The Optimistic City
One of the first European descriptions of the Jagannath Temple in Puri, Odisha, describes vivid scenes of pilgrims at the time “casting themselves under the wheels of the Chariot in acts of great devotion, and being crushed to death under its unstoppable wheels”. Figuratively, the idea of“something that demands blind devotion or merciless sacrifice” gives us the charming roots of our most enduring metaphor for the city experience, the Juggernaut.
The city as an unstoppable force, a self-evolving entity before which generations whiz past and wither away while the city watches. It’s an idea that’s endured through our understanding of the history and evolution of city fabrics and one that we bolster often with nostalgic talks of “how things used to be”.
What we fail to articulate here is the felt distance between the juggernaut and us, and our own personal definitions that almost pre-assume that nothing can be changed, and everything is out of control. To refer to something as “unstoppable”is to create a chasm between it and us, a metaphorical throwing up of the hands, and a blind acceptance of our impotency. John Updike put it well, “But cities aren’t like people; they live on and on, even though their reason for being where they are has gone downriver and out to sea.”
Two cities exist. And both are hidden in plain sight.
The city we know well is defined by top-down processes, the city of the municipal corporations, one that is a work in progress, and is created for its citizens. This is the result of laws and petitions, and teams of workers scurrying through a fine grid of capillaries to service the giant. We interact with this city when we use its highways, spot a sign on a crossroads, and marvel at its largesse. This city is the city of large networks, locomotion and transport,infrastructure and construction. The topdown city creates the bare bones of a city giant, that is then opened up to living people to populate. This city is shaped by forces beyond our control, defined by large decisions taken behind closed doors, and sweeping changes put into action where vast tracts of land are parcelled off, renamed and auctioned. All this without so much as a whiff of this escaping the badly ventilated corridors of power.
But there is another city in the cracks.
The second city is the city of the people, living souls expressing themselves in whichever way they know best, a loose agglomeration of bottom-up processes that shape their immediate surroundings.
This is the city of incidental gardens, of a Nativity scene at a street corner, of the colourcoordinated flowers in the balcony of that sweet old cottage. This is a hands-on city, it makes no distinction between personal and public space, it looks to improve, to improvise and to adapt to anything that’s thrown its way. The felt impulse to add to a shared experience is a driving force behind this. This city is formed mostly by art, in its loosest and possibly most accurate definition.
This city is defined by optimism. The contagious attitude of finding the best in everything. When we manage to score entry to this beautiful land we get an all-access past to the backstage. Here the city is considered a canvas, where everything is subjective, everything is transient, and anything can be altered. In Rotterdam, the city has framed an Urban Protocol for Artist participation. It engages artists of all kinds in participating actively in city initiatives, and is a fantastic symbiotic relationship between Art and the City. Closer home, our local blossoming street Art scene drives the point home. We recently saw theDelhi Street Art festival create massive city pride and optimism through a beautifully curated initiative. Large battleships splash paint across a deep chasm in Hauz Khas village while large cats roll balls of wool in Shahpur Jat. The benefits are unreal. The art makes streets more walkable, the city more inspiring, and people smile more.
“Cities have the capability of providing something for everybody, only because, and only when, they are created by everybody� Jane Jacobs.
The challenge of our times then, seems to be to migrate vast tracts of people to this, more immediate city, and convert ourselves from being observers and consumers of the city experience to becoming active users and contributors. We feel strongly that the clue to seeding this migration lies in the redefinition of our own “spheres of influence”. This sphere is an imaginary volume around our bodies that we tend to control. In compacted cities, increasingly like the ones we inhabit, our spheres end within a few inches of our bodies. This is the biggest reason we’re comfortable keeping our own homes clean, but chucking junk outside on the street.
It’s this felt distance between the city and us that breeds apathy.
The big leap is to make this sphere more promiscuous, more inclusive and a lot more engaging. The trick is redraw the boundaries of this sphere. If we decided that this line exists just 6 feet outside our own felt limits, the city changes overnight.
Banksy calls the city “A Party where everyone’s invited”. As soon as we accept this invitation, the city is ours for the taking.