 Book Image Courtesy: Mandar Rane, IDC IIT Bombay | Book: The Design Journey of Prof. Sudhakar Nadkarni Author/Interviewer: Mandar Rane Design history conferences often echo with the laments of leaving out the 'peripheral' and postcolonial accounts. There have been attempts to ‘bridge the gaps’ in the last two decades first through the initiation of the International Conferences on Design History and Studies (ICDHS) and later in the year 2013 through the Design History Society’s first annual meet outside Europe at The National Institute of Design (NID) in Ahmedabad, India. Scholars have taken these opportunities to challenge the hegemony of the ‘centre’ by presenting the accounts from larger geographies of design on broader facets like craft, communication and architecture. However, comprehensive accounts of institutional history around design in postcolonial India have only been few. The recent ‘50-years retrospective’ by National Institute of Design Ahmedabad’s is one such monograph. So, here comes a version which voices another school of design from postcolonial India, Industrial Design Centre at Indian Institute of Technology Bombay (IDC), now approaching its fiftieth year of existence. Read further |
|
Design in Visions: Visions of/on Design from the Events, Declarations and Policies in India
In the last six decades in India, like many developing nations, Design has repositioned and elaborated in/ by various visions. The research studies these changing positions of/on Design in the events, declarations and policies at different Design schools of postcolonial India. A mix of primary and secondary study looks into the timeframe from India’s independence in 1947 to the present and reflect on the nature and making of these positions and visions. Through the people and documents of/about events, declarations, charters, documents, working papers, and formal proposals, it analyses and presents the visions of Design as foundational, developmental, postmodern, neo-liberal and retrospective visions. Read Further
I presented "Design in Visions" at 10+1 ICDHS Conference. I discussed a thread of the journey of Design in India through various institutional visions and how it interacted with various postcolonial politico-economic developments at the centre. The paper analysed and presented the visions as foundational, developmental, postmodern, neo-liberal and retrospective. Post presentation, the Q&A included a discussion on the other possible forms and threads of Design History in India and comparitive developments in other greographies.
Out of the four Keynotes, I personally liked the Alain Findelli's (University of Nimes) talk for its broader historiographical nature. He critically reflected the journey of design in the last hundred years across the world. At the same time, I feel that it was inevitably Eurocentric until he discussed contemporary cases of community resilience and co-design from North Africa. ICDHS is a platform which seeks to challenge the existing histories of design by presenting otherwise 'peripheral' versions. There was a significant participation from Latin America, Scandinavian nations, Japan and Taiwan. My paper from India fitted well into the purpose of the conference. In the coming years, ICDHS seeks to decolonise the discourse of Design too. I hope the design, architecture and planning educators from India will contribute to the larger movement of decolonisation.
Paper presented at Lancaster University in September 2017 In the larger developing world context, the idea of ‘care’ is most visible in Gandhi’s ideas. Though Gandhi was not a designer in established notions, as an excellent communicator and critical political activist, his sense of ‘care’ was reflected in most of his thoughts and actions. He famously argued for the idea of ‘Sarvodaya’ or ‘Well-Being of All'; a thought deeply influenced by the work of John Ruskin. This action can be seen as an act of care for fellow human beings and their human rights. From Indian political history, when Gandhi dreamt of India’s future, the ‘care’ for various factors remained central in his vision. Be it caring for the human labor or towards reclaiming the environment, or cultural values to the village structures. In the domain of design and care, the idea of ‘khadi', a handmade fabric, reflect his greater ideas of Sarvodaya. Khadi’s making involves care for the human labor and environment at various levels of its existence. As a non-violent symbol of protest, ‘khadi’ even cared to take care of the opposition, an act rarely seen in the history of political revolutions. ’Sarvodaya’ as a thought might have lost in the political unfolding of history in India and the developing world, the sense of it remains at the politics of it, though more selectively. To answer the question, “What might politicized versions of care look and feel like?”, Sarvodaya can be a caring and careful answer. The study would like to unearth the idea of Sarvodaya as a political version of Care and Design. >>> Read more
दिल्लीवालों को समर्पित।
यह मेरा शहर! कब आएगा मुझे नज़र? यह मेरा शहर! कब होगा मुझे इस पर फ़क़र? यह धुँध कब छँटेगी, कब आएगा मुझे कुछ नज़र? लगभग दो करोड़ लोगों का घर, ये दिल्ली शहर, अब दर बदर, दर्द भरा मंज़र। हर तरफ़, बस बुरी ख़बर, ना दिखती कोई डगर, हिंदुस्तानी इतिहास का सबसे निराला नगर, आज चिमनी क्यूँ बन गया पर? साँसे है रुक गई, पास है दिखती क़बर, धुआँ धुआँ सा है, इंसान ही का है ये क़हर। गाड़ियाँ अब भी दौड़ रही, स्कूल क्यूँ बंद है मगर? सियासत की रोटी सेकते राजा वज़ीर, पर प्यांदे क्यूँ खाए ज़हर? जब धूप सुहानी आ जाए, उस वक़्त बता देना पहर। यह मेरा शहर! बस आ जाए मुझे नज़र? - सौरभ तिवारी 10 नवम्बर 2017 Does Design Care... ? A workshop on Design and Care at Imagination, Lancaster University. I presented Sarvodaya (Ruskin, Gandhi) as one of the ideas of care and Khadi as it's manifestation. >More...
At this year's DHS' Annual Conference, I presented my ongoing research project, 'Raw, Repair, Refurbish: ‘Re-Use’ Design Culture from India.
 Kolkata’s original canal (Khal in Bengali) network, the backbone of the drainage system in the city for about three centuries, has deteriorated over the years. Unchecked growth and related land-fill, lack of periodic maintenance, poor management of waste-water and solid waste are few of the reasons. Kolkata suffered terrible water-logging for over a week in September 2006. Situation has been better since then, yet there are lots to be done. Besides that, most of these water channels and large drains are stinking, dirty and unhygienic negative spaces within the city.
The workshop recognized potentials of these drains/ nullahs/ canals, and, taking inputs from multi-disciplinary intellectual exchanges, explored ideas and proposal to convert such unused spaces into environmentally sustainable and socially appropriate public places and mobility corridors. This book, a collection of the said ideas and proposals, is arranged in two parts: the one with articles situating the project (taken up in the Workshop) in the larger urban context, and the other with concept drawings and sketches depicting ideas and explorations undertaken by the diverse groups of participants in the workshop.   Images from the Book Launch Event of Blue Lines of Kolkata, the first from the Search Landscape Urbanism Series. This book I have co-edited with my teacher from undergrad days Dr. Suptendu P Biswas. The book was launched by Prof. Parth Pratim Chakraborty, Director, IIT Kharagpur with a personal note. A panel discussion on 'Future of Canals of Kolkata,' followed the book launch, consisting of Kalyan Mukhopadhyay, DC Traffic Kolkata; Prof. Samiran Datta from SRFTI Kolkata; Somnath Biswas, Civil Engineer; Abin Chaudhuri, Architect from Kolkata; moderated by Dr. Suptendu Biswas, Architect & Urban Designer from New Delhi. It was a fantastic learning experience through the diverse panel discussion and Q&A session as rarely you see such a passionate audience as Kolkata. Blue Lines of Kolkata, emerged out of ideas and proposals from the Search Workshop 16 and selected contributions from various experts, initiates a discourse on shifting the focus to Landscape Urbanism as a method to reimagine and rejuvenate the city. Interestingly, nine of the forty-two participants in the Search Workshop 16 organized by SEARCH and RCGSIDM, IIT Kharagpur, were from various levels and departments from SPA Bhopal. Image Credit: Subhadip Biswas, Saurabh Tewari, Anshuman Abhishek Mishra and Oxford Bookstore Kolkata  
 Had an amazing week in dealing with the Foundation Batch of NID Ahmedabad, along with the co-mentors Tanishka Kachru, Dr. Shilpa Das and Sangita Shroff.
People, Chair, and Value(S): A Qualitative Inquiry into the Material Lives
Let's Retrospect the Smart
On the invitation of Association of Architects Agra, i presented a lecture on emerging subject of 'smart cities'. My talk, 'Let’s Retrospect the SMART Revisiting the ideas of architecture, technology and progress towards the current discourse of ‘smart cities', considered the historical dimensions of the concept of 'smart', progress, development and modernity. It also covered briefly the Nehruvian era of development and the post-liberal 'impatient capitalism' (Mehrotra, 2011) to argue for better vision of 'smart'. The talk took a leaf from the academic collaboration, Holistic Sustainable Concepts, between me and my friend, Aurgho Jyoti. Today, Dr. Suptendu P Biswas and me, presented the context, framework and outcome of the recently concluded Search Workshop 16 at WIEZ2017. We represented Trust for Search and our respective institutions at this International Symposium organised by IIT Kharagpur and Columbia University. This is another step towards the dissemination of the idea of Landscape Urbanism and our workshop on the subject. Next in queue is a publication and an exhibition of all the proposals. Thanks again to all the associated; partners, mentors and speakers, and especially the participants of the Search Workshop 16, who will carry forward the baton. As the coordinator of the Search Workshop 16, I would like to thank each and everyone involved, participants and mentors, speakers and associates, sponsors and partners, technicians and vendors, who contributed in making Search Workshop 16, a meaningful and memorable experience. It was 21st January 2016, when I went to meet Dr. Suptendu P Biswas at his home and first conceptualised this workshop. Aur fir log judte gaye, kaarvaan badhtaa gaya...  Meeting one of the towers of Design History, Prof. Jonathan Woodham at ICDHS 2016 at Taipei  |
Archives
June 2020
Categories
All
|
RSS Feed