Remembering B V Doshi: The architect who connected the spiritual, material and intellectual

In my dialogue with him for the Forum for Exchange and Excellence in Design (2004), I witnessed his extraordinary gift of awareness of the many layers of consciousness experienced in society. His answers turned into stories. It was as if one was accompanying him on a winding walk through the city wherein he asked, “Have you noticed this play of light and space before? Did the fragrance of the inner courtyards ever attract you? Have you heard the notes of this subtlest sound of early monsoon showers? Did you see how people respond to the built form that encloses them?” Sharing with his students the world as he perceived it, came intuitively to him. At one point in the dialogue, he said, “I have always gone to temples and enjoyed them because I always wonder what is so fascinating there that stood the test of thousands of years?” He thus narrates the touchstone experience of architecture, “the Meenakshi temple at Madurai… for its splendour, mysticism, there are smells, there is life, and it is full of things…at Fatehpur Sikri you see structured, well planned, extremely humble, simple but equally powerful architecture… The Kailash temple where there is so much power… you get a sense of wonder… There are things one should see as necessary… like visits to Dharavi… Visit slums and you see how people there are miserable in terms of physical condition and yet economically and culturally they are no less lively and active… I don’t look at it as architecture. I see it as facets of life.” About the quality of architecture, he noted, “Good architecture is when it has many facets, like a diamond.” He talked about the creative spiral: “(first is) Vikās or blossoming when a thing develops. The second is vistār after blossoming, it expands… then, there is kshōbh, or churning… finally, there is drava, when something melts and a new blossoming begins.” In his conversation about architecture, Doshi seemed to be aware of the simultaneity of two realities — one of the world he lived in and the other of the world within.

I remember a student poking at him with a question, “Why do you wear a shirt with so many pockets?” Full of wit, he said that he liked to fill his pockets with impressions, memories, and thoughts. As a student in the mid-1960s, I had seen his work in Ahmedabad and Vadodara and it had caught my attention. We learned like Eklavya from Achyut Kanvinde, Doshi, and Charles Correa — all of whom I regarded highly for their pursuits in uncovering the Indian ethos, in their distinct ways.

When I built my house and studio in 1997, one fine Sunday morning, Doshi arrived with his family to see it. He was very curious. He came several times after that and each visit was something to remember. He came to Pune for the release of my Marathi book Jharoka in 2007 and enthusiastically read out paragraphs from it for the audience.

Later, on January 27, 2009, we sat on the lawns of his house engaged in a long conversation. Mid-way through, he arranged for the conversation to be recorded and promptly couriered the CD to me. We discussed how the “opening up of shoji in Japanese houses removes walls that take away all obstructions… He mentioned how “ambiguity is important not only in conception but even in the process of its realisation” and why it should be taught in schools of architecture. He called “architecture an enigmatic desire that you initiate in your work… when you have a desire, you search… if you create such an illusion then anybody would be connected with that… Will they come again and again? How many different ways can your work move people… that is why the bazaars — not malls — are so fascinating. This is because they are changing all the time. Permanence has sensuousness; a sense of acquisition… In architecture we must think of transition, threshold, antarāl… architecture should have flexibility so that each person can make his own story… Does architecture have a story, does it have an episode? Should it not have an episode?”… Doshi’s inquiring mind unfolded along with the unfolding of life and the uncertainties that come with it.

Paths Uncharted (2011, Vastu-Shilpa Foundation) contains Doshi’s autobiographical writings that are of interest for at least three reasons. First, for how the musings relate to his works, speeches, and writings, and the film on him; second, for how it has looked at the self and the “other”; and third, to understand what its literary and architectural value for posterity is.

Doshi suggested, “Act with posterity and allow change if it happens”. He saw himself as an “entrepreneur obsessed with the next big thing”. He enjoyed challenges and was charged up when confronted with the unknown to find new meanings and directions for his work. He believed in the joint family system for its perpetual capacity to give affection and strength to all members, especially when in distress or a state of duality, saying that life’s nature is “anything but constant”.

He regretted that architects had not been able to “open schools in hinterlands” and also that architecture and planning did not ignite spirited movements similar to those by Mahatma Gandhi. He was convinced that architecture and planning had the potential to create social movements.

Doshi’s architecture hence stands as testimony to his time, his passion and his vision of architecture, reconnecting formless ideas with vitality and manifesting them holistically.

The writer is a Pune-based architect and academic