Transendence: beyond the boundaries

A few months ago, I was asked to make opening remarks on a gathering of architects and students on a theme of transcendence. I have now forgotten when and where was it delivered. All who listened also , perhaps, forgot about too. though some asked for a copy then that I did not have. The notes I used just surfaced when I was searching for something else. 

It may be of interest to some, may amuse some others. If it does to any one, I would be happy.

Transcending  boundaries.

I am honoured to be here today and thank the designer publications for inviting me to make the opening remarks. I am standing here with great trepidation to make the first remarks where  a crème –de-la-crème of architectural fraternity is gathered. I agreed to take in this onus, not realising its enormity .

First there was the word, says the Bible. Similarly here, during the exchange mails, a word came into the correspondence.  Transcendence.  Sounding good with connotations of philosophy, sufficient , it stuck. It defined and created a curious intriguing barrier as any ambiguous abstract  theme would be for a conference on architecture that is most concrete. More I think of the theme I am perplexed and wonder how could we transcend it.

Transcendence and imminence are two words of philosophy, metaphysics precisely; to seek beyond or to seek within. That stuff is beyond me.  Let me stick to the common meaning: To transcend is to climb over a barrier, go beyond boundaries. 

At a mundane level, transcendence is life.  As life has barriers, physical, mental, chronological. Many of these barriers  are conceptual, natural and come or made up for a specific  purposive knowledge of the world.

 Look at butterfly’s life cycle. Its life, the same life, manifested differently  at different times with in limitations and barriers. And life transcends from one from to another. Egg, worm, pupa, cocoon, and the butterfly.  So does many others forms of life, a child’s growth. From physical growth to mental growth, acquiring emotions, skills and social behaviour, into a person and a unique personality.  Life transcends.  

Societies form and grow, cultures develop.  Skills develop differently , then some where exchanges do happen and evolution take different turns. Cultural artifacts and their creations transcend original boundaries.  Contrarily societal evolution has created barriers and limits; caste, creed , religion, professions .  Humanity always tried to transcend these systemic barriers and boundaries. And more such boundaries get created anew too.

Words try to define our architecture. Words and thoughts are expressed in languages and languages appear in procession. A linear procession at that. But many thoughts are non verbal . Are  architectural thoughts, about spaces and world about rhythm and time; are they linear ? Can language adequately represent architecture of it’s phenomenological sensory dimensions?  Are we not trying to transcend either way? From language to architecture and architecture to words.  And other representations of architecture too? Drawings, geometry, graphics, photography ; The print media. Electronic media. Is the idea of architecture itself is transmuted in this process?

Complexities are on the rise. Engineering and planning, urban design and infrastructure, humongous cities and buildings of gigantic scale go beyond our conceptions, beyond human ease of understanding.  Transcending andmoving towards a chaos? Or to an understanding and knowledge to tame the complexity?  Human knowledge has been bound into categories. Boundaries and cells .  Professions compete, uniformity of processes are enforced creating more complexities. Don’t we need a transcendence beyond desciplines and profession? 

First, the definition of architecture itself is in confusion. We are confronted by the raised middle finger of Frank Gehry. With an obnoxious gesture, he recently dismissed 98 % of all architectural productions as some thing coming out of the other end.  The arrogance of the few as being representing a few who does some thing worthwhile for humanity. Mostly, as critics say, creating sites of spectacular spectatorship, showy, self advertising, hollow. Rest are all just buildings. Not worth talking about.  But that the rest constitutes the world. This hiatus between the majority of ordinariness and the high end of design is not going to go away soon.  Do we have a theory which can connect the ends of high-design tradition, bordering the art and the habitat-space- tradition of the vernacular, craft and the folk out side the profession of architecture itself?  In squatter settlements, villages, small towns. Developing countries in Asia and Africa, where majority live? Stupid places standing in the way of march towards smart cities. How do we transcend these? That stupidity swams. We cannot ignore.

Architecture has always been playing out illusions. And illusions and visionary creative hallucinations drive the world of future, perhaps

Illusions are also after all wishes and dreams tying to  transcend current limitations. Like magic, it is attractive and appeals to logical minds too.  Flying trapeze and other adventures of circus and sports also transcend the normal human abilities, and push the limits of determination and skills. And perhaps, that appeals to more people. When dreams and utopia open up new possibilities, it can energize many young minds.  Illusions suggesting falsity could be products of snobbery and plain smart foolery or may be perceptions and glimpses of what could be too. When pursued it transcends thoughts to fiction and futuristic.

For example; the synthetic biology researches. The Fab-Tree-Hab of MIT labs. One scenario of the future of technology seems to be trying to imitate life’s processes as Rachel Armstrong says. Some materials even though not living may show properties of life; like growth and movement. In such a scenario the architect’s building blocks are not dead materials, but life’s processes. That would make very strange geometries or non-geometries and defy the sense of visual order we are used to. Yet it could be intelligent and claimed to be more eco- friendly as well. One may not even know what shape the building and city of such development scenario would take. We have been designing with a definite plan and construction plan leading to a definite product. The synthetic biology as an open system of design envisions a utopian system like an illusion, influencing the process not knowing the final product. Yet one cannot dismiss the possibilities. But how do we assimilate future into our human social systems and transcend their limitations?

From mere construction to functional notions, architecture transcended to semiotics and linguistics in search of  a support theory. None seem to last. Ecology and sustainability seem to provide a respite at the moment holding the fort. The success or failure of this movement will depend, unfortunately, not on the profession perhaps, but on the immanent force of destruction in the global economy and ecology. Yet the large masses of folk would continue to build large part of the world  non- professional non high design tradition and hybrid building systems . How do we transcend to system of coexistence and mutual influence

politics of space

Space has been a a theater of politics - of powers struggle of individuals, genders and groups.  In bed rooms, in houses, in public places,in cities and villages, in national spaces or outer spaces; where ever human and their tools and technology can reach, space has been modified and recreated and produced to serve the power relations and to augment or challenge the existing ones.  the professionals in this drama, who help create and design the arena are only agents of the actors and are actors themselves some times. Their power to create space depends on the manipulative and salesman skill they wield with the political power and not on the absoluteness of the goodness to the world as a whole.    01 February 2015

Smart Cities and Urban Corridors

Published in my column  Cubes of Words.   Design Detail  issue 9  oct-dec 2014

Movement from rural to urban has been phenomenal.  While 23 % of Indians were living in urban areas in 1981; today there are over 30% urbanites with 35% migrants.  There is considerable regional variation and some states in the West and South are urbanised more than 40% already. This tendency is gaining more momentum and all pundits and urban gurus predicting more than 55% of Indians would be urban in 2050. They also see a bleak urban future with poor capacity of cities to absorb the migrants gainfully.  When India became independent much of its urban population, that was only about one sixth of total population, lived in smaller towns; only less than half of it living in cities larger than 1 lakh population.  Now over three fourths of urbanites are in such cities.  One fifth of them are in the ten megacities of over 3 million populations.  A continuous concentration is making metropolises tearing their own fabric apart. The dichotomous quality of life between ends of the village- town-big city-metropolis spectrum as well as within the big cities is well articulated. So are the abysmal and distressing miseries of large-city life.  Dissatisfaction of the poor conditions and environmental goods is evident even among the higher classes of city dwellers.  Yet, large cities are the lure, but how can they be endured?

Developing urbanising corridors, making use of the trends, was one such suggestion since 70s by a task force on urbanisation headed by Charles Correa  as  part of a  multi pronged strategy. Its new avatar is the ‘smart cities’ and urban corridors along information highways on some selected high growth stretches.  No credible objective and detail is available yet, except that of creating cities in the vague image of hypermodernity catering to a metropolitan real estate dreams often modelled after parts of Dubai, or Singapore. Industrialisation and job creation seem to be thought of as automatic outcomes of this wish list of clean dense cities, an environment of urbanism appealing for the new elite middle and upper class, like gated enclaves or even some exclusive developer towns or vacation resorts, keeping off the reality of urban India outside the gates. Would this alone be the basis of this proposal that is yet to be articulated?

The paucity of opportunities in the overcrowded agriculture is pushing the people with very little urban skills to migrate to the burgeoning cities. They can be gainfully absorbed only in marginal jobs like construction labour or in household services or in marginal informal sectors. Will the smart cities be smart enough to change the migrants to ‘smarties’ in short duration?  To expect a transformation replicating experience of the urbanistically stable countries or of island economies in a short time is a pipedream.  Yet a new beginning is in order.  Hope it will not stop at that symbolic gestures and statements.

The cities had been nodes of regional culture and economy even in the medieval and 19 C India. They depended on a region and led the regional economy and regional culture including the language, education and architecture. Until recently urban centres played that role as a system and hierarchy of centres. However, the latter half of last century with `modern’ economy penetrating the country side saw a change of role where city systems slowly became networks for marketing of capital and service goods destroying the local industries and economies creaming off the agricultural / rural surpluses. This top down development has its impact on culture. The cultural artefacts like architecture seem to have shown much more visible hiatus. The much touted Gurgaon model and the ideas floated on the net of the smart city corridors are nothing but caricatures of urban design or influenced by comic strips and video games that seriously lack any genuine thought or debate. Urban planning and city governance have been an apology of lethargy and anarchy despite 74^th amendment of the constitution.  We have been inundated with ideas, technology and advice; none seem to work in our social and governance context. Do we change the context or the models? Can we generate a model of our own?

There exists a set of global metropolitan cities in India linked to each other and connected externally too and a series of intermediate regional cities. All these together form a national economic space. Another  set of intermediate and small towns like taluka headquarters for example also exist at next level  which are / can be networked to form corridors and regional spaces. The regional ‘space’ made of network of cities and towns superimpose themselves on a regional economic ` territory’ of agriculture and resources.  This system is in need to be strengthened.  Abandoning the existing ones to create totally new ones would leave these existing cities / towns to languish. The city / town is its people and its culture and character that are not built overnight. There are too few examples of successful new cities either.   A realistic policy and programme of urban development cannot ignore this; neither the works done earlier of multilevel planning and regional development planning.  Relying only on a hyper urban model of growth economics and industrial development to produce a healthy settlement system would be costly. It is demonstrated academically that small and middle size towns seem to have more healthy relation with country side. And can culturally absorb the rural migrants better. They have better chance to serve the future than big cities alone. I think that urban corridors do have a role in this scheme, so do territorial settlement complexes, where a network of many towns together can create the efficacy and the threshold of demands required for the services of a large city.  Such a system would possibly arrest excessive concentration on too few cities.

The urban design of these cities would then take the cue from the rural urban connectivity and not from real estate utopia. We need a way to develop a city system which can take care of itself controlled by the effects of economic and land policies and not by land use planning alone as done today, which is observed more in violation.  An innovation in the ownership and development of urban land should seem a prerequisite to extricate city development from land mafia.  What would that policy be and how would we bring that around? 

Good morning from Ganga river, Varanasi: Every thing is intense here; celebration of water, colour, food, street activity, faith as well as filth. Never seen such gargantuan scale of filth and a ceremonious neglect of it as though it does not exist. Eating joints the great tasty delicacies dotting the streets and the throng of people around seem to celebrate one side of metabolism and obliviously venerate the acrimonious olid sting of the products from the other side, of both human and animals.

WALKING THROUGH THE STREETS OF VARANASI

A tiny treasure of knowledge, a book store in a street of Varanasi. Devouring katchoris next to it. Cacophonic traffic of two wheelers, cycle ricks and four wheelers continuously honking to veer through the river of humanity. Add the chanting filtering through many turns. The human sweat and its smell. The open unabashed urination on the steets and the stench. The seemingly stoic bulls. The high performative dust settling on exposed sweaty parts making one constantly aware of one's physical existence. The experience is truly existential: moment to moment. Every sense is horned. I would say: I sense therefore I exist.

inside outside sept 2014

pages 106 -114

Oops, urgent matter of poops

to be published in my Column 'cubes of words'  in Design Detail issue no 8

....Then I sit and wait,

Sit and wait, sit and wait

Until the poop plops down.....

(From poop song ; a  rhyme  teaching 2 something to hygienically do number 2.)

One of primary bodily pleasures is the movement of bowels and urine. Growing up into self awareness, we acquire values of cleanness and privacy, shame and taboos nurtured  by culture. Pleasures turn to pains of controls often. The problems of privacy, hygiene and safe disposal of the discharges lest they transform into sources of pollution, diseases and sensuous discomfort is a collective concerns of any ‘modern’  society.

Latrines, toilets, water closets for use in privacy along with the sewerage system had become a sign of modernity by last century.  Yet over half of India does it in the open. They do not have access to even a rudimentary one.  A small section of Indians have luxury of ‘glamour rooms’ to do the job. Ironically more Indians use telephones and mobile phones than toilets according to 2011 census.   The poop and pee and their putrefying stench seem to define our existential reality and philosophical detachment to the environment.

 Most of us cannot stand the stench of it, yet we have live that ‘aroma of discomforting air’ hovering in many pockets our cities; our trains, railway stations and the bus stands  exuding a distinguishing pungent presence.  Many sidewalks of roads exhibit human excreta and filth.  So are our public spaces, and public toilets in public buildings are apologies of squalor.  Underground sewerage system is known only to a part of urban India; even so in larger cities. Small towns and medium sized towns are still to live with open drains and the pungent stench.  Manual scavenging was banned in 1966, yet it exists in many places. This dehumanising practice has been a basis of the social divide.  In the march towards a higher urbanised India of smart cities, sanitation poses a significant conundrum;  how the other half poops? It is a question of dignity as well as status. Open or private, pit or potty, local or western, yuk or glamour, evil or showpiece: defecation divide is real and crucial.

The question is not one of economics and technology alone. There is more to it, of sociology, psychology, concepts of hygiene and cleanliness, taboos and superstitions. A major international conference on sanitation last February at Delhi heard a call for including sociology of sanitation as a subject in schools and colleges. We sanitise even the problem. The conference talked of sanitation and used that word more often while it was denoting  defecation and the processing of ‘poo” and pee; called faeces or night soil or sewage more affectionately.  Even sex is more openly discussed than the shitty affair. Even those ‘decent Indians’ living luxuriously have great problems in reconciling the issue of toilets and their location. Attitude varies from that of a necessary evil to a vain showpiece those conflicts with concepts of cleanliness, purity or profanity and mundane personal hygiene. An objective attitude is rare.  Why that is no discipline has done a serious scholarly study of the history and sociology and behavioural aspects of defecation. Have any?

Prof. Alexander Kira of Cornel University is one who made an exhaustive and scholarly study of bath rooms in 1960s. His book,  the bath rooms,  a best seller in 1966 looks at the history and design of bath rooms and accessories ergonomically, largely from the US and Western perspective. He pointed out that squatting is the best position for bowel movement which only Indians and other Asians practice. This, it seems, prevents haemorrhoids somewhat. The horizontal thigh position constricts the rectum hindering easy bowel movement. So he proposed a semi squat commode design though unsuccessful with market. Similar designs were also tried by Le Corbusier and others. The Western closet has become a fashionable habit for its appeal to lethargic stiffer bodies. Studies also show that use of tissue paper does not clean effectively and about half of respondents had residual faecal matter in their briefs.

Studies by Prof. Kira

In fact all the new products seem to complicate things and designed to improve looks and increase size and feel of luxury and hardly to improve the ergonomics. The imported products and designs of even of green claims (waterless urinals and water saving flushes etc) do not take the Indian habits, sociology, physiology and psychology into the design. The Indian quantities of bowels are generally said to be larger than in others and the low water discharges do not always flush fully in one go always resulting in inefficiency. The Indian pan and the Asian pan have very little room for improvement and the market for it also in the lower luxury segments that make it unworthy of any investment in design innovation.

 Studies by Corbu & Garnier                          Approach to design by Prof. Kira

Manual scavenging widely practiced earlier had put the excreta to use as manure in some places like china and Japan and England. With water carriage system expanding, scavenging and dry latrines, even chemical ones, weaned ending all researches on that line. The shortage of water for carrying it away is looming large. Most of our urban water is consumed for washing, flushing etc and finally ends up in the sewers. Will we use dry latrines and processed poop as manure again?

 Sulabh International of Bindeswar Pathak builds low cost toilets for about Rs 5000. They also reach and maintain low cost toilets in many public places making a low profit business out of it and prove that it is economically viable. But why does not it d get replicated?   Peepoo and Ecosan are other groups which developed disposable kits that self sanitise itself and is comparatively cheap and easy to use. These initiatives to be replicated in large scale require cooperative movements that can generate employment as well. A clean India revolution?   It is demonstrated that the quantity human urine produced in India, would provide for all the urea needed for our agriculture. The urea factories may then close down. But except for some enthusiasts in isolated cases, this is not explored.  So also is the case with night soil as manure. It is possible to do that hygienically if enough research and education is followed up.  Why no management studies in this area?

SVEI Schools Mysore from the common space