For example, I was wondering about how interesting it is for a newspaper like Times of India to bring out a supplement on spirituality in times when our actions are heavily driven by commercialization and unrationalized aspiration. For India, spiritualism has still not assumed a relegated position in life, given people's priorities of money, material and possession. Spiritualism or spiritual thought still remains the essential component that validates their action. On one hand, such a supplement tries to infuse some amount of idealism within the masses. On the other hand it makes people evaluate their actions by laying out moral standards. But at the same time, it also reinforces the ideas spiritual living as against the rational way of living.


A supplement like Times Life reflects on the issues of social behaviour of the elite. They mostly talk of a refined class, critically bringing their actions into contrasting perspectives. It is interesting for a bourgeois society like ours to read such reflections. 


I personally like reading the technology section where the news paper discusses how to choose between technology and how best one can exploit their gadgets. They also tell you softwares and tricks which simply ease your life. But there are so many interesting things going on. One can not possibly engage with all of it! sigh! However, they exist and we must acknowledge them... and be aware to be able to pull out of our archives at the right time in the right place!

Spatial Chaos in Personal spaces

We do not know how to move in our own houses when a lot of people gather in our space. We create awkward pockets- completely displacing and misplacing objects and people when population of both increases. This is what produces chaos. Some people celebrate this chaos and describe it as the character of our society. I am not a fond proponent of this theory.

The contradiction is that although there may have been arguments that our society has been excellent in space management, I wonder if we need to invent a new term to address a chaos like such. What is this shortcoming to handle more people to be called? This cumulative change in our living conditions have always been beyond our comprehension. Many amongst us like to romanticize about such condition of chaos. This chaos is physical because of the indecisiveness of a lot of individuals. It is mental unclarity that manifests physically.

Architects therefore have a definite role to play here. The essential job of the architect is to plan spaces for people in such a way that this mental chaos can be abated. In some ways, it is mismanagement or lack of planning that should be attributed to people of here. But long old arguments have always maintained that Indian ways of planning and management have been meticulous. But I wonder how to place my argument amidst this metanarrative...? Is the context I am talking about specific to a specific time in history? It is of global historical space of now? I shall have to investigate into historical records and ascertain my argument....

(investigation under construction)

Of Financial Institutions & Social codes

Financial institutions (banks, investment companies, stock markets, etc.) have flattened peoples lives by sucking in all their money at their nascent ages making them think of their lives 20 years later. What financial institutions do is that they create within people's minds fear of the future. They always project people's futures as negative - completely blanketed with health problems, social problems and emphasizing the negative projections of today's world. Through this they are able to construct a story where life seems unmanageable at the beginning, which when mediated by these institutions assumes a positive end. Financial institutions do not allow you to take any risks. They flatten your life. Your life is made uni-dimensional. One track - where you are projected to be in a bad state and vulnerable to all possible harsh effects of life. So we never live the present but think of 20 years hence. This is not to say that we must not anticipate our futures. But the proportion of our resources that we allocate for 20 years hence may seem questionable.

In this process, it is only the financial institutions that reap the benefit of our money, giving us a paltry sum out of their profit. Are we such timid people who donot have ideas to do more creative things with our money? These financial institutions have created a hegemonic (subconsciously dominating) condition where their web of difficult descriptions of life do not allow us to be or think creatively. We get caught in our 'constructed'/'projected' difficulties even if our life may be much better. They stunt our creative growth as creative individuals. They suppress our enthusiasm. They restrict our dreams. On of the biggest problems of our society is that we do not appreciate dreamers - or people who have the capacity to dream.

Measured risks form an essential part of our life. Financial institutions create within us fears of failure. They choose moral ethical and social tactics to target their audience. They would talk of family values and the assumed responsibility of a son/daughter towards his/her family and make them conscious of their roles. One doesnot need to be burdened by such roles but take it up willingly, naturally. Financial institutions force it upon us and make our family relationships formal. Money becomes, quite absurdly, the medium that ties us to our family members more than relationships...these misplaced notions have to be critically considered. They create frictions and unnecessary tensions that donot need to exist within a familial setup.

And what can financial institutions do for a person losing ones life any way? In the middle class, how many people really lose lives because of lack of money? I guess middle class people do have strong networks to sustain themselves of such eventualities. Here too, the financial institutions create an image of 'awkwardness' that one 'should' feel while borrowing money from their own friends and relatives. Every person in a middle class setup understands each others' needs and the financial institutions almost project it as profane. In  other words, money and its virtual lack (as created by such methods) creates a completely new social and moral code of behaviour. It is internalized and you are forced to follow it - that is hegemony. I wonder if one person shall be ever able to challenge it.

But essentially, one needs to keep a check of inflation - thats the reason one must make a basic investment. Other than that, it's paying someone else to fiddle with your money. And on top of that, we get into countless amount of paper work and maintaining documents. There may be exceptional stories, no questions regarding that. There may be cases where such systems help. But I strongly feel it's over emphasized and becomes deterrant - because it is almost like a fever that grows on to you...

Oxygen Machine

Lungs of the Building

Detail: Outside & Inside 

Opposite to Academy of Architecture, I saw something that I found really fascinating.

I related it back to the Oxygen Machine that our students had proposed during the Orientation workshop 2010-11. 

"One of the direct consequences of a grave traffic jam would be increase in the amount of pollution. Students overtly pointed out that there would be need of more fresh air and hence the idea of Oxygen Supplying Machines, which would provide fresh air to the much needed spaces in this situation. The group chose an external facade of the college to suck in fresh air and prepared a large blowing assembly - a contraption which throbbed through specially designed bamboo hinges and covered by a cloth which would blow in fresh air. The Oxygen Machine magnified the experience of breathing in the city."

excerpt from "Orientation Workshop Summary 2010-11"

More ideas. To be elaborated later.

Quotations

Persons can be hypocrites. Can cultures also be so? Does the hypocrisy of cultures on closer scrutiny turn out to be a contradiction in the human condition itself? For that matter, is a hypocrite only a casual cheat? Or is he someone who reaffirms the basic human values in a word hostile to such values, while himself succumbing to worldly temptations? Is a hypocrite an unwilling critic of everyday life whose personal failure signals a larger cultural crisis?
-Ashis Nandy, the Uncolonised mind: A post colonial view of India and the west, pg 83-84

“Two clichés make us laugh but a hundred clichés move us because we sense dimly the clichés are talking among themselves, celebrating a reunion. Just as the extreme of pain meets sensual pleasure, and the extreme of perversion orders on mystical energy, so too the extreme of banality allows us to catch a glimpse of the sublime.”
-Umberto Eco

We all have our secret chart to tastes, distastes, indifferences, don’t we?
-Roland Barthes, Camera Lucida, p. 18

Lapod Diary: Part 2

The Built Environment

Architecture:


It is refreshing to see the modernity has yet not adulterated the village to a large extent. In whatever taste modernity has been appropriated, it doesnot really deface or affect the village adversely as a visual journey. People here are conscientious and understand how their building techniques help them contextually.
One can find few typologies of houses here (Drawings have been made by students which shall form a part of the official publication):

1. A basic enclosure with bare minimum rooms: This kind of house consists of an enclosing wall. This thick wall has niches carved inside it where people store all necessities for daily activities. The only covered spaces are the kitchen and living space, which too are sometimes open – depending on the season.

2. A minimum set of rooms with an open court in the centre: These are houses which are typical of joint families. Various rooms are shared by individual families and the courtyard is the common space. Such houses have made these rooms ‘pakka’ over time and thus have a common terrace over them. This terrace becomes space to store various things like pots, dry twigs, etc.

3. Havelis: There are smaller havelis and larger havelis. Havelis mostly are more than one floor. Both types have various sets of rooms. However, the size of the courtyard in the centre varies. Some courts are just for bringing in light while others are voluminous spaces that connect internal public spaces across various floors.

4. Those with storage: Based on occupations, houses have different storage areas. These storage areas include those for pots, livestock like sheep, cows, buffaloes, etc. etc. These areas are just added rooms which connect either from inside the house or outside for servicing the buyers.

Water Supply

Water is supplied to houses in the morning. Currently, few people collect water from the tubewells installed around the village or wells present in the village. Larger houses (more than one storey) have water tanks installed while other keep them stored in containers.The basic houses have a partitioned bathing area and sanitation facilities. Waste water is let out in open drains that can be seen throughout the village. Soil water is collected in grouped soak pits.

Construction

Houses in the villages are mostly made by the local material such as stones, bricks and timber. The roofing is done either in clay tiles or in weeds. Newer constructions are in concrete and hence hace beams and slabs. Concrete construction is mostly unfinished due to unskilled labour.

Floors use kota stone or dholpur stone. Pink seems to be a dominating colour of the buildings. However, many of the smaller self-made houses use cow dung plaster on floors.

The traditional choolha is still a part of their daily cooking activity. Women folk collect firewood from the nearby forest edge. The choolha brews out sweet smelling smoke which acts as a disinfectant and gives the houses a peculiar sweet smell.

One can find neem trees in the village. Generous plantations of bogain villa shrubs can be seen over the village. As mentioned earlier, there is a wheat farm that bounds the place.
Peacocks fly over the entire village, hiding themselves from the people.

Stray Dogs

Many a times, when I watch at the stray dogs on the streets, I end up involuntary comparing their lives to mine. Most of the times, I feel they are better off, because they do not have to answer any one around them: They can sleep any where, any time, they can eat any thing any time, they can choose their partner any where, any time; in fact they can also choose if they want to exist or not any time. Stray dogs are important cases to consider since dogs have been a part of our domestic lives for a long time now. One can associate them with having domestic sociable characteristics.

I think the best aspect about such animals is that they are left to their own once they grow up by their parents. Parents do not bother them any more! I am not sure if they follow the taboo of incest.

I wonder how dogs are never able to make or designate for themselves a living space. They choose to remain stray. Kennels, are but built by humans for them. Why don’t dogs, particularly stray ones, build themselves anything? Can we thus conclude that they choose to be stray? I have seldom seen them being possessive over territory. They must be perhaps. I  have not really invested in their behavioural patterns. But I have literally seen them eat, drink, breathe, stay in anything and anywhere. They even choose to defecate anywhere. Can life get more simpler? Seems like a joke!

I wonder why all of a sudden I chose to write about this today, and yet not well written. I shall need time to make it structurally strong and coherent. But I believe I have been procrastinating the elaboration of a lot of ideas. This is absolutely dangerous and I had to break out of it. When I am in no frame of mind, I do produce incoherent work like this. This is the reason why I avoid working without the right mood. But then, there is an aspect of practice which one needs to inculcate. If I must do something in writing, I have to constantly hone my skills in this field by constantly practicing this activity. I must be rigorous with it and produce profusely - especially when I have ideas. 

India's contribution to world culture

In the last two days; two people have raised the same question incidentally over our conversation on the practice of architecture in India.

"What essentially has India contributed in the last 500 years to world culture?"

Shinkre sir said that most of what we have produced is in the ancient ages. Referring to the practice of architecture, he questioned if we have been able to produce even a single exemplar building in the period after independence that we can look up to?

Diagonally substantiating it, Chaitanya critially pointed out that our discussion of architectural critique only falls within that limited cultural range of golden age. We have only been able to contribute what our great old forefathers did. There is hardly any thing intellectually culturally that the recent generations have given to the world that becomes a part of a global discussion.

I am not able to recall detailed discussions that we have had. I shall ask both, Shinkre sir and Chaitanya to elaborate and see if they can substantiate this dialogue further.

But the only thing that I kept recalling in the above context (see if you can find the clip with the preceding dialogue that instigates this song) - which may not be enough - is the following clip. And that is what Chaitanya criticises:

On sketching

Looking at Dhaval's sketch (or seeing him sketching), I feel we at the end of five years have internalized the art of sketching. We use one stick/medium in different ways to bring out different characters of lines. This in turn suggests a variety of materials and textures that the real space is made up of. In twisting turning the pencils or pens, we make it interact with the paper in a variety of ways. This sometimes generates interesting effects. This stylization in our drawing using limited mediums is the forte of an experienced sketcher.

Another aspect is framing one's drawing or choosing to ignore what is not to become the content of the image. The sketcher, more than depicting the reality must bring out the feel or essence of the space or object he/she is sketching. An architectural sketch is often a personal analysis. It must bring out, the essential character of the space the architect perceives.

This is often ignored in the elementary and intermediate drawing classes that are held during primary / secondary school days. The obsession with depicting reality is a preoccupation of the past - the renaissance period which was soon obliterated by the invent of the camera. The pursuit of sketching at its heart has always remained to observe, but the whole act of observation has taken an intellectual meaning in the modern age. This intellectualism, one feels, must reflect in what we draw today. But this calls for two things to happen - one, that you possess drawing skill; and two that you have a heightened sense of observation or understanding the surrounds. But another important skill one needs to possess is the ability to translate the intellectual observation into a drawing. Or, to make a prolific (intellectually skilled) drawing.

To take the example of Dhaval's drawings: he drew a balloon with a very soft hand - that emphasized on one part of the curve, a shadow through increasing pressure and density of line while made the line lighter and non existent on the opposite side. This made the balloon look floating and in tension. When he drew the cylindrical country tiles in elevation of a building, he kept balancing the pressure of the pencil in a way which brought out the curve of the tiles. When he draws out a perspective, he knows the details to put in.

Most students who come to architecture come with a heavy baggage of the elementary drawing classes. Actually it helps to be trained, but it is impediment for ways of seeing. They do not understand line intensities and that those can help conveying expressions. What voice modulation does in speech, line intensity does that in drawing. Exactly that is that the students have to understand. I have seen mostly that students draw caricatures / caricaturist drawings - where flat lines define form and content. I was explaining the student the other day how caricature is a medium for the masses, and it has to therefore flatten a lot of expression. A lot of such techniques result into mundane drawings because drawing techniques have been codified (institutionalized) into step by step kind of teaching methods / learn it yourself sketching books, which one can find every where. However, this is not to say that those are bad, but these books have to spell out that techniques are only methods, and tools have to be further explored by those who wish to develop their own ways of working.

As architects, we can not draw flat. Flatness has become the trend of drawings today. Very few teachers in graphics understand tonality and expression. The flatness in technical drawings has resulted into flat buildings and flat understanding of objects and built environments. It is therefore, that we draw a mundane skyline (a zigzag line - check images below) as a representative of the city. This does two things:
1. Gives an impression that skyline is a line of the buildings lying on the face
2. That the face is important and it must have a shape.

The problem with the above is that it ignores that:
1. Skyline is a photographic feature - that it is extracted from a photograph which is a two dimensional medium (even we see in two dimension)
2. That the skyline is essentially a layered set of buildings.

The flatness forgets the layers and results into viewing and intervention in the city as a flat enterprise.

Dhaval never draws flat. He brings out the tonality of a drawing very essentially. I shall request him to send over some of his drawings to publish here. And I shall try to put more examples of what I am trying to communicate.

Hell is very badly done // First year AD

Over the year, we have conducted architectural design projects based on representation and city, making life size models for hawkers (understanding anthropometrics and the body) and dealing with architectonics through crafting light. Thus, in some or the other way we kept making the course very formal. In the current project, we wanted to open up the dimension of imagination for architecture through everyday mythical spaces. We wanted students to think beyond the existing conventional ways of conceiving space. 

We introduced the students to the following:

"Hell is very badly done"

-Maxim Gorky

This one line statement was the brief that would drive the project.

Methodology:

We introduced the students to surrealist works of various artists (like Dali, Margritte, Dunchamp etc.) who have brought together different kinds of ideas together and other works. The students were asked to do the following stepwise:

1. Bring an interpretation, in any form (image, text, collage, painting, drawing, sketch, etc.) of the above line. (Note that we consciously played with the nuances of the statement - whether to prove or improve the claim)

2. Formalizing a single image using charcoal on large news print paper(s)

3. Detailing spatial character of this generated image

4. Asking students to get drawings of ten objects that come from their spatial imagination and further select a few to detail and hybridize to explore semantics and form.

5. Working with details of space - mechanics and function taking further hybridized concepts.

6. Translation of images into three dimensional models

7. Exploring models for materials, textures and further concepts through materiality of things.

8. Translating model back into a perceptive drawing of space.

As a part of the final work, the students were asked to present a single A1 sheet which explained the spatial character of their idea along with a brief write-up on the way they perceived "Hell"

Postscript:

"Hell" has remained a concept in the mythological narratives of most religions. It has been a part of all of our childhood imagnation. Our grandmothers and  mothers induced in us fear for this place thus preventing us from engaging in any 'wrong' acts. In doing so, they created within our minds an imagination of a specific place that equally evoked feeling of repulsion and interest to know more about. It was perhaps the curious mind wanting to expand its boundaries of visualization. Every grandmother created a new 'place' of hell through her description and programmatization - whether it be the devils who punish you by dipping you in hot oils or contraptions that chopped off your body parts. All of these activities were contained in a space or created a space of its own. However, we have never acknowledged and explored hell as a space having a definite program. A program that has been overtly described in various mythological texts seems to have no architectural / visual imagination. This dilemma of a concept that seemed present in our everyday mythical imagination, and so spatial, not having any visual imagination made us pursue it as an architectural project.

Although, we did caution ourselves of getting into too many of cutting-chopping projects. We definitely wanted to avoid dealing with bloodshed and physical torture: after all, architecture is a humanist practice (and I do not intend any ironies or paradoxes here). So Gorky's statement, which was essentially expressed in a different context, was chosen to be explored for the universal idea of 'Hell'. Here students explored ideas of a space that evoked tendencies that may seem socially, physically, behaviourally or logically misfit in the real world. 

We often mix up architectural programs with architectural aesthetic. This is not to say that each program has its own (or creates its own) aesthetic - that a school must 'look like' a school and a hospital must 'look like' a hospital. This project was critical for the fact that it allowed a difficult program to continue having a pleasing aesthetic. The core question is whether the difficult could also be beautiful? Or what could be an aesthetic of the unpleasing? (I am not using 'aesthetic' in the same way as 'beauty'). Thus, in doing so, we also challenged our own notions of beautiful. 

To talk of  beauty (which is more often understood as visual) in context of the questions above, we discussed ideas like "why are we not able to see a dead rat ran over by a truck lying on the street - with its blood spilling out and intestines all split apart? Why are we not able to engage with a heap of garbage containing all kinds of waste lying on the roadside, why don't we like the idea of sleeping on organic waste?" Haven't we seen crows feeding on human spit or vomit?; haven't we seen dogs sleeping on litter, haven't we seen vultures preying over the dead or haven't we seen micro-organisms creating spaces within garbage dumps? The comparison of  engagement of animals with things we reject raises the question of validation of beauty. To me, this project opened up methods through which one could face the other side of conventional aesthetic. 

Further, this project reminds me arguments of Georges Bataille and the surrealists who emphasized on the dual role of the perception; the question of disciplining the senses. Bataille raises many important questions. One of which includes reference to the Cross we see in most Churches - that which depicts Chirst is nailed onto it, he asks, what makes such a horrific image acceptable? What is so sacred about such an image? What provides pleasure in this image for worship? In his writings, Bataille explores the notion of guilt, of what goes on with negative emotions...

However, the project for Hell developed its own trajectories and aesthetic. We shall try and compile it for future discourse and archive. Following are some process images of student works:

Lapod Diary: Part 1

Lapod Diary: Part 1

Lapod is a small village in Rajasthan, about 15 kilometers away from Rani. Located in a desert climate, the village does not have any prime water body in or around itself. The village is bounded by a wheat farm, a dry lake and forest on one side and houses on the other. A ring road completes the boundary of the village. It has a community kitchen, some inns a little away, three schools and a village chowk which is the most active place here. The infrastructure is very basic: There is no special transport system except a single bus that stops at the chowk once a day. People otherwise use tractors to move within the village and nearby villages. The nearest railway station is Rani from where everyday necessities are sought out and the nearest city is Jodhpur which is about 3 hours away.

The local language spoken here is Marwari. The village comprises of Hindus and Jains, however shows no signs of a big or prominent Hindu or Jain temple. There are smaller private temples scattered over the village. They never really catch your attention. They are not spectacular.

Consisting of not more than 500 people, Lapod has a typical hierarchical setup of an Indian village. There are distinct communities that do different jobs and command distinct powers. The primary occupation in the village is agriculture. I did not really observe any allied by product craft activities of agriculture in the village. The village has its own set of tailors, masons, blacksmith and carpenters. Most people have cows or buffaloes (sometimes sheep) within their own houses which supply them with the basic stock of milk and related products all round the year. Butter milk is a daily preparation and all guests are greeted heartily with a bowl of salted refreshing buttermilk during the day. The daily supply of vegetables is brought by a local vendor who brings some basic stuff on a hand cart every day. They have electricity but only for some part of the day. Houses are minimal. They do not consume much resource. Many houses do have television and people watch tv serials regularly. Electricity, more than televisions, I feel is a luxury. They exploit electricity by switching on most appliances when they have power. Whether required or not, perhaps it’s only to acknowledge the presence of an electrical appliance in the house. Inspite of this, the village is quite humble.
The ethnographic cross section of this village will reveal a set of narratives which echo the difficulties of the village. One wonders how to locate oneself in its problematic. There are several issues one can list:

1. The problem of water: The most pressing problem of the village is the absence of sweet water. There are wells in the village, really deep ones, which only give out salty water. Often, people have to drink only hard water that is extracted from the ground using tube-wells. Apart from the 3 rainy months, there is no sweet water across the year. Villagers complain how the hard water makes their food tasteless, damages their body and  erodes their utensils. This hard water is said to have excess quantity of a certain unrequired mineral that shall lead the human body stoop over age. The villagers have tried to convince the District collector to get a source of sweet water to the village, but their requests have not been met by far.
About 10–12 kilometers away runs a canal that supplies sweet water to other villages.  There is a possibility that a secondary canal line can be drawn to bring in water to Lapod village that can fill up the village lake and replenish the wells of the village. However, the district magistrate explains that it has been difficult for them to divert water here because of the topography of the land that prevents the natural water flow of water towards the village.

2. The scene of education also seems to be critical. We visited two schools here - one which is till 8th standard and the other which continues from 8th to 10th. The schools do not have sufficient teachers and the available teachers have additional responsibilities by the government, such as making surveys and collecting demographic information of the village. It seems that the government sees teachers as the ‘educated’ people of the village and entrusts them with a lot of work that sometimes leaves them with no time for any additional initiatives for the school. They are burdened by physical tasks which interfere their academic interests...
The schools do not have any libraries or information network. The teachers have knowledge, but not adequate infrastructure. The teachers, in their capacities try, but I wonder if they have original thinking capacities.

We found that the school we went to had an extremely pessimistic principal who thought he had tried enough only to fail himself in bringing up the level of the students. Students, as everywhere, are enthusiastic. We looked hopes in them, as we shared a drawing session along. However, there have been a lot of people from the village who have moved to cities like Mumbai, Mangalore, Hyderabad, etc., and made big money. They have also managed to civilize themselves of city culture and get out of age old binding customs. Some earning heads of the families in the village continue to work in the cities, who frequently visit back Lapod where their families stay.

3. Gender divide is a very sensitive issue of the village. Women are not allowed to come out in the open, they are not allowed to speak freely, behave freely and their education is also stunted. The purdah system is still followed and most women can still be seen in ghoonghats. This dominance is to a level where school girls shy away even from speaking their own names. They are extremely quiet, but when we tried talking to them, we realized that they did want to open up. Their desires were suppressed and their lives were controlled by the society.

Boys were naughty, and very interesting. They participated enthusiastically. A teacher from another school staying in Lapod told us about how he finished his BA, then MA in Sanskrit, whose concern was to make students aware, through us, how they could use their education. There lies a great gap in making students realize what potential careers are available to them after their education.

The village is quintessential for the fact that it has its own village simpleton, an all rounder who can arrange for all things at any time of the day, a contractor, a ‘wise’ sarpanch, a few people who have been exposed to the city, naughty kids and shy women. Even architecturally, there is only one single node – the chowk where all important activities happen. The chowk is bounded by two general stores, the village panchayat space, a supposed library (politically named) and a group of houses.

This was a general view of Lapod and there may be a lot more stories to tell. However, I shall put them up with more relevant drawings and photos, and our intervention in the village in subsequent posts when the documentation of the village by our students will be complete. This write up was produced only as a reflection into my own critique of students' writeups that they produced as a part of their document over the study tour. I hope I have kept the adjectives to a limit and been able to report the village factually. The participants of this tour must respond here.

Structure of Image Display

image: Anuj Daga

Above are 4 ways in which we primarily arrange photographs.

A. Random > unorganized > memories > Wedding cards
B. Semi unorganized > unsure matter > related/unrelated > multiple content
C. Organized > Tiled > Structured > Institutionalized
D. Organized > Compositional > Highlight > Major / minor

The sets A to D are ways in which photographs are displayed or composed for different purposes. It appears that display of images has gone a certain kind of institutionalization by the various disciplines of visual communication. This institutionalization sometimes talks of class and taste. I made these 4 typologies only to make myself aware of the architectural bias that I have and that I enforce on photographic layouts. Often, our aesthetic judgements are codified through subconscious pedagogical tools and we end up evaluating everything through this constructed academic lens.

The schisms between academic training and existing ways in which people negotiate aesthetic for themselves gives makes me conscious of my own construct. the more and more this reveals to me, the more I try to neutralize myself. But this neutralization is questionable and I worry if this shall lead to some kind of a-cultural manifest.

However, the idea groups formed above meanwhile are interesting, since they allow me to read how intangible ideas manifest into image composition (which further translate into tangible realities). It gives a framework for evaluation of displays and how ideas may get miscommunicated if they cross boundaries. On the other hand, one can use this framework consciously to create newer meanings.

The Pritzker 2012

Wang Shu, the Chinese architect is the latest Pritzker laureate. Last year the Pritzker went to SANAA. It was the year when the committee was also considering Charles Correa and B V Doshi. The Prtizker committee was here to review their work. To look at a history of events, the economic slump also struck about two years ago. We all must agree that Asia did emerge as a stable economy as compared to other developed western counterparts.

The clear focus of the entire world on Asian countries in the recent times is very visible. But to talk of India, it began perhaps in the '90s. India was introduced to the world through the indroduction of the liberal policies. One could perceive it as a land of infinite people, lakhs of consumers. The chain of recognitions is interesting: In 1994, Aishwarya Rai wins the Miss World Pageant, and in the same year, Sushmita Sen wins the Miss Universe Title. In subsequent years, Diana Hayden, Yukta Mookhey, Priyanka Chopra, Lara Dutta - all of them win. India suddenly becomes popular. In the midst, there was also a Chinese Miss World. They market all beauty products through which the West re-enters India. Of late, A R Rahman wins Grammy and Oscar. Not to demean any of the talents or capabilities that south eastern Asian region has. But all such validation distantly seems capitalistic.

If such focus brings in opportunity, why not! On a critical reflection, one also feels that it is difficult to change India in totality. Rather, our cultures drive others to change a lot more. The huge mass of people that we have definitely works towards our benefit.

But what does it mean for us to accept an award from a country of the West; what does it mean to accept validation of a developing country from a developed country? What kind of hegemony are we being subjected to? All are questions that we ought to detail out. We always wait for such recognition from greatly progressed countries (Oscars, Pritzkers, RIBA Gold Medals, Grammys, Olympics etc). Countries which have essentially plundered a lot of natural resource from our own lands and thrive on it today. That is not to accuse them, but to make us aware and conscious of our own potential.

But these are such random questions and thoughts. I am sure there is some larger mechanism that is driving the attention to Asian subcontinent. I wonder if we must be scared or happy...

Problematising Academy of Architecture

I am writing this post through an understanding of Prasad Shetty's paper (the title of which I forget) on the mishandling of the city of Mumbai. Shetty argues (hints?) that the existence of multiple agencies, each which have their own interests and procedures of working in the city layer themselves upon each other, entangling them into a messy condition. Further, the non communication or the mis-communication between these agencies worsens the ways in which gaps are enlarged between the desired and the delivered product. Also, aspirations of different agencies are different and driven through a variety of forces, which are ultimately controlled or subjected through an altogether separate governing body which comprehends, schedules, funds and disseminates them, creating larger distortion.

Wondering of the condition of Academy of Architecture, I began thinking of it as sets of people (which could be analogical to the agencies above). Talking of condition, the question is why doesn't Academy function as it should or why is it not able to produce the kind of output it can / is capable of. One can locate / try to locate the problem at two levels - the scale of the institution as a set of functioning teams an the other at the level of the individual within these teams (if we may begin to call them so - teams of individuals - or sets of individuals). 

To begin with finding issues with the teams, one sees that the academy does not really have a vision - a vision for its students, for its intellectual future. This leads to different sets of people forming their own micro visions which may not necessarily be converging, although which may overlap. I would specifically like to point out a few distinct sets that exist meanwhile:

• the management (the funding team/team who has financial control/the fuel of the institute),
• the permanent faculty team (the intellectual team/team which drives the institute/the engines of the institute), 
• the visiting faculty team (the wheels of the institute), 
• the non teaching administrative staff (the lubricants of the system), and finally 
• the students (of course the consumers of the institute). 

One can talk about all these sets in great detail, only to come to a solution that all these sets have different imaginations that lead into different directions. To talk about the complexity of the project of the Academy, one could brief it as thus (the description below is fuzzy, but it shall take a long thesis to give descriptive details of each set):

The students come with an extremely glorified image of the institute - an image which to a large extent may remain true, but muddled when one sees the Academy having complexities of space, infrastructure, people, etc. However, as students get consumed in the course, they realize the problems with the course itself. Through their own limited imagination(s), they try to problematize the academic trauma, which always ends up in pointing out the resource crisis. The visiting teaching staff have their own agendas and come from different schools of thought. Old, new, young, open, conservative, philosophical, professional, academic, theoretical, technical - all kinds of teachers do all kinds of things trying to reach at a common goal, which seldom is achieved. Within their subjects they have their own visions and aspirations. Some crave for newness, others to maintain minimum required standards. What else shall one expect of mass education?

The permanent staff comprises of a range of people whose objectives are misplaced. Some look at the institution  as a place of work, some as a place to spend time in, others look at it as a place to educate, teach and learn. The least common denominator for such cross overs is to abide by the University syllabus. On the extreme end, the heads envision a large academic change, where they are unable to locate Academy in the larger picture, and further unable to locate a position for the student in the academic sphere. Meanwhile they struggle between revising curriculums, revising faculty attitudes, student attitudes, course structures and all possible things related to architecture education. 

Lastly, the non teaching staff have their own dynamic politics with the management, faculty and students. The largeness institution that increases the presence of this set in number, makes it a powerful body which creates micro-politics of information-dissemination between students, faculty and perhaps management. Taking advantage of the lack of resources, scrutiny and loose system, they manipulate things in their own ways. The management is the supreme - which decides the fate of every thing that exists on the premises. It's agenda is to make Academy a mega institution which sets the cycle of making money and introducing new courses. the management, as it appears, consists of capitalistic, short sighted individuals who have not been able to formulate a vision beyond the banyan tree. 

These different imaginations produce a lot of friction when various sets interact inevitably with each other. Where does an academic locate oneself in such a web - one questions. Further, what possible future shall we imagine of this institution? What future does one foresee of oneself with this institution - an institution which shall take perhaps 50 more years to find the right people and system to resolve its web of complexities? Rohan Shivkumar always says that every Institution goes through this phase of deterioration, giving the example of JJ College of Architecture, which today almost rots in the ideologies of archaic individuals; the physical space also speaks of it - the large BMC garbage can that welcomes you to an old grey building...


Academy meanwhile plans to just facelift itself. It's high time it gave itself booster injections and some internal nourishment so that it grows. Or else, I just proposed to one of my colleagues: the Banyan must be stripped of its leaves - it needs new ones.