Page 22 - Genius

SS bhatti

lives and works in Chandigarh, Punjab, India

SEARCH THE ARTIST ONLINE www.artbreak.com/prabhinder

ArCHITECTUrE gONE HAyWIrE
Preface: Wide-spread uglification of the natural environment is being done
worldwide in the name of “modern” architecture, or, as the historians have
misnamed it: “Post-modernism”, without even a semblance of the grasp of
Principles which were discovered by the pioneers of the modern movement.
the term “Post-modernism” is a misleading coinage of the historians. the rapid
advancement of technology has outpaced the cerebral evolution of “form-
givers” with the result that there is a “perfection of means but a confusion of
goals”. What the architects do succeed in selling to their nouveau riche clients
is anything but architecture.
architecture and Mother nature: at the mundane level, architecture is,
in my considered opinion, a psycho-emotional expression of many disciplines,
concerns, themes and issues, as embodied in building materials put together
by the available methods propelled by a creative imagination. this may be  BHaGat sinGH memoriaL mUseUm [PrOJECT] This building commemorates
called “ephemeral” architecture. the “eternal” genre springs from a poetic the unique contribution of Sardar bhagat Singh, called Martyr the great, who sacrificed
vision of which the fountainhead is the architect’s creativity: a never-ending his life to free India from the shackles of the british rule. It is intended to be built at his
adventure into the realm of the human spirit. an artist so inspired regards ancestral village khatkar kalan in District Nawanshahar, Punjab, India. He changed his
identity from a Sikh with a turban to an Englishman wearing a hat - an image which has
nature as “mother” so palpably alive that he wouldn’t rape her even in the become ingrained in the Indian psyche. The architect has used the hat-icon as a symbol
wildest of his dreams! recalling bhagat Singh’s dynamic personality.
the birth of Modernism: What we call “modernism” was born with the
advent of Renaissance when the focus somehow shifted from the gods to
human beings, with all their mundane problems as well as cultural aspirations.
this was a radical movement from the “religious” to the “secular” aspects of
human life at all levels as lived during workaday existence. these problems
and aspirations couldn’t be solved by the preceding gothic style even at the
pinnacle of its glory! the thinking minds thus revived their interest in the
classical periods, looking for solutions to the emerging problems—and ended
up creating a form of Building Design called the “Renaissance” style. the multi-
centred, pointed arch gave way to the semicircular arch, and whatever went
with it as a “creative” package. When it became a regimen too suffocating to
let fresh air in the realm of architectural creativity, the daredevil architects
broke away to form their own rules to create an architecture critics jeeringly
named “Baroque” [literally, a badly shaped pearl!] thus were twisted columns,
and sculptured skylines born—their ruthlessly bold expression carried the  pUnJaB arts CoUnCiL, [PAC] building called “Punjab kala bhawan” located in
unmistakable daredevilry of the architects who produced them. Rococo style Chandigarh’s rose garden which was once the largest of its kind in Asia. Dr MS randhawa,
followed with a shift to the interiors with an obsessive attention to finer details. who was the Chairman of PAC, called this the most beautiful building in Chandigarh next
to le Corbusier’s Museum. Dr randhawa designed the landscape for Chandigarh. The
industrial revolution: it was not long before the industrial Revolution building houses three academies: Fine Arts, literature, and Music-Theatre, and is the
upset everything once again by ushering in all kinds of problems too new to headquarters of Punjab Arts Council - an autonomous body set up by the government of
be solved by any of the existing styles or systems. the use of machine became Punjab to promote the stated activities. As envisioned by the architect, Punjab kala bhawan
has become a vibrant cultural centre for the State and the Union Territory of Chandigarh.
indispensable and, therefore, new methods had to be developed beyond the
sentimentality of William morris’s arts and crafts movement. the pioneers
of architecture, properly so called “modern”, did a great job to show a way architects created a truly modern architecture from which we have drifted
away from blind copying of the historical styles or their eclectic ensemble. far too away into a sickening gimmickry of Building Design that has produced
Louis Sullivan in america, and Peter Behrens, Henri van de Velde, auguste more monsters than monuments. thus there are a whole range of pseudo-
Perret, et al, in europe laid the ground for masters of architecture to create styles i call: arti-tecture, Histori-tecture, techni-tecture, money-tecture,
the new idiom for the new age: gaudi, Wright, gropius, mies, corbusier, mistri-tecture, Fantasi-tecture, and so forth. When art is over-stressed, it is
and Kahn are the “masters”. they are followed by “makers”, “continuators”, arti-tecture; technology-obsessed Building Design produces techni-tecture;
“Distorters”, and “traders”. a vulgar exhibition of black money in buildings as misplaced expression of
Perverted Forms of architecture: it may be conceded that the master social status produces money-tecture; structures prostituted by the whims
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