Leafy Rangoli

      Today is the Hindu festival of Diwali. One of the customs during Diwali is to make rangoli outside the entrance to one’s home. This is done to welcome Laxmi (the Godess of wealth) into one’s home. This year I have made rangoli with fall leaves (see below) instead of rice powder etc. Its colorful, quick and made with local resources. By doing so it bridges the east and west. Rangoli custom from east and fall leaves from the west.

  Leafy rangoli

      As I write about it, it is also a way to warm up this blog for a upcoming technical post titled ‘ Tango in Architecture’, as per my promise. This post is supposed to be about the architectural design for a multi-purpose arena, which was my thesis at IIT, Chicago, in 1989-90. Twenty years back when I designed it, the world was a very different place. Most of the west did not know most of the east and vice-versa. There was no internet, no Google! When one of my thesis advisers asked me, ” Is Chandni Chowk like South Michigan Ave?” my answer was of course ” NO”. I made a trip to India and made a short film to capture its ambience and character. Besides this I also designed the arena so as to bridge the east and west, architecturally.

      Now the world has changed! Everything is a click away. Everyday one comes across interesting examples of fusing cultures. Here are a few that explain the diversity of this phenomenon:

• Bharat natyam to the tune of four seasons.
• RTKL’s design of hotel Maratha Sheraton in Mumbai. It fuses modern architecture with eastern decor. The interior has walls adorned with paithanis and paintings depicting the coronation of Shivaji maharaj.
• A.R.Rehman’s music in many Bollywood films fuses Indian music with non-Indian e.g. the music in Slumdog Millionaire.
• Tabla restaurant in Manhattan fuses French and Indian cuisine by serving pork chops with sabudana khichadi.
• A book titled ‘ Dreaming in Hindi ‘ which is about a New Yorker who goes to Udaipur to learn Hindi.
• My book of short stories.

      As for Chandni Chowk, even that has changed. Now there is a Metro train that brings people from all over Delhi to this once forgotten part of Old Delhi. There is even a movie called ‘Chandni Chowk to China’! In the pastiche of all this fusion in different mediums, I am planning ‘Tango in Architecture’. It fuses western engineering technology with eastern design and hence demonstrates the bridging of cultures in the medium of architecture. With this as a warm to a future post, I wish all of you a very happy Diwali and a prosperous new year.

Ratna

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Last year on this blog: Leaves, Trees & a Forest