ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Gautam Bhatia
Gautam Bhatia BLOGS
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FROM TOI PRINT EDITION
Why can’t we laugh & therefore be free?
April 11, 2025, 7:17 AM IST
Recent state responses to satire remind us that free speech flourishes in societies comfortable with sharp comedy, historical complexity and ambiguity British TV series Monty Python staged an episode called ‘Ministry of Silly Walks�? In�?/p>
April 11, 2025, 7:17 AM IST
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Whither the genius architect? ‘The Brutalist�?reminds us of lost legacy
March 16, 2025, 4:00 AM IST
Historian Nikolaus Pevsner once said, ‘A cow shed is a building; Lincoln Cathedral is architecture�? By turning the definition on its head, Swiss-French architect Le Corbusier could say with equal conviction ‘A cow shed is�?/p>
March 16, 2025, 4:00 AM IST
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For Manmohan, let’s not build yet another memorial that no one visits
January 5, 2025, 5:00 AM IST
On a trip to Varanasi once, a friend suggested a visit to Lal Bahadur Shastri’s ancestral home. A house across the Ganga, it served as an informal memorial to India’s second prime minister. The tiny�?/p>
January 5, 2025, 5:00 AM IST
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FROM TOI PRINT EDITION
Stop the grotesque Disneyfication of our heritage
December 9, 2024, 7:25 AM IST
Earlier this year when a busload of foreign tourists arrived in the city square in Barcelona, locals threw tomatoes at them. When large numbers of tourists from northern Europe appeared in Tenerife, protesters went on�?/p>
December 9, 2024, 7:25 AM IST
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FROM TOI PRINT EDITION
No offence but this new political correctness is incredibly boring
May 26, 2024, 5:00 AM IST
Barely a few decades ago, a yellow school bus would proclaim that it belonged to the ‘School for the Deaf and Dumb�? Other institutes were similarly called, ‘School for the Blind�?or ‘School for the�?/p>
May 26, 2024, 5:00 AM IST
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FROM TOI PRINT EDITION
Sarkar will be poor company for great art
March 8, 2024, 9:11 AM IST
In the 1950s much of our modern architecture was so half-baked and thoughtless, it relied purely on gigantic size and a mishmash of classical ornaments to get its garbled message across. Even today, structures like�?/p>
March 8, 2024, 9:11 AM IST
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Race on to build mega convention centres but where will it lead?
October 1, 2023, 4:30 AM IST
In the 1980s and �?0s when Pragati Maidan was more maidan than pragati, its ambivalent architecture of no style and no substance happily tolerated India’s magnanimous diversity. Rich or poor, labourer or executive, everyone gravitated�?/p>
October 1, 2023, 4:30 AM IST
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What are we building?
August 1, 2023, 8:53 AM IST
In the daily dose of human tragedy, we in India stand head and shoulders above most other countries. In newspapers, on television, across the internet, tragic incidents oscillate between the comic and the bizarre, between�?/p>
August 1, 2023, 8:53 AM IST
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FROM TOI PRINT EDITION
A sense of loss, for a different India
May 29, 2023, 8:48 AM IST
Yesterday, the new Parliament building was inaugurated. In a country where pomp and show count for a great deal, the occasion had called for some major ceremonial decision-making. Who would inaugurate the new building, the�?/p>
May 29, 2023, 8:48 AM IST
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Green to grey: How we ruined the beautiful Indian countryside
March 12, 2023, 5:00 AM IST
A Scottish architect, a former classmate of mine on a visit to India, commented, “I have never seen places so utterly neglected and ugly.�?An unvarnished observation, he was referring to his most recent drive�?/p>
March 12, 2023, 5:00 AM IST
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FROM TOI PRINT EDITION
Be Africa, not Las Vegas: The message from Himalayan belt is clear: India needs to nurture back wild nature in some parts, and stop the construction mania
February 21, 2023, 2:25 AM IST
The story is repeating across the overbuilt Himalayan belt. Cracks in houses, sliding shifting road surfaces, and now cracks in the road to Char Dham, collapsed retaining walls, landslides, deep earth fissures and denuded hillsides�?
February 21, 2023, 2:25 AM IST
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India’s two biggest art events paint a picture of contrasts
February 5, 2023, 4:00 AM IST
In the 1960s, American artist Claes Oldenburg said, “I am for an art that takes its form from the lines of life itself, that twists and extends and spits and drips and is heavy and�?/p>
February 5, 2023, 4:00 AM IST
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When sport and nationalism collide on the pitch, and off it
December 18, 2022, 4:00 AM IST
At the World Cup, after footballer Breel Embolo scored a goal for Switzerland against Cameroon, his country of birth, Cameroonian fans stormed his father’s home in the village of Yaoundé, threatening to beat him up�?
December 18, 2022, 4:00 AM IST
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FROM TOI PRINT EDITION
MCD, BMC �?more of the same: Political parties and high stakes municipal elections are exactly what Indian cities don’t need
November 18, 2022, 2:25 AM IST
“More than any other time in history,�?wrote Woody Allen, “mankind faces a crossroads. One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness, the other to total extinction. Let us pray we have the wisdom to�?/p>
November 18, 2022, 2:25 AM IST
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What a demolition says about the state of urban architecture
September 4, 2022, 8:20 AM IST
One of the more interesting things about architecture, however big or small, is that the act of demolition converts what is essentially a visual art into a performing art. For the first time and only�?/p>
September 4, 2022, 8:20 AM IST
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Time to reimagine architecture for our overheated cities
June 5, 2022, 2:00 AM IST
While growing up in Delhi in the 1960s, I remember summer was a season we looked forward to. Cycling home from school at mid-day, you rode into a compound with a low rectangular thick-walled bungalow,�?/p>
June 5, 2022, 2:00 AM IST
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FROM TOI PRINT EDITION
Big and visible: Building in service of religion �?But this monumentalism is at odds with the quieter places and practices of daily Hinduism
January 15, 2022, 2:05 AM IST
In the past decade Hindu culture has actively sought the support of ancient myth, archaeology, sacred monuments and new construction to put forth the deadpan message that Hinduism is not just a culture but a�?/p>
January 15, 2022, 2:05 AM IST
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FROM TOI PRINT EDITION
Forgotten vista: Beyond history and archaeology �?Three ideas for leading Indian museums into a constructive public engagement with the present
September 29, 2021, 2:10 AM IST
To answer the critics and to place the arena in a historical perspective, the new Central Vista website is a welcome addition; however it still needs to address why culture’s participation in the scheme has�?/p>
September 29, 2021, 2:10 AM IST
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Beware the new Surveillance Raj that invades personal and political
July 25, 2021, 6:30 AM IST
The first census of independent India �?a 10-yearly survey �?was conducted in 1951 to gather statistics on population distribution, gauge the status of housing, household income, education, etc. The idea was that it�?/p>
July 25, 2021, 6:30 AM IST
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FROM TOI PRINT EDITION
A cultural vista: Central Vista plan is now a given. But there’s still scope of reinvention
June 4, 2021, 2:25 AM IST
True the Delhi high court has dismissed a public petition to halt work on the Central Vista redevelopment plan. But there’s still scope for reimagining it. One important thing is missing from current plans –�?/p>
June 4, 2021, 2:25 AM IST
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