Shree: On Architecture

 

Shree: On Architecture

If one focuses on mere architectonic space then one has already “fallen” from rich reservoirs of Inspiration. A form is meaningless if it does not stem from deeper experiences of existence – that which encompass the senses, time, scales, communities, environment and so on.  This may or may not be easy as a formula – perhaps a struggle is inevitable but the struggle is what is required to anchor oneself to creation – something coming out  from the individual but has an imprint of the collective One. Accordingly, an appropriate “experience” is shaped or crafted and architecture becomes only an incidental stage to express or contain or give a form to such an internal experience.  In this way, an approach to creation becomes a concept and is not a frivolous play of an individualized or atomized mind. If I only experience space without becoming aware of architectural elements that make the experience, then architecture has become divine. If the attention is anchored only on architectural attributes, then there exists no depth to the experience so crafted.

Is this an individual act or a collective one? It can be either as long as above mental process has taken place. What we mean is that it hardly matters who is doing it – is it one person or a community, since philosophically an individual can transcend self made barriers and can sense the transcendental dimension.

The purpose of architecture should be able for the creator and the user to touch upon the above mentioned divine dimensions in the act of doing and engaging; else for what reason would architecture exist if not for ascertaining the presence of spiritual dimension? The tangible or the concrete has the trigger of the intangible – let us remind ourselves so.

Hari Om.