Introduction

In 1975, C. A. Doxiadis, the Greek Architect planner warned that “ we are in a middle of a major ecological crisis on a global scale. We have no practical experience that will help us to meet it, as it is the first crisis of such seriousness and magnitude in historical times” Twenty years later, the world of architecture today presents an image of confusion and chaos. The heroic vision of early modern architects of “house as a machine to live in” (Le Corbusier) has been over taken by “ Complexity and Contradictions” (Robert Venturi) in our built environment reflecting the unprecedented ecologic, economic, political, social and human crisis. While on one hand the unfolding of scientific and technological revolution in the form of information technology and bio-technology have created unprecedented opportunity for globalization, the age-old ethnic and regional strife have staged an ironic come-back. This has found its manifestation in culture and architecture. Some like Fritjof Capra believe that this crisis is a result of “mechanical Cartesian thinking” and call for a new “wholistic” conceptual ramework to identify and resolve the issues in a harmonious manner. There have been many eclectic efforts during the wave of post-modernism to find alternatives to proclaimed demise of modern architecture (C.Jencks). The crisis in architecture seems to be more fundamental and deep-rooted. Rather than trying to understand its complexity within the narrow domain of “ architectural aesthetics”, it would be more worthwhile to critically evaluate the issues in context of “architectural environment”. The theme of the Symposium on “Appropriateness of Means” provides a good framework to undertake a review.

Appropriate definition of architectural profession

At the outset, I would like to refer to some of the critical remarks of Manfredo Tafuri about the state of architecture,. He wrote in his incisive criticism of design in the contemporary world that the profession of architecture was a dying field. He gave two vital clues to this phenomenon, the first was the accelerating drop-out rate of students from the courses in architecture in European universities. While the second, perhaps more crucial, was the change-over and shift-away from architecture to the new fields by the architects such as industrial design, films, interiors etc. It was shocking to read these remarks, because Tafuri went on to ask a more shocking question. ‘Is there any purpose in saving a dying profession?” Is this the result of the inappropriate approaches in architectural education and profession?

The situation in Asian countries is very different, there are more schools of architecture opening up with much greater enrolment of students in architecture. Take for example, the case of Bombay. We now have 10 colleges of architecture with more than 2500 students and 250 teachers. India has nearly 90 institutions of architectural learning with an overall enrolment of about 4000 students every year! The profession of architecture has been in the forefront of development, as a result the professional scenario is more optimistic. Indeed, it is a great honour for even politicians to get the title of architect of the modern nation! It is in this context, that one probed the alternative options to Tafuri’s pessimistic forecast of eventual death of a noble profession.

On critical examination, it was possible to identify the problem. It was social perception of the profession as mere designers of buildings. More critically it was seen as a kind of fashion designer of facades. John Turner, the British architect, who has done some pioneering work in the field of social housing and slum up-gradation, has described that “housing was not merely a product but more importantly a process” of shaping habitat. Housing was viewed not as a noun but as a verb. Since architectural production involves housing in a big way, nearly 80% of the entire production in the field, one thought that this may be true for the entire profession. Architecture, not merely as product but as process of shaping of the habitat. While discussing this in the Professional Services Board of the Indian Institute of Architects we resolved the issue with a recommendation that architecture should be redefined as “the art and science of built-environment”. This was endorsed by the Indian Institute of Architects (1987) and the Asian Regional Council, Asia ( Arcasia 1988). This opened a new vista for development of architecture.

Appropriate scope of architecture

Architecture as a profession was from its primordial beginning concerned with the entire field of built-environment rather than the question of mere shelter. Take for example, the early cave dwellings or the lake front dwellings or the first primitive huts. The choice of site, the climate, the resource for survival, the territory for security and sustenance were the crucial issues resolved by the early human communities. Rather than the stereotyped interpretation of early art-historians, we need to critically re-examine the development of the profession to identify its mission in the contemporary times and its future course.

Architecture was seen as a practical science of building or construction and its decorative expression was interpreted for its stylistic consistency to categorize and classify the same. The more fundamental cultural and spiritual dimensions were mystified and reduced to mere study of symbols and rituals. As a result, the history of architecture was seen as a record of successive periods of various civilizations and styles. The industrial revolution brought about a new situation leading to reinterpretation of architecture, resulting in development of modernistic architecture. However, the mechanistic thinking restricted its scope to particular ways or means of shaping buildings. It is only recently that a deeper insight has been obtained through the pioneering research by Amos Rappaport and Swiss architectural anthropologist Nold Egenter, that calls for reinterpreting the art and architectural history as an evolutionary development in shaping of human activities, culture, shelter, community and settlement.

As opposed to the Cartesian thinking, in India we have an uninterrupted wholistic tradition of “Vastu Shashtra”, which incorporated selection of site for habitation and agriculture, various trades, designing of the buildings, planning of villages and towns, designing of sacred rituals and a primer of dos and don’ts for various related activities. In a similar way, in China, Japan and Korea, there were similar systems of “architecture” which did not restrict the scope of architecture to mere building. This was distorted during colonial period, where the field of building, engineering and planning were separated from that of architecture. During long years of colonialism, this was accepted as a more modern way of looking at the problem of shaping of built-environment. However, the tradition has to be evolved and practiced into its contemporary state rather than be used as a mere mythical symbol.

Therefore, it was felt by us at the Indian Institute of Architects, that we need to take a fresh look at the scope of architecture. At Ahmedabad convention, I put forth a document which was unanimously approved as the Ahmedabad Declaration, which incorporated studying, surveying, planning, designing, building / constructing, developing, managing built environment within the scope of architecture. These activities could be structured as Architecture of building, interiors, landscape, housing, institutions, facilities, networks, villages, cities, regions and environment. Tafuri had critically pointed out that architects tend to drop their scope in favour of new trades and professions like interior design or environmental design etc. The reduction of the usage of the term architecture in popular language was seen as yet another indicator of the loss of relevance of architecture. Therefore, it was decided that rather than using the term “design”, it would be more appropriate to use the term “ architecture” e.g. interior architecture rather than interior design. One can learn from the field of engineering which came into its institutional structure only in 1750 A.D. and yet during 295 years of its existence, it has developed its branches in almost all fields of built-environment from civil engineering, mechanical, electrical, electronics, to planning, social and now to value engineering. Whereas, we architects tend to get bogged down with our narrow interpretation of the scope of architecture as mere “art and science of buildings”. It was, therefore, a revolutionary step for Indian architects to redefine the scope of architecture incorporating comprehensive activities and services at various scales of built-environment. This enables architects to reorient their creativity as specialists and or as generalists in the various human, social and environmental fields, which in turn leads to a more appropriate architecture.

Appropriate Conceptual Framework

Architecture is often mistaken merely as an art of designing buildings.. It has been our endeavour to correct this mistaken belief by questioning the fundamentals and to critically evaluate the evolution of the profession of architecture. While from its primordial origins, architecture has been concerned with shaping of built – environment.

1. Structure of architecture as a profession.
2. Scope of professional activities. Study, Planning, Designing, Construction, Conservation, Development
3. Aspects of Architecture: Tribal, Rural, Urban, Metropolitan, Regional, Global.
4. Sectors of Activities: Living, Working, Servicing, Producing, Relaxing, Regenerating etc.
5. Management of built-environment: Space ( land, water, air ) Finance, Materials, Services, Legal.
6. Human Community Scale: Individual, Family, Group, Neighbourhood, Community, Humanity.
7. Built Environment Systems: Space, Structure, Built-form, Service infrastructure, Environmental context.
8. Economic Sectors: People, Resources, Primary ( agriculture, animal husbandry..) Secondary ( Manufacturing, Production..) Tertiary ( services, education, social services..)
9. Issues: Ecological / Environmental, Behavioral, Economical, Socio-cultural, Technological, Philosophical ( Ideological / Aesthetical)
10. Action: Philosophy, Policies, Programmes, Projects & Practice
“ Mere appropriate conceptual framework is inadequate to generate a meaningful architecture. It needs to be transformed into a philosophy and has to result in action in terms of policies, programmes and projects that have to be implemented and evaluated.”

Search for appropriateness

In order to evolve an appropriate architecture, it is necessary to have an appropriate conceptual framework. It was discussed in great detail and we arrived at the following criteria for evaluating any architecture to identify its appropriateness:

1. Climate responsiveness.
2. Sensitivity to lifestyle of the people.
3. Social and cultural relevance.
4. Appropriate use of technologies.
5. Generation of meaningful work.
6. Austere use of renewable and non-renewable resources.
7. Making architecture affordable to the common citizen.
8. Active involvement of the community.
9. People’s participation in shaping of the built environment.
10. Innovation in sustainable environmental design.

Restructuring of architectural profession

In order to achieve a more humane and appropriate architecture, there is a need for restructuring architectural profession. Rather than trying to model our profession like “fashion designers” and compete in the global market of architectural commodities and real estate e.g. the cult of golf-course and holiday resort designers which is spreading world-wide, it would be more appropriate to evolve it like “missionaries” of sustainable development, appropriate technology and environmental enrichment. There are precedents in the works of Patrick Geddes in India and Hasan Fathy in Egypt, and there is a living example in Laurie Baker in India, for creation of a more appropriate architecture.

While the majority of architects are engaged in struggle for survival in urban real-estate market producing an architecture of mediocrity, there are some architects who have succeeded in achieving great creative heights. In India some of our leading architects like Achyut Kanvinde, Charles Correa and Balkrishna Doshi have been engaged in creation of an architecture of substance and excellence. In their recent projects for new urban nodes in New Bombay, they have made significant contributions in creation of humane living environment, where their scope of work spanned urban planning, urban design and housing. Laurie Baker’s low-cost housing and institutions in Kerala and Doshi’s Aranya low-cost housing project in Indore and Vidyadharnagar township in Jaipur are shining examples of restructuring of architectural profession in the service of humanity.

The profession of architecture in India has been enriched with the works of architects such as Ashish Ganju, Dulal Mukherjee and Hema Sankalia. They have made significant contribution in developing a new contextual architecture while younger architects like Miki and Madhavi Desai, Bimal Patel, Revathi and Vasanth Kamat, Ashok Lall are charting new paths of appropriate architecture in rural and urban contexts. The real challenges of rural and urban housing are being addressed by the younger architects like P.K. Das, S.K. Das, Pankaj Modi, Sharad Mahajan and B. S. Bhooshan while there are innovative institutional buildings by Bimal Patel, Ashok Lall and Nilkanth Chhaya. Architects like Sen Kapadia and Nitin Killawala are engaged in some stunning creative urban architecture. Together they represent the pursuit of appropriateness and creativity in Indian architecture today.

Restructuring of architectural education

In early nineties the Government of India launched its liberalization policy in response to the globalization of world economy. As part of this drive, privatization of education was promoted. The Council of Architecture, India decided to open up the field of Architectural education to private sector. Rizvi College of Architecture was one of the many private architectural institutions to launch a 5 year degree course in architecture in affiliation with the University of Mumbai.

As the founding principal of the College, it was my duty to set the direction of educational development of the institution. We based our educational programme on the issue of appropriateness, social relevance, environmental concerns, sustainable development and excellence through innovation in architecture. It is only the fourth year of of our establishment and perhaps, it is too early to critically evaluate the achievement of the school and students. During last three years, we organized seminars on the themes of “future directions of Architecture”, Issues in Architecture and Earthquake Resistant Rural Housing and Metropolis in Transition. The student projects were linked to these issues. While we are following the present academic syllabus of the University of Bombay within the framework of All India Board of Architectural Studies, there is a need for academic restructuring to make it more appropriate and relevant to our context. We need to restructure architectural education to make it more responsive to a humane and sustainable living environment. Even within this short period of time it was possible to identify issues on which is based our academic international collaboration.

International Academic Collaboration

With the development of international communication network, the world is now a truly “global village”. In India, we have a traditional concept of “world as family”. Inspired by these ideals, we at Rizvi College of Architecture took up international collaboration as one of the important activities. In 1933, I visited Graz and made a proposal for a formal technical collaboration with Institut fuer Hochbau fuer Architekten of Technische Universitaet Graz (TU Graz). Encouraged by Dr. Harald Egger, the dean of the Institute, we launched our first collaborative project in response to a massive earthquake that had hit Latur and Osmanabad districts of Maharashtra State in India killing nearly 10,000 people.

It would be most appropriate to cite the works of the students of Institut fuer Hochbau fuer Architekten and Rizvi College of Architecture as inspiring example of emerging Humane Architecture for Indian villages. The project was conceived as a long-distance process of interactive learning using available literature on architecture, earthquake, engineering, socio-economic, legal-administrative aspects, analyzing the data to develop an insight into the issues. Understanding the human, social, cultural, technical and environmental aspects of the issue through the primary and secondary data. Visiting the earthquake affected region, meeting the people, voluntary agencies and administrative personnel to get feed-back on the preliminary proposals and then critical evaluation of the students proposal at the institute and Rizvi College. Prof. Peter Schreibmayer visited India twice in this regard and provided the critical theoretical and technical input in Graz, while I co-ordinated the Indian students together with my colleagues at Rizvi College of Architecture. The results are stunningly appropriate!

Take for example, the project by Robert Kroger and Barbara, the project is based on understanding of the culture and lifestyle of the people, resulting in a courtyard typology of the house which can be developed over a period of time. It uses an appropriate mix of construction techniques with light-weight roofing and earthquake resistant block walling. It also offers an alternative low-technology options using stabilized mud-blocks and bamboo construction on a reinforced cement concrete foundation. The houses are then clustered around community and social interaction spaces to generate a village settlement.

Or take the project by Christinge Konrad and Karin Trummer. Here the students have taken inspiration from the wind. It is called “ a band of wind”. It is based on the environmental concern for alternative energy sources. Here in this case it is based on wind energy. A band of wind turbine constitutes a wind farm supplying energy to the village settlement. A set of rows of earthquake resistant rural houses set with proper orientation using the interior courts optimally constitutes the neighbourhoods around common social, health-care and educational institutions. A main shopping street is developed around which are dispersed several public facilities. The innovative use of built-form results in a distinctive appropriate architecture. The fact that the students have chosen the project for their final diploma thesis shows the importance they attach to the issues of human architecture. It is desirable that some of these designs should be built and tested for its appropriateness. International academic collaboration between the developed North and developing South needs to be encouraged! We are now planning to engage in a collaborative workshop on the study of urban housing, slum-upgradation and urban development with the Technicsche Universitaet Graz in near future.

Appropriate future mission of architecture

Architects have to view their future mission in the context of a sustainable habitat. By the year 2100, the world population would touch an astonishing figure of 20,000,000,000! In order to survive, it would necessitate maintenance of a “Global Ecological Balance” as suggested by C. A. Doxiadis long before the UN Conference on Environment. Ecological balance shall have to be maintained not only at Global, but more appropriately at community, local and regional levels.

Architects as planners and designers of human settlements shall have to take up the challenge of creating sustainable settlements in rural, urban and regional contexts. These cities which Koichi Nagashima calls ECOCITIES, shall use minimal resources for maximizing social benefits at an optimal ecological balance.

Architects as designers of the buildings, shall have to develop an inventory of sustainable design elements, components and systems to develop environment friendly architecture. Use of solar energy, recycling of water and waste; use of proper orientation and appropriate climate control; maximum use of daylight and natural ventilation and selective use of high technology to obtain a better environmental performance, are some of the means to achieve appropriate design.

On the mission of a human architecture, as we move away from ego-centric architecture to eco-friendly architecture, it would be essential to incorporate citizen participation and involvement in making of a sustainable built-environment. Indeed as Henryk Skolimowski, the eco-philosopher, says in his treatise on heralding the dawn of the ecological reconstruction in the 21^st Century, “ we need a new mandala or paradigm for a new consciousness incorporating, wholistic, qualitative, participatory, evolutionary, reverential and spiritual as the key characteristics of living environment.”

In conclusion, it would be appropriate to project some of the future missions of architecture. Architecture as noble profession has a great future in the service of humanity. It is an on going quest for creation of humane values that gives meaning to our life. Its mission is to generate a quality of built environment that ensures, peace, balance and harmony among the people, leading to enrichment of what Amos Rappoport describes as “ the cultural landscape” which is a reflection of enlightenment of the human mindscape. In the process it shall achieve a synthesis of human architecture with the architecture of the cosmos. It shall then attain a level of spirituality and a higher sense of spiritual order. It shall also feel liberated by transcending the constraints of space, place and time, in the process becoming universal and timeless and perpetually sustainable, therefore the most appropriate. We need to experiment and innovate alternative visions of the future. The future is now! We should endeavour to co-ordinate activities at community, academic and professional institutions at local, national, regional and global levels, to evolve a world-wide movement for a humane architecture – an appropriate architecture for the humanity! The quest for humane architecture is on-going and eternal.