Crap

1 year lay slain behind him. And forward lay the 3 he’d wanted to face.

To speak, sans retort. To sketch, sans unaskedfor critique.

He now thought he’d earned some of it. Mistakes had been made, grave ones at that. He’d known a log time ago, whence his mother had asked him thus,

There are two kinds of people in this world. The former evade the errors whence informed. The latter, commit the foul, and learn off the recoil. Frighteningly, there’s a rare, third type – those who don’t learn even once bitten. Who, son, will you be?

He knew he belonged to those few that his mom feared he might. Even so, he promised her he’d try to learn the off first bite. Walking barefoot among snakes was something he couldn’t stop himself from doing.

Some day, ma, i’ll teach those snakes to stop biting. And if i can’t, i’ll know, “Atleast, i tried.”

3 years of pure Design. Apparently, they teach it at IIT Guwahati. Design? He knew not whether it could ever be taught…

And to think of the questions they’d ask. “What’s the scope of Design?” People, for you, Design has no scope. For, if you chose Design, turned up at this college to be taught the same for 4 years, paid the fees, aaaand still don’t know of the scope – then, i guess you’re plain dumb.

Still, he figured he’d share his views with them. He began, with Architecture.

Architecture, he said, is all about ‘making it’. Architects may build condominiums, they may build bridges across infinite fluid expanses. Painters, sculptors, craftsmen – they’re Architects too. They all build, whatever is conceived. In his view, an architect knew how to make the design go, from a raw idea, to, a revolution. The boy wished, that someday, he’d get to be an Architect. In the true sense of it.

But first, he’d garner his strength to being the Designer. The one that conceives. The one that observes the world.. The one that draws up a cure, and the one that speaks up to convince the world to change (for the world, sadly, caccooned within set-patterns, follows redundant orthodoxy unto a grind).

The boy would try be a Designer. And someday, an Architect.

i had originally composed this as someone else’s homework assignment. but i guess i took a liking to the subject of ‘functionality versus utility’. the result, lies below.

creativity has No limits. however, it is often seen (as is the case whence directives and duties do not restrain an individual’s freedoms) that creativity is unfocussed. function and utility, thus, present means to harness the genius that a creator possesses, unto an end that is both, constructive, and aesthetic.

in much the same way that pairs are innately inseparable, creativity and its constraints, work in harmony. it would be impractical to build the most elegant bridge in the world, and abandon structural integrity in lieu of a curvaceous mould. on the flipside, it would be horrifically mundane for a buyer if the virtues of variety and uniqueness were entirely absent, and each home was simply a repetitive embodiment of functionality..

often it is seen, that an innovator, in his quest for brilliance, ignores functional constraints that dictate a structure. often, scenic bridges (akin to a recent case in london – the millenium bridge) have not lasted 48 hours from their inauguration, since certain flaws had crept into their exuberant designs.

then again, some of the stand-alone masterpieces of architecture are some of the most lacking structures when it comes to utility or practical-applicability. take the pyramids at giza, or the moai structures on easter-island in the pacific. in fact, these structures and their constructions are actually blamed as one of the causes for the fall of those civilisations. even so, no one regrets the fact that the pyramids exist, do they? :)

yes, coming back to functionality, i must reaffirm that, the so-called ‘limits’ imposed upon an architect’s (or any inventor, for that matter) designs are actually beneficial to his creations. it only matters upon the perspective he(or she!) adopts whilst complying with the guidelines; why not look upon each requisite as an added avenue unto further expression of genius?

originally : March 27, 2008