Category: Z-Axis

Z-AXIS 2024 SPEAKERS

Posted on Posted in Z-Axis, Z-axis 2024

Nondita Correa Mehrotra

Director, Charles Correa Foundation, Principal, RMA Architects
Panjim/Mumbai/Boston

Nondita Correa Mehrotra is Director of the Charles Correa Foundation and practices in India and the United States. She studied architecture at the University of Michigan and at Harvard’s Graduate School of Design and worked for over two decades with Charles Correa. She is a principal in the firm RMA Architects Mumbai + Boston. She has incorporated an active academic life into her career as well, teaching studios at the University of Michigan and at MIT and is currently teaching at RISD. Augmenting her teaching, several of her essays have been published in architectural books. She has been on numerous juries, including the Master Jury of the Aga Khan Award for Architecture; the Lafarge-Holcim Awards Jury in 2020; and the 2023 AIA NY Design Awards. She is also an External Design Advisor to the Harvard Allston Land Company, a peer review process for Harvard University’s new campus. Mehrotra was among 5 finalists for the design of the symbol for the Indian Rupee, an idea she had initiated with the Reserve Bank of India in 2005. 

William Curtis

Architectural Historian, Critic
Cajarc

William J. R. Curtis is an award-winning historian, critic, painter and photographer. He has taught at many universities including Harvard, the A.A. London, and Cambridge where he was Slade Professor of Fine Art. Curtis’s best-known books are Modern Architecture Since 1900 and Le Corbusier: Ideas and Forms, both referred to as ‘classics’. He has written extensively on architecture ancient and modern on the Sub-Continent, including Le Corbusier, Louis Kahn, Muzharul Islam, a monograph on Raj Rewal,(1986, Om Books, 2024), the seminal text ‘Towards and Authentic Regionalism’(1986) Archnet > Publication > Towards an Authentic Regionalism and the award winning monograph Balkrishna Doshi: an Architecture for India (1988). Curtis has received numerous awards, among others:  The Tau Sigma Delta National Honor Society Gold Medal in Architecture and Allied Arts, USA (1999); and the Golden Award for Global Contribution in Architecture (CERA, A+D, India, 2014), in recognition of his defence of modern architectural heritage in India.

Kulbhushan Jain

Emeritus Professor, CEPT University
Ahmedabad

Kulbhushan Jain, architect-urbanist and conservation consultant studied and worked with Louis Kahn. He taught at CEPT University, Ahmedabad, for more than four decades and held various positions including Director, School of Architecture, and Chairman, Doctoral Programme. He has been visiting professor at MIT, Cambridge, USA; UBC, Vancouver, Canada and POLEMI, Milano. He has worked as consultant to NID, Ahmedabad; INTACH, New Delhi and MMT, Jodhpur. Jain has published several books, articles and conference papers. He has been a member of several juries for national and international design competitions.Jain’s major conservation projects include Mehrangarh Fort (1990-2023) with Museum design, Jodhpur; Fort of Nagaur (1990-2023) including rehabilitation of Ranvas; Jaisalmer Fort (1985-2005) including restoration of Rani ka Mahal and Amber Fort (2005-2010) including comprehensive planning, Jaipur.   

Rahul Mehrotra

Founder Principal, RMA Architects, Professor, Harvard University
Mumbai/Boston

Rahul Mehrotra is the founder principal of RMA Architects and the John T. Dunlop Professor in Housing and Urbanization at the Graduate School of Design at Harvard University. Mehrotra’s most recent books are titled Working in Mumbai (2020) and The Kinetic City and other essays (2021). The former is a reflection on his practice, evolved through its association with the city of Bombay/Mumbai. The second book presents Mehrotra’s writings over the last thirty years and illustrates his long-term engagement with, and analysis of, urbanism in India. This work has given rise to a new conceptualization of the city which Mehrotra calls the Kinetic City.

Mustansir Dalvi

Poet, Editor, Academician, Professor, Sir JJ School of Architecture (retd)
Mumbai

Mustansir Dalvi is Professor of Architecture at Sir JJ College of Architecture (retired). He is on the Board of Governors of the MMR-Heritage Conservation Society and a Trustee of Art Deco Mumbai. Dalvi holds degrees in architecture and a diploma in Indian Aesthetics from the University of Mumbai. He received his PhD from the Indian Institute of Technology-Bombay. He is the author of The Romance of Red Stone: An Appreciation of Ornament on Islamic Architecture in India (2011) and The Past as Present: Pedagogical Practices in Architecture at the Bombay School of Art (2016). Dalvi is the editor of 20th Century Compulsions (Marg, 2016), a collection of writings about early Indian modernist architecture. His latest book, Citizen Charles: a biography Charles Correa, by Niyogi Books, is scheduled to be published in October 2024.

Malvika Singh

Author & Publisher, Seminar
New Delhi

Publisher of Seminar, a prestigious monthly magazine of ideas and alternatives, founded in 1959. Author of Perpetual City: A Short Biography of Delhi. Author of Bhutan: Through the Lens of the King, New Delhi: Making of a Capital, Delhi: India in One City, Snowdon’s India, portraits of 100 celebrated Indians – images by Lord Snowdon. She has worked as Editor for various books. She is a Trustee of the Ranthambhore Foundation and Founding member of Rehwa Society, working to revive the Maheshwari sari in India. She also has extensive experience as a journalist both in the print media as well as in films and television. She has served on multiple advisory boards of the Ministry of Culture, Government of India; designed and produced products for The National Museum Shop, New Delhi. Served on the board of the National Culture Fund. Government of India. Served as a member of the Board of Trustees, India Brand Equity Foundation.  She was Member of the Advisory Board of the Chief Minister of Rajasthan for one term spanning five years, and was responsible for art, culture and for the redefinition of the state’s tourism policy. Malvika was decorated as a DAME in the civil merit honours list of the King of Spain, 2009. She is Consulting Editor to LIMITED EDITIONS, an imprint of Academic Foundation. She has edited a series of social histories written by professionals with an extraordinary story to tell, and also by extraordinary people sharing their personal stories.

Rajnish Wattas

Principal Chandigarh College of Architecture (retd)
Chandigarh

Rajnish Wattas, former principal of the Chandigarh College of Architecture is an architectural critic and modern architectural and landscape heritage expert. He has authored a huge compendium  of professional writings and published hundreds of essays, travelogues and features in leading journals and newspapers. He is co-author of two books Trees of Chandigarh and Sukhna — Sublime Lake of Chandigarh and co-editor of ‘LE CORBUSIER REDISCOVERD: Chandigarh and Beyond. Has lectured at prestigious forums including Graduate School of Design, Harvard University, the American Institute of Architects and Illinois Institute of Technology IIT, Chicago among others. On various expert groups, he evolved the ‘Master Plan of Chandigarh – 2031’ as a team member and presently a member of the ‘Chandigarh Heritage Conservation Committee’ and Governor’s Advisory Council. He is co-founder of the ‘Chandigarh Tree Lovers’ and an acclaimed photographer with photo exhibitions and photo essays to his credit.

Tridip Suhrud

Professor & Provost, CEPT University
Ahmedabad

Dr. Tridip Suhrud is a Professor and Provost of CEPT University, Ahmedabad.  He is also a Director of Lalbhai Dalpatbhai Institute of Indology, Ahmedabad and serves as Chairman of the Governing Council of MICA. His recent works include the critical editions of M K Gandhi’s Hind Swaraj and the Autobiography, a two-volume project on editing and translating the diary of Manu Gandhi (one part published), has translated into English the canonical Gujarati novel Sarasvatichandra and is currently working on a possible nine volume project, Thumb Printed (three volumes published) on the testimonies of indigo cultivators of Champaran.

Catherine Desai

Architectural Historian, CEPT University
Ahmedabad

Catherine Outram Desai is an architect in research-based practice. She is an Adjunct Assistant Professor at CEPT University where she teaches undergraduate and master’s programs in architectural design and history & theory. Her books include The Architecture of Hasmukh C. Patel and the forthcoming texts In-between Histories: Reading Indian Modern Buildings and Complete Works of Hema Sankalia. Her current academic research opens and reconsiders narratives of Indian architectural modernity through large-scale drawings and analysis of historic buildings and landscapes. She is a founding member of Ahmedabad Commons, a collective that opens buildings for public visits and debates issues of conservation and access to the city.

Liane Lefaivre

Architectural Historian, Critic
Paris

Liane Lefaivre is Professor and Chair of Architectural History and Theory at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna (retired). She and Alexander Tzonis have been writing about global regionalism since the early 1980s when they coined the term “critical regionalism,” a concept often misconstrued. Among their books on the subject are Architecture in Europe (Thames and Hudson 1993, Architecture in North America ( Thames and Hudson, 1995), Tropical Architecture, Critical Regionalism in the Age of Globalization ( Wiley, 2001), Critical Regionalism (Prestel, 2003 ), Regionalism in a Globalized World (Routledge, 2011). Among her recent publications are Rebel Modernists. Viennese Architecture since Otto Wagner (Lund Humphries, 2017) and, with Alexander Tzonis, a collection of their articles since the 1960s entitled Times of Creative Destruction. Architecture and the City in the 20C (Routledge, 2018) and an expanded edition of Regionalism in a Globalized World (Routledge, 2020) which is being updated and published in French (Parenthèses, 2025).

Ranjit Hoskote

Poet, Cultural Theorist & Curator
Mumbai

Ranjit Hoskote is a poet, translator, cultural theorist and curator. His collections of poetry include Central Time (Penguin, 2014), Jonahwhale (Penguin, 2018; in the UK by Arc as The Atlas of Lost Beliefs), Hunchprose (Penguin, 2021) and Icelight (Wesleyan University Press, 2023). Hoskote is the author of more than thirty books, including the acclaimed translation of a 14th-century Kashmiri woman mystic’s compositions, I, Lalla: The Poems of Lal Ded (Penguin, 2011) and, a translation of the 18th-century Urdu poet, Mir Taqi Mir, The Homeland’s an Ocean (Penguin Classics, 2024). In 2011, Hoskote curated India’s first-ever national pavilion at the Venice Biennale. With Rahul Mehrotra and Kaiwan Mehta, he co-curated the exhibition, ‘The State of Architecture: Practices and Processes in India’ (NGMA, Mumbai, 2016). He has been a Fellow of the International Writing Program, University of Iowa, and researcher-in-residence at BAK/ basis voor actuele kunst, Utrecht. 

Pradeep Dalal

Artist/Architect, Director, Andy Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant
New York

Pradeep Dalal is an artist and writer based between New York and Mumbai. His work has been shown at venues including Hallwalls Contemporary Art Center, Oakville Galleries, Sala Diaz, Art Cake, EFA Project Space, Callicoon Fine Arts, and Murray Guy. His photographs have been featured in publications including Blind Spot, BOMB, Cabinet, Grey Room, Nueva Luz, and Rethinking Marxism. With Fia Backström, he co-authored Photography in the Sensorium (Dancing Foxes Press, 2021). His artist book Bhopal, MP was excerpted in Chandigarh is in India (The Shoestring Publisher, 2016). Dalal studied architecture at CEPT University and at MIT and worked on the design of the British Council Library in Charles Correa Associates in the late 1980s. From 2015 to 2020, Dalal co-chaired the Photography Department in the MFA program at Bard College. At present, he is Director of the Andy Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant.

Kaiwan Mehta

Architectural Critic
Mumbai

Born in Mumbai, Kaiwan Mehta is a theorist and critic in the fields of visual culture, architecture, and city studies. He is completing his doctorate at the Centre for the Study of Culture and Society, Bengaluru, under the aegis of Manipal University; and has now published as well as exhibited his research work and ideas internationally. He authored Alice in Bhuleshwar: Navigating a Mumbai Neighbourhood (Yoda Press. New Delhi, 2009). Since March 2012 he has been the Managing Editor of Domus India (Spenta Multimedia) and writes prolifically on architecture, aesthetics, and cities. He has been elected as the Jury Chairman for two consecutive terms (2015–17 and 2017–2019) for the international artists’ residency programme across 11 disciplines at the Akademie Schloss Solitude in Stuttgart, Germany. Mehta recently co-curated the national exhibition on architecture with Rahul Mehrotra and Ranjit Hoskote – “The State of Architecture: Practices and Processes in India” (UDRI, 2016) at the NGMA, Mumbai. He has authored the book The Architecture of I M Kadri (Niyogi. New Delhi, 2016). He is currently the Dean of Balwant Sheth School of Architecture, SVKM’s NMIMS (deemed to be) University.

Sunil Shelar

Principal, Sunil Shelar Architects
Bangalore

Since the earliest civilization, the ritualistic pathway was, and is, the central aspect of life on the subcontinent. Planetary positions held great importance and meaning in planning a building or a city. Charles Correa was fascinated by this knowledge and its significance with reference to the design and organisation of buildings. In his introduction to the Vistara exhibition, he underscores the fact that as vistaras (expansion of knowledge) happen, the central aspect gets richer and more meaningful.  The 3 buildings here are different in terms of their function, yet the ritualistic pathway, the climate, and the quintessential square remain central to their genesis.

Ashok Vajpeyi

Poet, Literary- Cultural Critic
New Delhi

Ashok Vajpeyi, a Hindi poet-critic, translator, editor and culture-activist, is a major cultural figure of India. With more than 30 books of poetry, criticism in Hindi English to his credit, he is widely recognised as an outstanding promoter of culture and an innovative institution-builder. He has organised more than a thousand events to his credit relating to literature, music, dances, theatre, visual arts, folk and tribal arts, cinema etc. He has been awarded the Sahitya Akademi Award, the Dayawati Kavi Shekhar Samman, Kabir Samman, Shakti Chattopadhyay Puraskar, K Ramakrishnan Award etc and awarded D.Lit. by the Central University of Hyderabad and ITM University. Also, he has been decorated by Poland with the outstanding national award ‘The Officer’s Cross of Merit of the Republic of Poland’ and the French Govt. by the award of ‘Officier De L’Ordre des Arts Et Des Lettres’. He set up the renowned Bharat Bhavan in Bhopal; has been the first Vice-Chancellor of Mahatma Gandhi International Hindi University and Chairman, Lalit Kala Akademi. A retired civil servant, now the Managing Trustee of the Raza Foundation.

Ajit Kembhavi

Astrophysicist, Founding Member, IUCAA
Pune

Professor Ajit Kembhavi is an astronomer. He is Professor Emeritus at the Inter- University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA), Pune, where he was Director during 2009-2015. He was the Director there until August 2015. He is one of the founder members of IUCAA and played a major role in setting it up and developing it into a world-class institute. He did his Ph. D. from TIFR with Professor Jayant Narlikar. Kembhavi works on galaxies, quasars and other extragalactic objects, Big Data and the application of AI to astronomy, biology and chemistry. He has published a large number of research papers and several books in English and Marathi. Kembhavi is involved in many national and international collaborations and is one of the key persons responsible for India joining the Thirty Metre Telescope (TMT) project as a partner and taking up the LIGO India project. Kembhavi has been a member of the Space Commission and is a member of ISRO Apex Science Board. He was Vice-President of the International Astronomical Union and former President of the Astronomical Society of India. He is a Fellow of the Indian Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Sciences, India.

Vidyadhar K Phatak

Dean, Faculty of Planning, CEPT University (retd)
Mumbai

Vidyadhar Phatak worked in various public organisations such as CIDCO and MMRDA for 37 years till 2004. During this period, he had an opportunity to work with Charles Correa on New Bombay, and policy development for housing and regional structure of MMR. He was a member of National Commission on Urbanisation (1988) and a Study Group on ‘Cotton Textile Mills in Mumbai’ (1995). Charles was the Chairman of Both. Thereafter till 2016 he worked as freelance consultant on various aspects of urban development. From 2016 to 2019 he was Dean, Faculty of Planning, CEPT University. His book on “Planning for India’s Urbanisation” was published by CEPT University Press in April, 2024.  

Jagan Shah

CEO, the Infravision Foundation
New Delhi

Jagan Shah is CEO of The Infravision Foundation. His previous roles include Senior Adviser (Capacity Building) at The World Bank and Senior Infrastructure Adviser in the UK’s Department for International Development. As Director, National Institute of Urban Affairs, he co-created the Smart Cities Mission and incubated centres for digital governance, sanitation and climate adaptation. He has designed AfD’s ‘City Investments to Innovate Integrate and Sustain’ program and CDRI’s Infrastructure for Resilient Island States facility and led the preparation of the Draft Master Plan for Delhi 2041. Shah studied architectural design and history, theory & criticism in New Delhi, Cincinnati and New York. He is Adviser to My Liveable City and a Trustee of Clean Air Asia.

Rohan Varma

Lecturer & Researcher, TUDelft
Amsterdam/Mumbai

Rohan Varma graduated as an architect from the University of Mumbai and worked for Charles Correa between 2008 and 2010 before receiving his master’s in architecture from the TU Delft as a Tata and Mahindra Scholar. He currently divides his time as the Principal Architect of VARMA Architects with his work at the TU Delft, where his doctoral research and teaching activities focus on affordable housing in the rapidly urbanising cities of the Global South. In 2018, he co-curated an international travelling exhibition on the housing designs of Charles Correa. More recently, in 2020, he was appointed as a Delft Global Fellow, and in 2022, he, along with his colleagues at TU Delft, won the global edX Prize for the online course ‘Global Housing Design’. In 2023, he was appointed editor of the journal Delft Architecture Studies on Housing.

Dirk Van Gameren

Dean, Faculty of Architecture, TUDelft, Partner, Mecanoo Architecten 
Delft

Dirk van Gameren is a professor of housing design and dean of the Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment at Delft University of Technology, and partner at Mecanoo Architecten. At TU Delft, he leads the Global Housing Study Centre that focuses on the issues related to designing and building affordable housing in the rapidly expanding cities of the Global South. Dirk van Gameren is founding editor of the DASH Delft Architectural Studies on Housing book series. He curated in 2018 the exhibition Living Ideals, designs for housing by Charles Correa that has been travelling to various cities in India. In autumn 2022 his study Dutch Dwellings, the architecture of housing, was published by Park Books.

Rohan Shivkumar

Dean of Architecture, KRVIA
Mumbai

Rohan Shivkumar is an architect, urban designer and filmmaker practising in Mumbai. He is the Dean of the Architecture at the KRVIA, Mumbai. He is interested in exploring different ways of reading and representing the city. His work ranges from architecture, urban research and consultancy projects to works in film and visual art. His research includes projects in Dharavi, the National Park, and the spaces of Dr Ambedkar in Mumbai. Rohans’ work in film includes the interdisciplinary research and art collaboration ‘Project Cinema City’. He also curates film programmes and writes on cinema, architecture and urban issues. His films include ’Nostalgia for the Future’, ‘Lovely Villa’, and ‘Squeeze Lime in Your Eye’. His work has been featured in many events including the Chicago Architecture Biennale, the Sharjah Architecture Triennale, the Seoul Architecture Biennale, the World Social Forum, the Dhaka Art Fair and Documenta. 

Why Charles Correa’s thoughts on architecture and urbanism remain relevant, six decades on

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by  Arthur Duff I Architectural Digest I Published on: Jan 31, 2025

Image Credits: GQ

Inclusive, culturally rooted, and climatically appropriate—The Z-Axis Conference, held recently in Mumbai and organised by Panjim-based Charles Correa Foundation, critically reviewed the late architect’s thought and practice.

The agenda of the Z-Axis Conference, held in October 2024 at the NCPA in Mumbai, was to understand the life and work of Charles Correa as a way of addressing key issues concerning the future of India’s cities that are just as critical now as they were throughout his lifetime. It was organized by the Charles Correa Foundation based in Panjim Goa, which the architect established towards the end of his life in order to create an independent institution for citizens and professionals that would act as a catalyst for the improvement of the quality of human settlement of all scales in India. To this end, the Foundation supports excellence in the work of students and graduates of architecture, through awards and competitions, and also hosts bi-annual conferences making public the challenges of settlement today, bringing together the best practitioners and thinkers in the field of architecture and design, both from India and abroad.

Read the full article here Why Charles Correa’s thoughts on architecture and urbanism remain relevant, six decades on

Why Generation Now must know Charles Correa

Posted on Posted in News, Events & Press Release, Z-axis 2024

Architect Charles Correa’s work, his larger social vision, and his commitment to a modern India with housing is always relevant

by Ela Das I The Hindu I Published on: Nov 04, 2024

It was a simple Hornby model train set, and the track formations he could make with it, that sparked Charles Correa’s interest in architecture as a child. This is one of the first things we discover at ‘Conversations with Charles Correa: A Critical Review on Six Decades of Practice’, held last month in Mumbai, when author Mustansir Dalvi launched the first biography on the visionary modernist architect. The two-day conference, in its third edition, had scholars and professionals discussing different facets of his work, ranging from his ideas on urbanism to his writings on cities. And, of course, his buildings — from Correa’s Gandhi Ashram, which visual artist Kaiwan Shaban once referred to as “one of the finest examples of humility in architecture”, to the multiplicity of Jawahar Kala Kendra.

Read the full article here Why Generation Now must know Charles Correa

What Do Memorials Really Convey, And How Much Do We Need Them?

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Memorials are, to put it succinctly, a form of making memories or emotions material and tangible through the creation of space

by Smruti Koppikar I The Free Press Journal I Published on: Oct 25, 2024

Correa, though, developed a relationship with Gujarat with Ahmedabad carrying many of his plans-designs from his early years of work, as one of the sessions in the conference detailed out. The one that ranks high among these was Correa’s plan for the Gandhi Smarak or memorial in the Sabarmati Ashram — the latter now under the lens of redesign. Correa was barely 28 years old when he took on the assignment to design the memorial for Mahatma Gandhi barely 15 years after the icon had been assassinated. Gandhi had lived in the Sabarmati from 1917 to 1930 but had never returned to spend long days there, as political scientist and Gandhian scholar Tridip Suhrud reminded those gathered at the NCPA.

Those of us who have been to the Gandhi Smarak — modular units that flow into each other, modest scale, local materials, open and covered spaces around a water body, all of this allowing a subtle play of light and visual porousness — have soaked it all in. It continues to draw awe from planners and architects around the world, and has stood the test of time, so far. Suhrud consciously refrained from examining Correa’s design but dwelt at length on Gandhi’s philosophy to ask the question: does the man need a memorial at all? He argued that Gandhi had gradually shed every possession of his and lived like a peripatetic ascetic; a physical memorial, therefore, militates against this.

Read the full article here What Do Memorials Really Convey, And How Much Do We Need Them?

The ‘Z-axis’ conference reflects on Charles Correa’s legacy and India’s urban identity

Posted on Posted in News, Events & Press Release, Z-axis 2024

Held in Mumbai, India, the two-day event explored Charles Correa’s role as an architect, planner and cultural thinker in post-independence India.

by Akash Singh I STIRworld I Published on: Oct 19, 2024

Mumbai—Charles Correa’s beloved city, described by him as “a great city, but a terrible place”—set the stage for the sixth edition of the Z-axis conference, organised by the Charles Correa Foundation (CCF) on October 12 and 13, 2024. Held at the NCPA experimental theatre, the conference celebrated Correa’s multifaceted legacy and explored his projects, philosophies, writings and advocacy for urbanisation. Correa, widely acclaimed as a visionary of post-independence modernist architecture in India, demonstrated an innate curiosity in numerous disciplines which imperceptibly reflected in his expansive repertoire. Spanning six sessions, the conference brought together 21 speakers from diverse fields to reflect on Correa’s protean disposition. The overarching theme captured Correa’s contribution to India’s post-independent search for identity and his ideas on urbanisation, with one of his quotes shining through, “You cannot look at cities without wandering into architecture at one hand and politics into another.”

Read the full article here The Z-axis Conference Reflects on Charles Correas Legacy and Indias Urban Identity

Z-AXIS 2024 SESSIONS

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SESSION 01- A PLACE IN THE SUN

‘There are no great men,’ said Stendhal apropos of Napoleon, ‘there are merely great events.’ And, one could perhaps go further and say that there are great issues. For we are only as big as the questions we address. And this, to my mind, is the central riveting fact of life for architects in the Third World. Not the size or value of the projects we are working on but the nature of the questions they raise — and that we must confront. A chance to grow – the abiding virtue of a place in the sun.

Charles Correa, A Place in the Sun (1983)

SPEAKERS –

Nondita Correa Mehrotra | The Conversations Continue: CCF and the Archives

Our first talk of the conference questions – How does one take forward the conversations – engaging with the ideas that for the most part were ahead of their time? What are an architect’s archives? Are they just the tangibles – the drawings, models, photographs, and writings? Or are there others? This presentation will highlight the work of the Charles Correa Foundation which focuses on extending the spirit of his ideas and continues the conversations.

William J. R. Curtis | Taking the Long View: Charles Correa in Historical Perspective (Keynote Address)

The talk attempts to overall assess the life and works of Charles Correa. While it is desirable to recreate each context and to reconstruct the anatomy of intentions and guiding ideas of Correa’s individual buildings, it is also necessary to see his work as a continuing experiment with guiding principles. With this as the key premise, the speaker touches upon various facets of Correa’s architecture and urbanism – his key design principles and influences, all while exploring a sort of mythological concept of ‘Indian identity.’

Kulbhushan Jain | Charles Correa: Meaning and Pertinence

With the aspirations for a post-independent modern India in the foreground, this talk focuses on the dual influence of modernity and traditional inheritance seen in Correa’s architecture.
The speaker attempts to look at three museums/art centres designed by him namely Gandhi Smarak Sangrahalaya, Ahmedabad (1963), Bharat Bhavan, Bhopal (1982) and Jawahar Kala Kendra, Jaipur (1986).

Rahul Mehrotra | Charles Correa and his Idea of India

The lecture will examine the spectrum of Charles Correas project in the context of his idea of India. It will attempt to situate his vision in his understanding and response to the political conditions in which he practised as an architect, planner and most importantly as an activist. The projects that will be covered would include his institutional work, housing as well as ideas about urbanism and his theoretical suggestions for practitioners in India. That is to examine Charles Correa’s legacy for India and his contribution of articulating a clear agenda for architects in India. That is to theorise the everyday in productive ways for designers and construct a clear idea of India.

Discussant – Ranjit Hoskote

Session 02 – Volume Zero

It refers to what Louis Kahn meant when he spoke of ‘Volume Zero’. What Kahn would say to his students goes something like this: ‘I love English history; I love the bloodiness of it. I’ve got eight volumes which I enjoy reading.’ Then, after a pause, he would add, ‘Well, actually, I haven’t read all eight — I’ve read only Volume One…and even that, I haven’t read more than just the first few pages.’ And then, more fiercely, ‘Actually, I don’t think history started the way they say it did. I think it started before that. I want to read Volume Zero.’ And then he would finish with this truly extraordinary sentence: ‘Architecture is magnificent because it deals with the recessions of the mind…with that which is not yet said, and which is not yet made.’

Charles Correa, The Pietro Belluschi Lecture, MIT, Boston (1998)

SPEAKERS –

Mustansir Dalvi | Citizen Charles

This talk will focus on how Charles’s architecture and urbanism are rooted not in the flourishes of design or notions of legacy and posterity but more in being a citizen of a city, a country and the world. Very early in his career, he moved away from the enticing possibilities of materiality and universalism, away from the ubiquity of Corbusian international Modernism and more towards the appreciation of the socio-cultural situation of his countrymen. Both his successes and failures, his built and unbuilt work are testament to this political location, that an architect is a citizen first.

Malvika Singh | The Quintessential Polymath A True Renaissance Person

This talk outlines Correa’s influence with his comprehensive identity as an architect, public intellect and importantly, a humanist. Highlighting the synergy between Correa and his partner Monika as his other half, his ardhangini. They together injected the structures with the metaphors that marked their life. His architectural philosophy advocates for designs that respect local contexts while promoting sustainability. The talk asserts that his ethos lives on and is palpable in our everyday lives.

Rajnish Wattas | The View from Chandigarh

Charles Correa was and remains a colossus. His persona is etched on Chandigarh’s hearts and the béton brut concrete facades of Corbusier, whom he loved to rub the wrong way. This talk is a reversed telescopic view of Charles, as to how we saw him then and read his views on the city of Chandigarh along the lines of his brilliant article ‘The View from Benares’.

Tridip Suhrud | A Memorial for Mr Gandhi

A man who aspired to be a mendicant, whose striving was to attain a state of desire less, who eschewed statues and idols equally is assassinated and his associates embark on a mission to memorialize him. This conversation seeks to ask a question, what is a memorial to Gandhi? This will be done with the memorial at Sabarmati and the Gandhi Smarak Sanghrahalaya designed by Charles Correa.

Discussant – Ranjit Hoskote

Session 03 – Blessings of The Sky

The sky has always carried a profound and sacred meaning. Through some instinctive process, man has perceived it as the abode of the gods. Hence to climb a sacred path to the top of the hill, where the immortals dwell, is a paradigm of such mythic power that it has been central to the beliefs of almost every society, since the beginning of time. Such spaces have an infinite number of variations: one step out of a room…into a verandah…and then on to a terrace…from which one proceeds to an open courtyard, perhaps shaded by a tree…or by a large pergola overhead. True Enlightenment cannot be achieved within the closed box of a room – one must be outdoors, under the open sky.

Charles Correa, February, 1995
Part of the ‘CHARLES CORREA’ exhibition catalogue held in BORUSAN Art Gallery, Istanbul, May 22 – June 24, 2000

SPEAKERS –

Catherine Desai | First works: Charles Correa in Gujarat

This talk focuses on the early phase of Correa’s career in Gujarat, among the first five constructed projects, four were built in Ahmedabad or surrounding towns. Examining both his seminal and less often discussed buildings, we see that far from being hesitant beginnings or false starts for mature work to come, they are powerful, diverse and sophisticated statements of architectural intent, that remain of relevance to contemporary practice. What might an analysis of these first buildings, overshadowed by more famous works, reveal?

Liane Lefaivre | Charles Correa and Regionalism of the Global South

Talking about the architect and planner Charles Correa within the rise of regionalism as a major movement following WWII in the Global North and the Global South. Highlighting how Correa distinguished himself from many Northern architects by addressing environmental concerns in his designs. He experimented with more efficient techniques adapted from his early mentor and life-long friend Buckminster Fuller. Also discuss how Charles became committed to the idea of large-scale top-down planning, exemplified in projects like Navi Mumbai and lastly see how his towering contribution only gets more relevant with time in this present era of horrendous climate change and wretched poverty and homelessness.

Ranjit Hoskote | Charles Correa’s Approach to the Sacred Everyday

Charles Correa’s lifelong preoccupation with the sacred – not as a counterpoint to normal experience, but as a current within the every day – has remained under-regarded in the study of his vision and oeuvre. This talk will reflect on the interplay between inquiry and wonderment, and the hope of cosmic belonging, which animate many of Correa’s projects, including Salvacao Church in Mumbai, IUCAA in Pune, the Jawahar Kala Kendra in Jaipur, and the 1986-87 exhibition project ‘Vistara’.

Discussant – Mustansir Dalvi 

Session 04 – Buildings As Ideas

For architecture is not created in a vacuum. It is the compulsive expression of beliefs (implicit or explicit) central to our lives.

Vistara, The Architecture of India (1986)

SPEAKERS –

Pradeep Dalal | Like the shade of a great tree: Howard Hodgkin’s Mural for the British Council Library in New Delhi, 1987-92.

Many of the buildings designed by the architect Charles Correa from the 1980s onward feature visual art as a significant aspect of the architecture. This talk will focus on the collaboration with the artists such as Janghar Singh Shyam who was commissioned to paint the shell domes of the Bharat Bhavan and walls of the courtyard at the Vidhan Bhavan, Bhopal. He also worked with the artist Howard Hodgkin to produce an immense mural for the façade that the artist later described as an “ecumenical tree of no particular species and no specific symbolism.”
For both Correa’s architecture and Hodgkin’s mural, this collaboration was “the product of an infinitely refined imagination in the face of nature.”

Kaiwan Mehta | Humility and Multiplicity – Architecture’s Tryst with Indianness

The talk will build a conversation on two buildings by Charles Correa – the Gandhi Smarak Sangrahalaya at Sabarmati Ashram, in Ahmedabad, and the Jawahar Kala Kendra in Jaipur. The Sangrahalaya exemplifies humility in architecture, reflecting Gandhi’s core value- the self is public, and the public is not out of the self. Its simplicity and structure foster introspection and connection. In contrast, the Jawahar Kala Kendra represents multiplicity and creative expression, embodying Nehru’s vision of ‘unity in diversity’ and emphasizing the enjoyment of knowledge and not being trapped in myopic traditions. Correa captured a nation, in a tryst with its destiny – the difficulties and pleasures of being Charles Correa in India.

Sunil Shelar | The Ritualistic Pathway – 3 projects with different topologies

Since the earliest civilization, the ritualistic pathway was, and is, the central aspect of life on the subcontinent. Planetary positions held great importance and meaning in planning a building or a city. This talk will focus on how Charles Correa was fascinated by this knowledge and its significance regarding the design and organisation of buildings. The 3 buildings here are different in terms of their function, yet the ritualistic pathway, the climate, and the quintessential square remain central to their genesis.

Ashok Vajpeyi | A Home of Arts as a Non-building

This talk will be about Bharat Bhavan, a multi-arts centre in Bhopal designed by Charles Correa, to come up at a place that almost joined the old city to the new city. He called it a non-building since the whole building could not be seen in its entirety from anywhere. The presentation would trace the Correan aesthetics, imagination, and the multiple artistic uses many spaces could provide for and gently provoke.

Ajit Kembhavi | Architecture, Astronomy and the Cosmos: From Conversations to a Masterpiece

In his talk, he will recount the heady days when the ideas were first conceived in Mumbai and Bengaluru, the twists and turns through which the project of the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA) progressed in Pune, the eventual completion, and the additions which have been made to the buildings from time to time, all in coherence with the original conception. He will end by summarising the progress of the IUCAA 2.0 building, which is now under construction and is probably the last design by Charles Correa.

Discussant – Rajnish Wattas

Session 05 – An Urban Manifesto

“For the city which we experience is, of course, much more than just a physical plant – it is also a set of powerful mythic images and values…that give sustenance, and enrichment to our lives. This, in the final analysis, is what cities are about. What culture is about. And what, hopefully, urban centres will once again become.”

Charles Correa, The City as: City, Housing and Urbanisation (1999)

SPEAKERS –

Vidyadhar Phatak | Charles Correa – An Urbanist

Though committed to his architectural practice, Charles Correa made significant contributions to urban development in India. Notable of these are the planning of Navi Mumbai, policy initiatives of MMRDA, National Commission on Urbanisation, Delhi Arts Commission, and Regional Plan of Goa. In this talk, the speaker intends to present his understanding and interpretation of Correa’s thinking about three themes viz. Indian Urbanisation, Urban Structures and Role of Land, Markets and Governance in shaping cities.

Jagan Shah | The National Commission on Urbanization: An Unfinished Project for Modern India

Through his talk, Jagan Shah will highlight the quality of the NCU’s contribution to modern India’s urban history. In stark contrast with more recent attempts at national policymaking, the NCU is overt in its affirmation of constitutional values, social justice, and equitable growth, which is a testament to the deep influence wielded by its Chairman, Charles Correa. The talk correlates the NCU’s work with Correa’s writings and with contemporaneous events such as the planning of Navi Mumbai to argue that the 1980s were a decade of tremendous progress on the urban policy as a lever for livelihood creation and poverty alleviation and that the progress has been subverted by the forces of globalisation and neoliberalism that have dominated policy discourse over the past three decades. The talk will conclude with reflections on the guiding principles of the NCU and their continued relevance for the future of India’s cities.

Discussant – Rahul Mehrotra

Session 06 – Space As A Resource

SPEAKERS –

Rohan Varma | The Bill of Rights for Housing in the Third World: Charles Correa’s Manifesto for Housing the Masses

This talk de-centres and expands this debate on habitat beyond its typically limited geography and timeframe by focusing on its development through an understudied manifesto written from the context of the Global South: Charles Correa’s 1985 ‘Bill of Rights for Housing in the Third World’. It also makes a case for revisiting Correa’s work and writings that advocate for an approach to housing that blurs the dichotomies between the formal and informal and top-down and bottom-up practices.

Dirk Van Gameren | Housing Lessons Charles Correa’s patient search for a habitat for all

A remarkable part of Charles Correa’s built, and unbuilt work are his projects for housing. His ‘recherche patiente’ is arguably one of the main contributions in our times to that most crucial challenge for both architects and urban planners: to address the continuing demand for good, accessible and affordable housing. The talk will focus on this long and patient search for optimal models for housing. Different lenses will explore how to understand his thinking and designing, looking from the way the built form shapes public and collective spaces, the inclusion of open space in the private realm of the dwelling, to how material structure and detail emphasise the climatic and functional experience of space in and outside the individual dwelling. 

Rohan Shivkumar | Lovely Villa: A film on growing up in Charles Correa’s LIC Colony

Every house is haunted by the spirits of those are yet to come, and of those that came before. We are all marked by the architecture of the homes we live in. ‘Lovely Villa’ is the name of the apartment building where the filmmaker grew up, as he studied to become an architect. It is in the LIC colony designed by Charles Correa and represents an imagination of the ideal community for a modern India.  This is a film about the relationship between architecture, everyday life, family, coming of age and the memory of ‘home’.

Discussant – Catherine Desai

Z-AXIS 2022 SPEAKERS

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Kartik Vora

Academician, Ajeenkya DY Patil University

Kartik Vora studied architecture from CEPT Ahmedabad, Masters’ from UIC Chicago and PhD from MS University Vadodara. He was Chief Researcher for Charles Correa’s Vistara exhibition for the Festival of India Exhibition in India, Russia, Japan, and Germany; and Research Fellow with SOM Foundation in Chicago. Subterranean architecture and Topology grab his passion — particularly the three dimensional double labyrinths and their applications in Nanotechnology and in Space. He has been teaching and researching for over 35 years — integrating advanced Climate and Construction technologies in the Built Environment curriculum. At the present he is Professor Design-Chair with Ajankya DY Patil University, Lohegaon, Pune.

Marc Angélil

Architect, AGPS Architecture

Marc Angélil is a practicing architect at AGPS architecture, a firm with ateliers in Los Angeles and Zurich. He held the 2021 Kenzo Tange Visiting Professorship in Architecture and Urban Design at Harvard University and is professor emeritus from ETH Zurich, conducting research on social and spatial developments of metropolitan regions worldwide. His publication Mirroring Effects: Tales of Territory, co-written with Cary Siress,

explores the socio-spatial impact of development-led urbanization on local habitats in different world regions today. His built projects include the IUCN headquarters in Geneva, Children’s Museum of Los Angeles, Portland Aerial Tram, Zurich International School, and midfield terminal at the Zurich Airport. The atelier has received international acclaim, recently for an off-the-grid ranch in California, including three recognitions from the Los Angeles AIA Chapter.

Richard Hassell

Co-founder , WOHA

Richard Hassell is the co-Founding Director of WOHA. He graduated from the University of Western Australia in 1989 and was awarded Master of Architecture from Melbourne’s RMIT University in 2002. He has lectured at many universities and serves as an Adjunct Professor at the University of Western Australia. He is also appointed the Seidler Chair in the Practice of Architecture at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia. With every project, the practice aims to create a matrix of interconnected human-scaled environments. These spaces foster community, enable stewardship of nature, generate biophilic beauty, activate ecosystem services and build resilience.

Valerie Mulvin

Co-founder, McCullough Mulvin Architects

Valerie Mulvin is a co-founder of McCullough Mulvin Architects, a Dublin-based practice focusing on the design of sustainable cultural, educational and civic buildings, with an interest in innovative contemporary architecture, place, and history. Valerie graduated from UCD School of Architecture in 1981 and spent a year in Rome on post-graduate scholarship.

She collaborated with Niall McCullough on “A Lost Tradition, the nature of architecture in Ireland”, a seminal book. As part of Group 91, designers of the competition-winning Temple Bar Framework Plan, she designed Temple Bar Gallery & Studios and Black Church Print Studio. Other award-winning buildings in Ireland and internationally include Ussher Library TCD, Trinity Long Room Hub, Dublin Dental School & Hospital, Waterford Fire Station, Blackrock Further Education Institute & Public Library, St. Mary’s Medieval Mile Museum Kilkenny, and the Learning Laboratory in Thapar University, India.

Her latest book “Approximate Formality – Morphology of Irish Towns”, published 2021, discusses the origin, originality and potential of towns and town plans in Ireland. She is a member of Aosdána.

Lina Ghotmeh

Founder, Lina Ghotmeh Architecture

Lina Ghotmeh — Architecture is Paris-based atelier founded by Lina Ghotmeh. Echoing her lived experience in Beirut, her office’s work is orchestrated as an “Archeology of the Future”: every project emerges in complete symbiosis with nature after a thorough historical and materially sensitive approach. These Projects include “Stone Garden”, a hand-crafted tower in Beirut; “Réalimenter Masséna”, winner of the call for innovative projects of the city of Paris; and the new Hermès Workshops, a low-carbon passive building under construction in Normandy.

Lina Ghotmeh is a Louis I Khan visiting professor at the Yale School of Architecture, a Gehry Chair at the University of Toronto, and is a Member Professor at the IAA International Academy of Architecture. She has been awarded the 2020 Schelling Architecture Prize, the 2020 Tamayouz “Woman of Outstanding Achievement” Award, the 2019 French Fine Arts Academy Cardin Award, among others.

Louisa Hutton

Co-founder, Sauerbruch Hutton

Louisa Hutton founded the practice in 1989 together with Matthias Sauerbruch in London before moving to Berlin in 1993. Louisa was a member of the Curatorial Board of the Schelling Architecture Foundation for thirteeen years, and was a Commissioner at CABE as well as a member of the first Steering Committee for Germany’s Bundesstiftung Baukultur. She is an Honorary Fellow of the American Institute of Architects. In 2014 Louisa was elected to become a Royal Academician, and was subsequently awarded an OBE in 2015 for her contribution to architecture. Further to Sauerbruch Hutton‘s endeavours, Louisa has taught at the Architectural Association and was a visiting professor at Harvard Graduate School of Design. Louisa herself studied at the University of Bristol and the Architectural Association in London.

Matthias Sauerbruch

Co-founder, Sauerbruch Hutton

Matthias Sauerbruch founded Sauerbruch Hutton in 1989 together with Louisa Hutton and has since been directing the office. Matthias is a founding member of the German Sustainable Building Council, a member of the Urban Design Council in Munich and on the board of KW Institute for Contemporary Art Berlin. He is an Honorary Fellow of the American Institute of Architects, and was Director of the Architecture Section of the Akademie der Künste, Berlin. Matthias has taught at the Architectural Association in London as a Unit Master. He has held tenure professorships at the TU Berlin as well as the Academy of Fine Arts in Stuttgart.

He was a visiting Professor at the University of Virginia, the Harvard Graduate School of Design and the University of the Arts in Berlin. Matthias himself studied at the Hochschule der Künste Berlin and the Architectural Association in London.

Christopher Lee

Co-founder + Principal, Serie Architects

Christopher Lee is the co-founder and Principal of Serie Architects London, Mumbai and Singapore; and leads the design of Serie across all three offices. He is Arthur Rotch Design Critic in Architecture at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design, and the London Mayor’s Design Advocate.

John Ochsendorf

Educator, MIT

John Ochsendorf is the Class of 1942 Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Architecture at MIT, where he is the founding director of the Morningside Academy for Design, which aims to elevate design education and innovation globally.

A native of rural West Virginia, Ochsendorf earned his degrees in engineering at Cornell University, Princeton University and the University of Cambridge. He is known internationally for his work combining design of architecture and engineering with traditional construction knowledge. He has contributed to the design of a number of award-winning structures around the world, including the Mapungubwe Interpretive Centre in South Africa, which was named the 2009 World Building of the Year, as well as the Sean Collier Memorial on the campus of MIT.

Ochsendorf is the recipient of numerous awards, including a Fulbright Scholarship to Spain (2000) and a MacArthur Fellowship from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation (2009). He was named a MacVicar Fellow for exceptional teaching at MIT in 2013, and from 2017-2020 he served as the Director of the American Academy in Rome.

Solano Benítez

Architect, Jopoi De Arquitectura

Solano Benítez is an architect based in Asunción, Paraguay and graduated from Facultad de Arquitectura y Urbanismo, Universidad Nacional de Asunción (FAU UNA) in 1986. Over the years, he has founded different groups working towards developing professional activity. Currently, Solano works from Jopoi de Arquitectura. He has received numerous national and international awards and distinctions, within an individual and collective capacity. This includes the Decade Award for 1989-99 (College of Architects of Paraguay), BSI Swiss Architectural Award in 2008, Arquitecto del Bicentenario from the Asociación Paraguaya de

Arquitectos in 2011, the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at the Venice Biennale in 2016 and the 2021 Global Award for Sustainable Architecture. He was also a finalist for the 2nd Mies van der Rohe Award for Latin America, is a Honorary Fellow at the American Institute of Architects (2012) and holds an honorary Doctorate from the Universidad Nacional de Asunción (2021) 

Nelson Mota

Educator, TU Delft

Nelson Mota is associate professor of Architecture at Delft University of Technology. He earned his doctoral degree from TU Delft in 2014 with the dissertation “An Archaeology of the Ordinary: Rethinking the Architecture of Dwelling from CIAM to Siza”. Nelson is author of the book A Arquitectura do Quotidiano (edarq, 2010), co-editor of Global Housing: Dwelling in Addis Ababa (JapSam Books, 2020), and co-editor of the academic journal issues Footprint 17 (2015), Joelho 8 (2017), and Footprint 24 (2019). At the TU Delft, Nelson coordinates the Global Housing research group and educational program. He is editor and member of the editorial board of the academic journal Footprint and the book series DASH- Delft Architectural Studies on Housing.

Rahul Mehrotra

Founder Principal, RMA Architects

Rahul Mehrotra is the founder principal of RMA Architects. He divides his time between working in Mumbai and Boston and teaching at the Graduate School of Design at Harvard University where he is Professor of Urban Design and Planning and the John T. Dunlop Professor in Housing and Urbanisation. Mehrotra’s most recent books are titled Working in Mumbai (2020) and The Kinetic City and other essays ( 2021). The first, a reflection on his practice evolved through its association with the city of Bombay/Mumbai. The second book presents Mehrotra’s writings over the last thirty years and illustrates his long-term engagement with and analysis of urbanism in India. This work has given rise to a new conceptualization of the city which Mehrotra calls the Kinetic City.

Sean Godsell

Founder, Sean Godsell Architects

Sean Godsell graduated with First Class Honours from The University of Melbourne in 1984. In 1994 he formed Godsell Associates Pty Ltd Architects. He obtained a Masters of Architecture degree from RMIT University in 1999. 

In July 2003 he received a Citation from the President of the American Institute of Architects for his work for the homeless. In 2006 he received the Victorian Premier’s Design Award and the RAIA Robin Boyd Award and in 2007 he received the Cappochin residential architecture award in Italy and a Chicago Athenaeum award in the USA, in 2008 he was a finalist in the wallpaper* International Design Awards and a recipient of his second AIA Record Houses Award for Excellence in the USA. In 2008, Kenneth Frampton nominated him for the inaugural BSI Swiss Architecture Award for architects under the age of 50 and his work was exhibited in both the Milan Triennale and Venice Biennale in the same year. In 2010, the prototype of the RMIT design Hub façade was exhibited in Gallery MA in Tokyo before being transported in 2011 to its now permanent home at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. In 2013 he received the RAIA Victorian Medal and William Wardell Awards for the RMIT Design Hub and the Harold Desbrowe Annear award for the Edward St House. He is the recipient of the 2022 AIA Gold Medal.

Mariam Issoufou Kamara

Founder , atelier masōmī

Mariam Issoufou Kamara is an architect from Niger. In 2014, she founded atelier masōmī, an architecture and research practice that tackles public, cultural, residential, commercial and urban design projects. The firm is headquarted in Niamey, with a design studio in New York. Kamara believes that architects have an important role to play in creating spaces that elevate, give dignity, and provide people with a better quality of life. The firm’s completed projects include the Hikma Community Complex, a library and mosque complex, which won two Global LafargeHolcim Awards for sustainable architecture. Other works include the Dandaji Regional Market and Niamey 2000 Housing, which was shortlisted for the 2022 Aga Khan Award for Architecture. Kamara is a professor of Architecture Heritage and Sustainability at ETH Zurich.

Kapil Gupta

Co-founder, Serie Architects

Kapil Gupta is the co-founder of Serie Architects and Principal of Serie Mumbai. He graduated with honours from Sir JJ School of Architecture in 1996, Mumbai followed by postgraduate studies at the Architectural Association, London. Kapil leads and manages Serie’s project portfolio in India with projects ranging across housing, commercial and institutional sectors. He is closely involved with the development of projects from inception to completion.

He was a Director at the Urban Design Research Institute, Mumbai between 2003 and 2008, where he led India’s first entry to the Venice Architecture Biennale in 2006. He has served as a visiting critic at numerous schools in India and been on several jury panels for competitions and design awards including Archiprix, Boston in 2010. He was the Charles Correa Design Chair at the Goa School of Architecture for 2020 and a design reviewer for the 2022 cycle for the Aga Khan Award for Architecture.  He has written on the challenges of south Asian urbanisation and is currently involved with ecological and land regeneration strategies in India as a response to climate change.

He is a Registered Architect with the Council of Architecture, India.

Mark Mulligan

Educator, Wentworth Institute of Technology

Mark Mulligan is an architect-educator based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with projects completed in New England, Costa Rica, Hawaii, and Japan.  As a young architect, he worked for several years with Fumihiko Maki in Tokyo, and his engagement with Japanese architecture has grown to include research and design collaborations with Maki (Nurturing Dreams, MIT Press 2008), Kengo Kuma (Horizon House, 2013), the Takenaka Carpentry Tools Museum (The Thinking Hand, 2014), and structural designer Jun Sato (Komorebi Pavilion, 2017).  He has taught at Harvard Graduate School of Design, University of Oregon, and Hosei University in Tokyo, and is now Associate Dean of Architecture at Wentworth Institute of Technology in Boston. 

Heinrich Wolff

Architect, Wolff Architects

Heinrich Wolff is an architect working in Cape Town, South Africa. He is in practice with his wife Ilze as Wolff Architects. Their practice is developing an architecture of consequence through the mediums of design, advocacy, research, documentation and art.

Heinrich’s work has been exhibited internationally, the most significant exhibitions being the Museum of Modern Art (2010), the Venice Biennale (2006 & 2010), the Sao Paulo Architecture Biennale (2005, 2007 & 2019), the Chicago Architecture Biennial (2015 & 2019) and the South American Architecture Biennale – Ecuador (2008).

In 2011 Heinrich was selected as the Designer of the Future by the Wouter Mikmak Foundation (Netherlands). In 2007, he won the DaimlerChrysler Award for South African Architecture. With his practice Heinrich received the Lubetkin Award in 2006 from the RIBA for the Red Location Museum of Struggle. He has won several other international and South African awards for excellence in design, most notably for public buildings such as schools and hospitals.

Heinrich has been guest professor at various institutions; IUAVenice (2013), ETH Zürich (2014-15), Washington University, St. Louis (2016) and the Goa College of Architecture (2017) as the foreign visiting Charles Correa Chair. He was an associate adjunct professor at the University of Cape Town and was an honorary research fellow at the same  institution.

Dirk Van Gameren

Educator, TU Delft

Dick van Gameren is professor of housing design and dean of the Faculty of Architecture and the built Environment, TUDelft, Netherlands. He is founding editor of the bookseries DASH, Delft Architectural Studies on Housing. He is currently developing the Global Housing Study Centre for research and education on affordable housing in the Global South. He is a practising architect and partner of Mecanoo Architecten. In 2007 he received an Aga Khan Award, and in 2012 the Best Building of the Year Award of the Dutch Association of Architects.

Nondita Correa Mehrotra

Director, CCF

Nondita Correa Mehrotra is an architect working in India and the United States. She studied architecture at the University of Michigan and at Harvard’s Graduate School of Design, and worked for over two decades with Charles Correa. She is a principal in the firm RMA Architects with offices in Mumbai and Boston. Ms Correa Mehrotra is Director of the Charles Correa Foundation, which is involved in research, publications and the facilitation of projects focused on the improvement of the built habitat and the debates around architecture and urbanism in India. 

She has taught at the University of Michigan and at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and continues to be a design critic at the Rhode Island School of Design and the Wentworth Institute of Technology. She was a finalist for the design of the symbol for the Indian Rupee, an idea she initiated. She has been on the Master Jury of the Aga Khan Award for Architecture, and the Holcim Awards for Sustainable Construction, and has designed furniture and architectural books, and has curated several exhibitions.

2020 Award Ceremony Schedule

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You can watch the ceremony on YouTube here.

Z-axis 2020 Lecture Series out now!

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The Z-axis 2020 Lecture Series has ended. You may watch recordings of all the sessions on our YouTube channel, click on the sessions below to watch the recordings:

01 CHARLES CORREA MEMORIAL LECTURE

02 REDEFINING THE CITY FOR THE PUBLIC

03 COMMONS AND THE CITY

04 STREETS IN THE NEIGHBOURHOOD

05 HOMES IN THE STREET

Registered participants took part in the Design Competition.

Z-axis 2020: Competition

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Competition Brief

Download the brief hereDownload
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‘Nightwalkers glide through Tier III towns’: How can India heal its coronavirus-ravaged cities?

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By Vivek Menezes

The Z-Axis Conference brings together ‘starchitects’ from around the world to share their experiences about solving urban challenges.
‘Nightwalkers glide through Tier III towns’: How can India heal its coronavirus-ravaged cities?
A family of migrant workers from Madhya Pradesh walk out of Navi Mumbai. | PTI

A few days ago, the outstanding poet and translator Mustansir Dalvi (he has also been on the faculty of Mumbai’s Sir JJ School of Architecture for 17 years) released a new collection of verse. Walk, he said, was written from his “sense of helplessness, frustration and anger” earlier this year, when “we were seeing vast number of people, walking back home, sometimes covering over 1,000 km from state to state, without support, money or transportation”.

By now, it’s clear India launched heedlessly into “the world’s strictest lockdown” without the measures necessary to safeguard the vast majority of its citizens. At that time, Prime Minister Narendra Modi misguidedly promised that the “Mahabharata war was won in 18 days, this war the whole country is fighting against corona will take 21 days”.

Continue reading “‘Nightwalkers glide through Tier III towns’: How can India heal its coronavirus-ravaged cities?” →

Z-axis 2020: Event Schedule

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CONFERENCE SUBMISSION DATE 

12 NOON (Indian Standard Time) on 01 December 2020.

The Virtual Conference Schedule is divided into 5 Sessions: Each one is from

6:00pm to 8:15pm Indian Standard Time (IST)

SPEAKER LIST 

Click on the images to view a detailed biography, list of readings, and case studies 

Charles Correa’s 1955 Master Thesis Uses Animated Film to Explain Public Participation in Urban Processes

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By Andreea Cutieru

Charles Correa’s 1955 Master Thesis Uses Animated Film to Explain Public Participation in Urban Processes, Charles Correa passed away on June 26th 2015. Image © Chistbal Manuel
Charles Correa passed away on June 26th 2015. Image © Chistbal Manuel

Charles Correa Foundation has recently released several snippets of ‘You & Your Neighbourhood’, Charles Correa’s 1955 Master Thesis at MIT, an animation film for which the architect was scriptwriter, animator, photographer and director. The thesis put forward the idea of a participatory process for the betterment of neighbourhoods, with a strong emphasis on creating a framework for improving urban conditions in a bottom-up approach.

Continue reading “Charles Correa’s 1955 Master Thesis Uses Animated Film to Explain Public Participation in Urban Processes” →

Z-AXIS 2020: REGISTRATION OPEN

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BRIEF RELEASE-01

General Registration

Registration Open.

The registration fee is ₹900 /- per individual.

All amounts inclusive of tax.

The registration fee for the event will cover both the Virtual Conference as well as the Design Competition.

Participation in the competition is not mandatory but will be an interesting conduit to engage deeper with the ideas discussed during the virtual competition.

We are extending our registration deadline!

The registrations will close at 11:30 noon IST on 25th September 2020.

For foreign credit card payments kindly write to zaxis@charlescorreafoundation.org

 

The registration form can be downloaded here

You and Your Neighbourhood: the film

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‘You & Your Neighbourhood’ is the title of Charles Correa’s Masters Thesis at MIT, 1955, for which he made an animated film. He was the scriptwriter, animator, photographer and director.

 

Continue reading “You and Your Neighbourhood: the film” →

Z-axis 2020

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Save the Date:

SAVE DATE 03 fnal

The current COVID-19 pandemic and its response have raised critical questions about how we live and work. It has also led to a lot of us asking, ‘How can we improve our own neighbourhood?’

At the fourth edition of Z-axis — the Charles Correa Foundation’s biennial conference — participants will draw their attention back to their own neighbourhoods to generate creative visions that uplift the public realm.

With a series of lectures in September, followed by a unique design challenge in October-November, Z-axis 2020 will host a number of international speakers focusing on these issues. A Jury will critique and recognise projects by participants — creative individuals who improve everyday life for their neighbours by making changes at four distinct levels — the neighbourhood, the commons, the street, and the doorstep.

Stay tuned for more updates regarding Z-axis 2020 — You and Your Neighborhood, and in the meantime, save these dates!

01 Charles Correa Memorial lecture

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The third of a biennial lecture series to celebrate the legacy of Charles Correa, this lecture is delivered on 1st September, Correa’s 90th birth anniversary. The lecturer will be a person whose values and work exemplify the interest and issues that Charles Correa engaged with. It is our intention to use the Memorial Lecture to establish a biennial celebration of architecture in India to be held in Goa — the home of the Charles Correa Foundation. The 2020 Charles Correa Memorial Lecture will be delivered by Mirai Chatterjee.

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02_Redefining the City for the Public

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03_Commons and the city

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Continue reading “03_Commons and the city” →