terra rise.
A documentation book by Aditya Bharadwaj.
a c k n o w l e d g m e n t s This project is one that would not have achieved what it has if not for all the scrutinizing discourse, and poetic dialogue bartered amongst people influencing itself, and in turn myself. To begin with, I’d like to express my sincere gratitude toward the BMRCL and Mr. Vasanth Rao, for providing us a platform to perform. I am grateful to have a class full of people that help churn my ideas and create. The guidance from Agnishikha Choudhuri, Amitabh Kumar, Arzu Mistry, and Samir Parker has been invaluable in the growth of this project. Finally, I’d like to thank my friends and family for all the support through this journey.
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“the more perfect the artist, the more completely separate in him will be the man who suffers and the mind which creates.� -T.S. Eliot
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index getting comfortable.. 6 cartography.. 16 ruminate.. 23 crystal clear.. 29 epilogue.. 59
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getting comfortable. The project began with exploring different metro stations along the green and purple line alike. It got us warmed up to their existence in a historical, spatial, civic and cultural context. It helped identify the metro as a function of a larger entity, like the city.
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Observing Peenya metro station from different vantage points helped grasp the physical scale at which we would be working.
Thinking through sketching is a process that proved effective when deducing information as such, and futher representing them.
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Swiftly, Namma Metro became the epicenter of our thoughts and concurrently our practice. 11
Building upon, and working with metaphors to abstract the Metro station fueled many of the ideas behind the final outcome of the project. The metaphor chosen here was the metro as an organism. It was an attempt to showcase the metro as an organism, alive with sounds, stories, gestures, motion and mannerisms alike.
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By being able to map the entire purple line using the imagery inspired by the microbial world, I was able to identify that it was an element of the organic that was absent from the functionally flawless metro station. Survey-
ing the unpopular areas of the Peenya landscape revealed a scape of forestland, before the whip of urbanization. The metro line is almost like an incision along the landscape stitching the encroaching urban drift. 15
audio cartography. After getting acclimatized to the workings of a metro station it was time to evaluate various possibilities of installing a piece of art in the metro. During a walk toward Attur Lake, Manush and I became aware of the presence and effect of sound all around us. It seemed ephemeral but profound. A 1km radius, sectional map was put together to represent auditory elements of that space. When pondered upon, the possibilities of using sound as a medium in Peenya metro station seemed endless. Many experiments were done to try and reimagine a map through sound but unlike maps, sound does not rely on surfaces or depths, it penetrates them. The experiments with sound in a metro station proved ineffective because of the excessive background sounds that interfered with recreating an environment through sound.
Mapping Peenya through sounds in the surrounding environment. 17
The project reached an abrupt stand still. Cancelling sound in a metro station was not possible due to high levels of background sound. The technicalities to simplify these sound waves to an inverse silent sound wave was beyond my cognitive capabilities. This gave rise to a creative stagnation. It was time to rethink my position in the metro station and articulate what it was I was trying to communicate.
ruminate..
During the exhibition I was assisting Raj Palan with his mural and Sayori Mukherjee with her garden project. This gave me time to ruminate over my position as an artist in Peenya. The rigor (both in thought and work) involved helped me realize that I was merely trying to evoke thought through my art. It could be simple, yet evocative. Trying to create a pause in a space of transience was my fundamental inquiry. Exploring these two projects simultaneously, gave rise the idea of painting an image with plants. Material like rocks, bark, leaf, plants, sand, and the lot of it made the starkly metropolitan metro station, feel soft and tranquil.
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crystal
clear
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terrarium : Terrariums are sealed transparent globes or similar containers in which an ecosystem is created. The reason behind chosing an enclosed environment was to provide the flora protection, from
fire hazards within the metro. Additionaly, using glass in particular, stems from symbolizing the metro as an object, shiny and precisely fabricated.
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Researching organic material and reflecting upon the feeling it evokes. 35
inspired by different terrains and equipped with new tools, i was ready to start creating.
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piecing together a terrarium in a bulb.
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the idea of minimising landscapes to fit the confines of a glass box sprouted. it almost seamlessly blends painting and image with creating an ecosystem.
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Trying to recreate snippets of natural environments, emphasizing on the miniature.
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Working with scale and scene... 49
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THIS IS A TERRASCAPE. 55
epilogue Before it became a clutter of factories that it is, Peenya resonated a green, calm, euphonic locality, lush with trees and a grass-cushioned ground. It is a paramount landmark in the city’s development, showcasing the steady rise of urbanization. Although, there is an underlying biotic character that reminds oneself of a more bucolic Peenya. As Yi-Fu Tuan said, “The city is just a monotonous background to our everyday lives�. The idea behind this project is to subtly evoke the mind to observe the movement of stillness whilst journeying the metro; to capture the animate within the inanimate. It is an attempt at throwing someone into a reverie, hopefully, blurring the lines between transience and permanence. If the tools are present and the idea in place, this project can go beyond working within the restrictions of a glass box. As far as function is concerned, an irrigation system will provide for a constant flow of water and nutrients. The various organisms at work do the rest. Availability of resources like drip-irrigation systems, strengthened glass, underwater substrate, flora, and other landscaping material will expand the possibilities of this project immensely. The art board would be open to more surreal and evokative terrascapes.
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