PETER EISENMAN

INTRO

This paper, discusses Peter Eisenaman and the Memorial to the Murdered Jews in Berlin briefly and talks in depth about deconstructivism – a label tagged to all of Eisenman’s work, what deconstructivism means to the architect and how he seeks to answer the reluctance of the people toward such unconventional forms.

Peter Eisenman studied in the architecture school as an undergraduate at Cornell University. He received a Bachelor of Architecture Degree from Cornell, a Master of Architecture Degree from Columbia University's Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, and M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Cambridge. He received an honorary degree from Syracuse University School of Architecture in 2007.

He first rose to prominence as a member of the New York Five (also known as the Whites, as opposed to the Grays of Yale: Robert A.M. Stern, Charles Moore, etc.), five architects (Eisenman, Charles Gwathmey, John Hejduk, Richard Meier, and Michael Graves) some of whose work was presented at a CASE Studies conference in 1967. Eisenman received a number of grants from the Graham Foundation for work done in this period. These architects' work at the time was often considered a reworking of the ideas of Le Corbusier. Subsequently, the five architects each developed unique styles and ideologies, with Eisenman becoming more affiliated with Deconstructivism. (Wikipedia)

Eisenman has been known to be exteremly liberal when it comes to expressing his views on his theories and philosophies. His projects such as The Memorial to the Murdered Jews in Berlin and The Great Columbus Convention Centre are  solid proof of his strong hold on the theory and ideology he eventually made his forte – deconstructivism.

Deconstructivism is a style that emerged after the post modernist period. Modernists strongly believed in the importance of function over form, promoted minimalism and shunned any kind of ornamentation. Post modernists wished to embrace historical references which modernism had rejected. Deconstructivism was a new approach to the ideologies of modernism.

It is believed to have a strong confrontational elelment which constantly seeks to eliminate the notion of predictability and seeks to make the user comfortable with the visual and experiential discomfort that the built environment has to provide.

“The experience through the presence of an object must not give you the understanding of the object.”      -Peter Eisenman^{1 (Eisenman, 2012)}

Elaborating on this statement, Eisenman explains, the architectural elements in a building help the user to gain a deeper understanding of the space they are in. His ideology, however aims at constantly breaking and eradicating the predictable elements in a built environment.

Eisenman has explored different territories: first, structuralism and Chomsky’s linguistic theory; successively, Derrida and Delueze’s post-structuralism, passing through the influence of Colin Rowe’s formalism, and his recent interest in the return to autonomy as theorized by Pier Vittorio Aureli.^2 (Corbo)

His differentiation between a deep and superficial structure would be the main reference for Eisenman’s discourse: the American architect in fact distinguished between superficial/sensorial aspects (colour, texture, shape, and so on), and deep aspects (frontality, compression, and disjunction). To cite Rafael Moneo, we may say that Eisenman built a dichotomous version of his architecture, based on the opposition between the mental (the deep structure) and the sensorial (the superficial structure).^3 (Corbo)

This segregation of the deep/ mental structure and the sensorial structure is what forms the basis of Eisenman’s ideology. And this ideology when put into constructing a building would mean doing so irrespective of the needs of functionality, symmetry or aesthetics and hence his works are labeled as deconstructivist.

The Memorial to the Murdered Jews, Berlin

The idea of building the memorial was reduce the meaning of experience as much as possible, drawing a parallel to the situation in the holocaust cells, Eisenman further explains that the memorial gained inspiration from the fact that the holocaust cells reduced of the meaning of experience.

Eisenman’s ideology fits perfectly into the project of constructing a memorial for the murdered jews. The memorial fully consumes the architect’s ideology of breaking down and segregating experience and understanding.  As mentioned earlier, Eisenman’s philosophy persistently seeks to reiterate the separation of experience and understanding. The experience of a building, he mentions, must not uncover the understanding of the building.

Jacques Derrida

His works, hence, always suggest a notion of breaking pre existing notions in new ways through deconstructivism.

Later, he talks of Jacques Derrida, a famous French philosopher who, Eisenman follows meticulously, and his theory which in  a way provides an explanation to the constant reluctance of the users and the people towards deconstructivism.

The reason why deconstructivism is not widely accepted by its users, keeping aside the overwhelming form and the fact that experience is segregated from understanding, is that this ideology doesn’t suggest a direct link to origin and truth in architecture. It appears to many as frivolous because the form and experience are incapapble of being understood by a people who have always related to built with familiar symbols and forms.

Jacques Derrida helped understand this problematic constraint which often crops up in Eisenman’s and other deconstructivist architects’ works.

Conclusion

Peter Eisenman is an  architect who strongly supports the notion of having solid and strong ideas and ideologies.  Built, he says, is not the solution or answer to all the problems. Great architects, he says are those who write strong philosophies in architecture, such as Alberti, Vitruvius, Rem Koolhas etc. Comparing writing to building, writing provides scope for reflection and reading architecture means revisiting a philosophy or a detail about the building. The experience through a building is however only one time. Deconstructivism, hence holds strong ground- historically and philosophically.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

 Book :  From Formalism to weak Form by Stefano Corbo

Interview by Peter Engelmann

RESEARCH PAPER GOTHIC REVIVAL

Gothic Revival

“Spira, spera”.

(Breathe, hope)

― Victor Hugo, The Hunchback of Notre Dam

Gothic- represents that aspect of the human emotion which illustrates the struggle of the people, their anger, their superstitions and their struggle to live through tough times.

Gothic- be it architecture or art has been a form which represents the energy of the people who suffered, who were denied justice but yet sustained hope.

Above all, this expression is a symbol of hope and liberation.

The Gothic Revival movement is one that, evidently, got its roots from the original Gothic movement.

This paper shall discuss the genesis of the Gothic revival.

The Gothic revival movement was a result of many movements which took place since the 17^th century, starting with the age of enlightenment to romanticism and finally to the Gothic revival.

In this paper, we shall discuss how and which elements, in every movement since the 17^th century, affected the Gothic revival movement.

Studying the original Gothic movement first is important in order to understand the key elements of Gothic architecture and how this particular kind of architecture made the people feel.

The original Gothic style was actually developed to bring sunshine into people's lives, and especially into their churches. To get past the accrued definitions of the centuries, it's best to go back to the very start of the word Gothic, and to the style that bears the name.

The Goths were a so-called barbaric tribe who held power in various regions of Europe, between the collapse of the Roman Empire and the establishment of the Holy Roman Empire (so, from roughly the fifth to the eighth century). They were not renowned for great achievements in architecture. As with many art historical terms, “Gothic” came to be applied to a certain architectural style after the fact.

The style represented giant steps away from the previous, relatively basic building systems that had prevailed. The Gothic grew out of the Romanesque architectural style, when both prosperity and peace allowed for several centuries of cultural development and great building schemes. From roughly 1000 to 1400, several significant cathedrals and churches were built, particularly in Britain and France, offering architects and mason a chance to work out ever more complex problems and daring designs.

The most fundamental element of the Gothic style of architecture is the pointed arch, which was likely borrowed from Islamic architecture that would have been seen in Spain at this time. The pointed arch relieved some of the thrust, and therefore, the stress on other structural elements. It then became possible to reduce the size of the columns or piers that supported the arch.

So, rather than having massive, drum-like columns as in the Romanesque churches, the new columns could be more slender. This slimness was repeated in the upper levels of the nave, so that the gallery and clerestory would not seem to overpower the lower arcade. In fact, the column basically continued all the way to the roof, and became part of the vault.

In the vault, the pointed arch could be seen in three dimensions where the ribbed vaulting met in the center of the ceiling of each bay. This ribbed vaulting is another distinguishing feature of Gothic architecture. However, it should be noted that prototypes for the pointed arches and ribbed vaulting were seen first in late-Romanesque buildings.

The slender columns and lighter systems of thrust allowed for larger windows and more light. The windows, tracery, carvings, and ribs make up a dizzying display of decoration that one encounters in a Gothic church. In late Gothic buildings, almost every surface is decorated. Although such a building as a whole is ordered and coherent, the profusion of shapes and patterns can make a sense of order difficult to discern at first glance.

In human representation, where the Classical style was both naturalistic and idealistic, the Gothic style was crude, caricature-like, grotesque and exaggerated. This could be compared “expressionist’ art, a style pioneered in the late 19th-early 20th century in which the artist seeks to express emotional experience rather than impressions of the physical world.

It is in the great churches and cathedrals and in a number of civic buildings that the Gothic style was expressed most powerfully, its characteristics lending themselves to appeal to the emotions.

Gothic architecture had a lot to say in terms of human emotion as well.

The Gothic style expressed the essence of the Catholic faith, concerned with creating a sense of the numinous, of the presence of God, while still incorporating older Pagan (nature-worship) symbolism: gargoyles, elemental spirits whose purpose was to ward off evil.

Gothic art expressed the apocalyptic ("millennial anxiety," sense that a great day of judgment and/or catastrophic change is at hand, which some writers see paralleled in our own age) mood of the period, and the strong belief in the authority of God and the Church combined with the need to understand the meaning of suffering and death.

From the Gothic style originated the movement of Gothic revival. The events that triggered the Gothic revival were, however different from those which triggered the original Gothic movement. However, there are detailed accounts of the events which led to the Gothic revival movement, concluding with the probabilities of the genesis of the event and in what ways the genesis of the Gothic revival movement was similar to that of the original Gothic movement.

Tracing back the events which led to the Gothic revival, the first event we come across is the Age of Enlightenment.

The Age of Enlightenment (or simply the Enlightenment or Age of Reason) was a cultural movement of intellectuals beginning in late 17th-century Europe emphasizing reason and individualism rather than tradition. Its purpose was to reform society using reason, to challenge ideas grounded in tradition and faith, and to advance knowledge through the scientific method.

Originating in the 17th century, it was sparked by philosophers Francis Bacon (1562-1626), Baruch Spinoza (1632–1677), John Locke (1632–1704), Pierre Bayle (1647–1706), Voltaire (1694–1778) and physicist Isaac Newton (1643–1727).[3] Ruling princes often endorsed and fostered these figures and even attempted to apply their ideas of government in what was known as enlightened absolutism.

The scientific revolution

The Scientific Revolution is closely tied to the Enlightenment, as its discoveries overturned many traditional concepts and introduced new perspectives on nature and man's place within it. The Enlightenment flourished until about 1790–1800. The history of science during the Age of Enlightenment traces developments in science and technology during the Age of Reason, when Enlightenment ideas and ideals were being disseminated across Europe and North America.

Science came to play a leading role in Enlightenment discourse and thought. Many Enlightenment writers and thinkers had backgrounds in the sciences and associated scientific advancement with the overthrow of religion and traditional authority in favour of the development of free speech and thought.

As with most Enlightenment views, the benefits of science were not seen universally; Jean-Jacques Rousseau criticized the sciences for distancing man from nature and not operating to make people happier.

Science during the Enlightenment was dominated by scientific societies and academies, which had largely replaced universities as centres of scientific research and development.

The philosophers, during the age of enlightenment had a great influence on the movement as well.

Amongst the prominent philosophers was John Locke.

The English philosopher and political theorist John Locke (1632-1704) laid much of the groundwork for the Enlightenment and made central contributions to the development of liberalism.

His essays on religious tolerance provided an early model for the separation of church and state.

The separation of the state from the church meant that the beliefs of the state and hence its people were now independent of the church. This separation grew, in the years to come with the beginning of the scientific revolution.

Amongst those who did not completely had faith in the enlightenment movement, were Immanuel Kant and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. He had a double relationship with the movement, on one hand he believed that enlightenment meant the almost blind faith in the almightiness of human reason. However, Rousseau rejected the tyranny of Reason and advocated the return to nature and the revival of inner feeling.

In the field of physics, laws governing motion of material objects were formulated, theory of inertia, gravity were among the other discoveries during the scientific revolution.

Similarly, important discoveries like the discovery of elements in nature and a new model of the universe also took place during the revolution.

The scientific revolution carried forward the ideology of reason. Everything that man knows is by reason, man’s existence can be defined through reason. Religion, superstition, and fear were replaced by reason and knowledge.

With the onset of the scientific revolution, religion started to take a back seat.

More recently, sociologist and historian of science Steven Shapin opened his book, The Scientific Revolution, with the paradoxical statement: "There was no such thing as the Scientific Revolution, and this is a book about it." Although historians of science continue to debate the exact meaning of the term, and even its validity, the scientific revolution still remains a useful concept to interpret the many changes in science itself.

More than the scientific discoveries, the scientific revolution was an era that marked the change in relationship between man and nature, the people’s independence from the church and the prominence of reason.

The discoveries and inventions during the scientific revolution gave birth to the industrial revolution.

The industrial revolution was an era of mechanization and mass production. Machines did everything. The machines, however, did not only impact the economy and social structure, they affected the people as a whole.

They overturned man’s traditional concepts and introduced a new perspective on nature.

Man’s relationship with nature hadn’t changed as radically as it had during the industrial revolution. The age of enlightenment and the scientific revolution were building blocks of theory which finally gave rise to the industrial revolution in practice.

The impact of mass production was not just positive. The events that follow in history (romanticism, catholic and gothic revival) after the industrial revolution prove this.

Constant mass production and machine production had left the people with a sense of loss of individuality and religion. Since the age of enlightenment, although individualism prevailed, reason had replaced religious belief.

However, the sense of individualism was lost during the industrial revolution with the onset of mass production.

Hence what followed the industrial revolution in the 19^th century was a counter enlightenment movement, where the liberals felt the urge to return to their roots and felt that the forces of imagination, mystery and sentiment needed to be revived. These liberals were later called the romantics.

An artistic and intellectual hostility developed towards the industrialization during the later half of the industrial revolution. This movement emphasized the importance of nature in art and language in contrast to monstrous factories and machines.

The liberals stressed upon the importance of the individual and individualism and this became the slogan of the liberals.

Certain philosophers, however had a different opinion.

From the viewpoint of Marx and Engels, the individual was a negligible thing in the eyes of the nation. Marx and Engels denied that the individual played a role in historical evolution. According to them, history goes its own way. The material productive forces go their own way, developing independently of the wills of individuals. And historical events come with the inevitability of a law of nature.

Despite varying opinions, romanticism as a whole, was seen as a movement, which brought back religion, sentiment and individualism back.

Romanticism had many offshoot movements, two of them being the Catholic revival and the Gothic revival.

The Catholic revival was a movement which focused on bringing back religion into the lives of the people. Having lost its importance during the age of enlightenment till the industrial revolution, religion in England needed to be revived. In the form of structure, religion took the aid of gothic churches, this later came to be known as the Gothic revival movement.

Gothic revival was not merely a revival of the gothic style to bring back religion into the lives of the people, it also had something to do with the style of building as well.

As discussed earlier, the gothic architecture was symbolic of rebellion. During the catholic revival in the 19^th century, people(the liberals) were shifting from the idealistic scientific norms and mundane mass production to a more humanistic, compassionate and emotionally responsive state of mind.

So, when religion needed to be introduced into the lives of the people, Gothic architecture was chosen as a physical representation. For Gothic architecture stood for being extreme, seemingly uncontrolled, larger than life, intending to invoke a strong emotional response, whether awe, pity, compassion, horror or fear.

The tall spire like façade inculcated a sense of awe and fear with beautiful rose windows, allowing rays of sunlight to gush into the interiors of the high ceilinged cathedral.

The ribbed vaults and flying buttresses added a crude and caricature like human touch to the entire built form.

The Gothic style was developed to bring in more light into the lives of the people.

The slender columns, allowed more light into the church by providing larger sized windows.

Hence the genesis of the Gothic revival is an entire cycle, starting from the age of enlightenment, which brought to light the importance of reason, side tracking religion, however giving importance to individualism, to the scientific and industrial revolution which not only emphasized upon the importance of reason but also lost the element of individualism.

The gothic revival was a reaction to the events, which took place in the centuries earlier.

Sources

1.http://www.torontopubliclibrary.ca/search.jsp;jsessionid=8nKMH0MMgax+-QtT7EYu1Q__?Ntt=Gothic+revival+(Literature)--History+and+criticism.&Ntk=Subject_Search_Interface

2. https://www.boundless.com/art-history/europe-and-america-in-the-1700s-and-early-1800s/neoclassicism-in-britain/the-gothic-revival/

3.http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/988353?uid=3738256&uid=2129&uid=2&uid=70&uid=4&sid=21103606755901

4.http://www.thamesandhudson.com/The_Gothic_Revival/9780500203590

5. http://counterlightsrantsandblather1.blogspot.in/2008/07/gothic-revival-industry-and-social.html

6.http://books.google.co.in/books?id=xGBlSmSrt48C&pg=PA131&dq=industrial+revolution+and+gothic+revival&hl=en&sa=X&ei=hl5AU6jYEMG5rgfsx4DYBA&ved=0CEEQ6AEwBA#v=onepage&q=industrial%20revolution%20and%20gothic%20revival&f=false

PUNJABI BAROQUE AND OTHER MEMORIES OF ARCHITECTURE

Book Review

PUNJABI BAROQUE AND OTHER MEMORIES OF ARCHITECTURE

Eesha Bajaj

Gautam Bhatia, Punjabi Baroque and other memories of architecture,

1993,New Delhi, 265 pages.

This book is based on the personal viewpoint of the author. According to him, the book sounds autobiographical, however it is not meant to communicate his fortune or misfortune, but to reflect upon a common condition that affects most middle class Indian professionals.

It is a beautifully blunt book. Initially the reader would assume it to be 200 pages of cynical views of the typical Indian who obviously does not appreciate any of what the country is or has, thrown in with a bunch of complaints about the broken roads and open drains.

In the book the author talks about a set of very peculiar kind of styles, which have developed in India. He very bluntly talks about these peculiar styles in a very bitter manner, an approach I find hard to agree with. One of the reasons of the disagreement being the overdose of bitterness with which he describes architecture in his own country. It talks about how architecture as a profession in India has turned into an ugly cycle of copy paste and make money.

Mr. Bhatia talks about how the distinction between building and architecture is taking shape in India today. How India views this distinction, and how its architects apply it in their practice and how people's (client) choices have been shaped by this current generation of architects who are trained to design cathedrals but whose job is to build cowsheds.

 Its about how the Indian mentality of copying the west, starts with education and how this education has carried forward into practice and application in architecture. How we are blindfolded and copy European architecture.

It is because that's HOW we're taught, in fact that's WHAT we are taught. The Indian architect has fooled its clients into believing that what he is doing by adding a Doric column in the residence, is transforming a BUILDING into ARCHITECTURE! Well that's the only way we put are knowledge to use. 

Architecture has a very strong relation with the economy. Because we have obscenely rich businessmen in our country, the buildings that we see today are a result of not an architect’s designing capabilities but a result of what is in the heads of these moneymakers, which is obviously what the architects have brainwashed them about before, the entire saga of how to turn your house into a brilliant piece of architecture!

So, since all of these moneymakers, policy makers and people who run our country can have a piece of architecture in the comfort of their own homes, why invest time and money into beautifying the public areas?

What Mr. Bhatia has written would hurt the eyes of many, but this book is a slap in the face of those money hungry policy makers and politicians who are literally eating away the country, destroying the lives of millions and also taking down with all this an entire profession.

Mr. Bhatia reminds us of what a dangerous era we Indians are entering into.

A vivid description of the all buildings, which have been built by mindless copying, is all very well, but then one expects an equally vivid description on how to fix these or at least reason explaining, in the author’s opinion, distasteful practices which ‘can evoke as much delight as it does disgust’.

Hence in the last chapter, New ways, the author talks about the reasons for his vividly bitter descriptions regarding Indian architecture. He reasons with the architect by explaining as to why a blatant copy just doesn’t fit into or work in a place where the entire city has been conventionally built in a vernacular style. He talks of regional appropriateness, which will strike a chord with most of the readers.

Since this book urges the reader to think, the whole reading experience turns into constant dialogue between the author and the reader.

 Being in agreement with the author, I see no harm in being inspired from anything that we see. However, what the author very rightly explains is that we Indians have taken the word ‘Inspiration’ for granted, so much so, that we have started categorizing blatantly copying historic European buildings as inspiration.

In my opinion, the reason why we aren’t quite successful in being truly ‘inspired’ is because of the gap between the architect and the mason. It has increased to a point where the lack of communication is affecting the final outcome. To reiterate my point I would like to take the example of Ar.Dharmesh, Dharmesh is an architect practicing in Auroville. A major part of his design process includes discussion with the master mason.

So, the architect creates the design, which is his expertise, and he discusses it with the masons in order to look for the best material, which can be used to execute that design.

An architect should have hands on experience with masonry and construction and keep the channels of communication open with those building on site.

Architectural practice in India has become dictatorial.

Although this book starts off on a harsh note, it is filled with honest and ruthlessly truthful opinions regarding architecture in India today, which, shockingly, by the end of the book, the reader would agree with.

This book is for not only those pursuing architecture, but is for all those who are either in the process of building a house or dreaming of having a home of their own one day. Including a little architectural sense in one’s dream house wouldn’t hurt.

The eyes of the skin

The eyes of the skin has been written by Prof. Juhani Pallasmaa.

The title speaks volumes for itself. At first, it seems that out of the two senses mentioned in the title, sight is being referred to as the dominant one. As one reads through Pallasmaa’s interpretation of spaces and his ideas on the importance of the other senses and tactility, however ,one understands the title of the book only better.

Through out the first few pages in the book the author talks about the importance of the other senses of our body, how sight seems too be the dominant of all senses and how peripheral vision plays an important role in our experiences of space and architecture.

It is stressed time and again how vision has usurped our understanding of the world and how the other senses are treated as supplementary, through no apparent flaw of their own.

What we feel and hear and smell, usually takes a back seat when it comes to expressing our opinion of a space. He questions this and forces the reader to realize such a blatant flaw in our perception.

He further mentions peripheral vision. He talks about how the experiential quality is moulded by not only sight but hapticity and peripheral vision.

Combing the argument put before, about how sight seems to be dominant of all senses and how peripheral vision should shape our experience, he brings to light the importance of certain things which are slightly recessed. We feel, but we think the experience was a result of what we saw, we are awe inspired and overwhelmed by the Qutab Minar but don’t realize that the Quatb Minar’s scale is only enhanced by its surroundings. The surroundings is what makes the Qutab Minar the awe-inspiring minaret that it is. Take that out, and it is a mere image supplementing the text of some book in our history course.

He very beautifully puts across his views as ‘ focused vision is like a confrontation whereas a peripheral vision lets us into the flesh of the world’.

Further , he quotes many philosophers and thinkers and  their views on the importance and dominance of the skin over other senses.

After reading, go back to the title of the book. The perception of senses changes completely. It seems as if sight is the dominant one and the title seems to imply the same, however, getting a deeper understanding, we realize that the one sense with which we can feel and understand the most is the skin, the properties that the skin has, no other sense has. The eyes provide us with sight, the picture we get only through the eyes is very confrontational, whereas when sight is combined with the other sense, skin or touch,  ‘picture’ starts becoming an experience. The skin has he ability to perceive all the senses together in a manner that the rest do not.

Sight, taste, smell, sound when functioning alone will give us a picture, but the skin is responsible for changing that flat picture into an experience, it takes us from one dimension to another, it

We have forgotten how to perceive ,on an intellectual plane with our skin and thus have managed to submerse ourselves in this “ technological breakdown” where everything is seen and nothing felt.

Hauz Khas

Hauz Khas Village. 

For us young people, it's the place to be. There's an uppity commercial street offering the best food and drinks and there's a nice old fort to give it a nice "feel". I've been visiting the streets of hauz khas almost everyday for the past two weeks and what I've found was not what I was expecting to find. 

I visited the basti behind the parking lot and met an old lady, Murti aunty, her family has been living there for decades, generations have been born there and died there in the same house. This is the response I got when I asked her if the loud music on the weekends playing in the pubs troubled her and I quote her reaponse , " हम तो परेशान हैं बेटा. लड़का लड़की कुछ भी करना शुरू कर देते हैं यहां, दारू इतनी पी लेते हैं कि अपने आप को संभाल नई पाते. हमारे घर पर बोतल तोड़ते हैं, लड़ाई करते हैं. गंजा पीने वाले छोटे छोटे बच्चों को भी शामिल करते हैं. किसिंग और सेक्स भी करना शुरू कर दिया है. "

" We're fed up. Girls and boys do absolutely anything here, they drink so much that they can't handle themselves. They break glass bottles on our house wall and fight with us. Weed smokers involve and influence small children. Kissing and sex has also started happening here". Now sympathy will do nothing here. All I'm trying to share is the matter or rather question of perspective. This is their home, for us it's a space designated for leisure. So, why can't we fix this? Why have we forgotten to be sensitive to the needs of our own people? Why can't we take a 180° turn, change our perspective and understand? 

All of these pictures is Hauz Khas. It's two worlds existing together, but just existing,not living together. This space is a brilliant example of the economic disparity that exists in every part of the world. The rich use it for recreation and the poor live here. Sounds odd when I put it that way. We'll, obviously the poor came here and settled decades ago, much before the commercial street existed. Our economic disparities are making two groups of people, living in the same city, exist together, but giving no potential to ever live together.

Whose perspective do we look at?

Utopia

“The many great gardens of the world, of literature and poetry, of painting and music, of religion and of architecture, all make the point as clear as possible. The soul cannot thrive in the absence of a garden, If you don’t want paradise, you are not human; and if you are not human, you don’t have a soul.”

                                                                                                                      -Sir Thomas More

The human imagination has no bounds, and we have taken it to unimaginable possibilities and beyond; many such possibilities having come to life.

One such idea was the idea of Utopia, the existence of a society with no flaws, perfect in every sense, where everything runs as smoothly as can possibly be.

The idea of Utopia first came appeared in Plato’s republic, where he gives his idea of how an ideal society should function and how that society can cultivate more peaceful peoples.

Later, Sir Thomas More used the same term to describe Utopia as an imaginary society and how it exists in isolation, in his book Utopia.

Ever since, Sir Thomas More’s proposed society has become the blue print for a realistic working nation. However, he did not intend to do so while proposing the idea of an ideal society through his book Utopia.

Human imagination has no bounds, but our imagination needs a trigger. Perhaps the idea of Utopia came into existence in times of war.

The logic behind these statements would be that, we realize the value of something only when it’s gone or we don’t have it. So, the greatest ideas of a peaceful society were perhaps developed in an environment, which was completely violent, which is a contradiction in terms.

The point is that, need is the trigger. Although the Utopian society proposed by Sir Thomas More has become the blue print for a realistic society, but looking at it today, the IDEA of a Utopian society is what we wish to achieve, not how he described Utopia in his book as.

In the 21^st Century, there are a variety of ‘needs’ and hence a variety of ‘triggers’. Hence all of us have our own version of a Utopian world. So, it’s difficult to describe and define Utopia as such.

 Life in the 21^st century is very different from what it was back in 1516, when Sir Thomas More wrote the book. We live in a society, which offers everything ‘instantly’, be it food, information, luxury, pleasure, relaxation.

With changing times, the idea of Utopia has also changed. Today, along with ‘instant’ food, entertainment, luxury etc., we have instant Utopia as well. Places like Las Vegas and the Disney movies are said to be the Instant Utopias of the 21^st Century, many also call it ‘Fake Utopia’, which is a paradox.

 The reason for it being called ‘Fake’, according to Ken Sanes, would be that it postulates and promotes the ideology of instant happiness, and we all know that without hard work and time there is no success or happiness.

So is Disney to be blamed for teaching us how to dream but not teaching us how to achieve it?

One could either criticize this bunch of Fake Utopias on how it teaches children to wait for your prince charming to find you or wait for your fairy godmother to wave her wand and make everything perfect.

Or look at the bigger picture; look at what it teaches children in the end. The happy endings are not false promises; they teach the children a very important lesson of life- hope and faith.

What sources of entertainment like Disney are doing is only helping us in expanding our horizons of imagination.

True it does offer an escape into another world, but as citizens of the 21^st century, with innumerable distractions, and living the fast life, the source via which we expand the horizons of our imagination also needs to be radical and escapism in my opinion is radical enough, given that we come back to reality to implement and achieve our ‘dreams’.

Saying that Disney falsifies our desire of a better world would be incorrect.

The ideology that Utopia as a concept is promoting is the ideology of perfection and people living in a ‘perfect’ society.

However, we all know, that there is no growth in a society where there is no change, where everything is perfect. In a society where nothing changes and is perfect might be seen as an ideal society but changing our perspective, it is also a stagnant society.

Change is inevitable, is the only constant and is also a vital element for a civilization to survive in contentment.

Now, looking back at the idea Utopia, it seems completely imprudent.

If the idea of Utopia can change and vary over a span of time, the means to achieve it will also change.

The concept of Utopia, has been polished and understood better over the years. And I believe that the way the message is being conveyed by the Disney movies, cannot be understood better. The reason being that we live in a world which thrives on competition, we as adults know well that there is nothing for those who don’t work hard.. The one important lesson anybody learns living in the 21^st century is that hard work is the way to a better life. So, we know the value of hard work well.

In the midst of all the struggle and hard work we get to watch these brilliant movies which show us ideas undreamed-of, show children how to have faith and hope even in the harshest of conditions, teach young girls that they don’t need a prince charming to be happy; we get to visit places like Las Vegas which take us to another world and show us what its like to have all the things that we could ever dream of. These instant utopias give us a channel into the possibilities of what life has to offer.

Hence in my opinion, the instant utopias like the Disney movies and places like Las Vegas are more realistic than the concept of Utopia, they are the perfect amalgamation of dreams and reality.