remembering rockport seaport
February. 12. 2012
"There either is or is not a way things are.
The color of the day. How it felt to be a child. The feeling of saltwater on your sunburned legs. Sometimes the water is yellow. Sometimes it's red. The color in memory depends on the day. I won't tell the story the way it happened. I'll tell it the way I remember it." - Mitch Glazer (Adaptive screenplay for Charles Dickens' Great Expectations)
Like this:
still not the stuff we are made of
January. 31. 2012
Revisiting an old post from September 15th 2009…two years older transcendence still evades, but the sorcery is ever more delightful.
freedom from fear
September. 11. 2011
I am steel and concrete.
“All material in nature,
the mountains and the streams and the air and we,
are made of Light which has been spent,
and this crumpled mass called material casts a shadow,
and the shadow belongs to Light.”
– Louis Kahn
being and becoming
July. 29. 2011
[Shunyata : acrylic, watercolor + waterproof ink on brown particle board]
ahhh the splendour of physicality! this
spellbound atomic breakdown
simultaneous particulate collision
see, I
only just came alive
consciousness no more than chemical reaction?
from singularities to Turing’s labs
dimensions wrapped within dimensions
existence smiles, experiencing itself
as you in me in me in you- I
trace my being through the ovals of your eyes
past the outermost of orbits
and seep again into the void
falling up
July. 7. 2011
and staring into the whirlwind atmosphere at 27,000 feet
she almost fell upwards, head on the ground (fast dissipating) and feet in the clouds
there was nowhere to go but up, and she had no fear of falling
and there is much to be said about that.
Like this:
not alone
January. 25. 2011
…but of course!
“Challenging the meaning of life is the truest expression of the state of being human.” -Viktor Frankl
time space and i
December. 27. 2010
In the end, I may just be a colourist. Colour always spoke and I learned to listen.
Have you ever pondered the porosity of the universe?
its lines, its breadth, its breaths, its slipping through your being?
ever questioned the nature of existence? the lack of a beginning, the lack of an end?
“Time,” I read in Vedic texts “is nothing but a modification of the mind.”
Ironically, my mind will be thinking about that a long long time.
Mostly in colours…
Like this:
the mother tongue
December. 15. 2010
resurrecting an ancient language in starlight…
sensuously earthen
primordially timeless
which language does one employ to describe another?
re-learning Sanskrit from texts of the Gita-
I think all the wisdom of the universe is embedded in its very constructs.
you have to know it to know it
of the unreal there is no being, of the real no non-being|
the seers of truth have perceived the essence of both in their encounters with the true||2-13||
chicago
November. 16. 2010
…written when I was fresh off the boat about nine years ago and landed in Chicago and still used punctuation and capitalization. I can’t pin a picture to this one, yet.
Chicago
Looking out at the sprawl of twenty million left behind at dusk,
bent over the metal rail of the lofty lighthouse in a shadowed skyline
I watched the landscape smoulder in the blueness of the night.
Waters glowed in a full moon like the shivers of a firefly.
The city shone with defiance,
rebelling against the night.
Challenging the authority of the dark
Man made fire-
he
created light.
And, refusing to retire
into the shadows of the dark
I opened my arms and joined in the rebellion.
the yogi glass
October. 4. 2010
neither half-full, nor half empty
the yogi glass
just is
I know everyone thinks I’m an optimist, but I keep it real- reality just happens to be so bloody beautiful- I really, just enjoy the being!
bounded but not confined
for how can you be,
when you are one with everything in you?
sometimes art really stirs it up- walking at the Rachofsky house one summer day.
mytimemachineisyourtimemachine
September. 16. 2010
look up.
breathedrift with me through the time sky
my time machine is your time machine
my eyes like yours
parse through eons
gathering tales from infinity in whispers
can you hear?
did you know when we were?
does it matter?
but-
who can grasp the expanse of the universe?
but-
who can refuse to try?
…long exposure, looking up from the Koibab Forest up at the Grand Canyon rim before the descent.
A not-so-stellar-stellar shot, but not bad for a first, right?
Thank you Cole Rise: antimethod, for a shot of confidence. At least it made me try…
the heart of the matter
September. 13. 2010
Depths of my spirit, for I have seen those who are
Satisfied the most wretched of people.
I have heard the sigh of those in yearning and longing, and it is sweeter than the sweetest melody.”
-Khalil Gibraan (A Tear and a Smile)
The heart of the matter has always been here. I knew it when I learned of its existence….and then it made sense. Of course it did- it’s where we came from, and I had to go to it.
The Grand Canyon has haunted me since memory- even when I lived on the other side of the planet, surrounded by no one and nothing that had any connection to it, it was like a given.
In everything I do, I seek understanding- the bigger picture, the bigger picture. An obsession that keeps instigating wandering- very precious to me. The heart of the Canyon had to be a stop in the journey. It would be the place that hurt my soul to leave….and it did. Something of my spirit lies in that river, in the red rocks I lust after- it must, because the tears are streaming down my face still.
Every step of the journey was surreal. I kept trying to trace the source of this craving- it is so far removed from the life I come from- the roots of my lineage that wind around the Indian subcontinent in simple minded, earthen folks; our Vasant Kunj flat that I grew up in in the heart of Delhi…Delhi, where most are consumed by survival, amid the bustling humdrum of life lived in sensory explosion….to here; to rocks, and yearning and joy and pain.
Here I was. I was here.
I still can’t believe I touched it. Or rather, that it touched me…this magnanimous space chiseled by the ebb and flow of time and water. One look up- the history of our planet carved and on display. Swallow that, it says to me- and I struggle to digest.
When the climb got really rough, I found myself singing “we had joy, we had fun, we had seasons in the sun…” just like my mother had taught me…back when I had just learned to speak and words flowed into each other, sometimes amalgamating their meanings into residual feelings, that I still remember.
Funny thing about that canyon- distracted by your desperation to understand its heart, you stumble upon the heart of your matter.
you in me in me in you
June. 26. 2010
breathe
June. 2. 2010
photograph by the mother [ backflip by me ]
HOMELAND
Last night a friend asked me, "Where is your homeland?"
I said nothing, for what could I say?
My homeland is not Egypt or Syria or Iraq.
My homeland's a place that has never had a name.
-Jalal-ud-Din Rumi
I was born in India
and used to figure that made me Indian.
It runs deep in my veins, but I see now that so do a lot of other things…
things more ancient than this planet
my parents have taken to telling me I’ve become “too American”
Americans I know say I speak British
the Brits say I speak American
and even though nowhere really fits
and you’d expect an identity crisis here,
it’ all seems to fit so well that these lines don’t matter-
no one more than another
I’m just a child of the universe, and I’m dealing with it
like a friend once said:
home is where people love you and the people you love are-
and my home is boundless
i can i am
May. 19. 2010
I tried to make a self portrait yeeeears ago
it was a Jim Morrison evening then, and it is one now
power
I can make the earth stop in
its tracks. I made the
blue cars go away.
I can make myself invisible or small.
I can become gigantic & reach the
farthest things. I can change
the course of nature.
I can place myself anywhere in
space or time.
I can summon the dead.
I can perceive events on other worlds,
in my deepest inner mind,
& in the minds of others.
I can
I am
– James D. Morrison
the dweller
January. 10. 2010
sifting through dawn with mouthfuls of morning mist…“poetically, man dwells”
and so it goes…the search to pin down the fluid horizon
here’s the genesis of that reference, before Heidegger came along to dissect
its core:
“It is the measure of man.
Full of merit, yet poetically, man
Dwells on this earth. But no purer
Is the shade of the starry night,
If I might put it so, than
Man, who’s called an image of the godhead
Is there a measure on earth? There is
None”
-Hölderln
take another little piece of my heart now baby
October. 24. 2009
Gripped with this sudden desire to go public and “be an artist properly” last month, I went and submitted some work to a local art show. I came home with a piece of my soul missing, or so it felt- this giant gaping hole left in my stomach where my beautiful charcoals used to be. I don’t want anyone to buy them.
I’ve never understood how people can part with their art.
Everything one make is a self portrait- it is a matter of course…the pieces of a soul are intrinsically embedded in its expression- the artist and the work of art are so to speak, monovular in their genesis and their synthesis. Like Rushdie’s Farishta bound to the Prophet, or a child to her mother- the creation is bound to the creator…
“We flow in both directions along the umbilical cord.”
-Salman Rushdie, The Satanic Verses
So how do you sever that sacred connection and let it go? It isn’t the selfish need to possess the thing that is made, more the fright of losing a piece of the self and becoming vulnerable.
I realize the irony of the situation- grossly enmeshed in it myself both as an artist and an architect. Nascent in the choice to make buildings for a living, there is an acceptance of the fact that our deconstructed identity will embellish everything we create- pieces of our souls scattered in every piece of architecture we touch. The scale of the profession leaves no choice in the matter- the Other and Otherness are both inherent in each reflection of the Self.
CeSRON
October. 4. 2009
As in- self reflection is obsolete today, in the age of narcissism the search for self is labyrinthine…what you see are attempts to architecturalize that notion of being and becoming and the tumultuous process herein…
Studies for CeSRON (Center for Self Reflection, Otherness and Narcissism). There must be questions about what the hell this is all about- so ASK!
not the stuff we are made of
September. 15. 2009
When I was eight I asked my mother why my brain couldn’t understand itself- “I” was a blank to my self, yet I could understand the external world. I’m twenty six, and still wondering. Answers anyone? Cognitive Science is endlessly intriguing…
The fundamental question has always been who we are. What is the “I” we refer to as our “self?” People often separate our minds from our bodies- our soul from the corporeal…but what is the soul if not the sum of our consciousness- that which exists in our very cells? What makes a thing a being? What makes you you and me me? How about this for an answer:
“Matter flows from place to place, and momentarily comes together to be you. Whatever you are therefore, you are not the stuff you of which you are made…”
-Richard Dawkins
(http://www.ted.com/talks/richard_dawkins_on_our_queer_universe.html)
We are, in essence, at every point in time- a confluence of numerous possibilities- never to be repeated- a rare, magical moment in the universe at any given time. Never are we the same, yet we continue to retain our “self” through this seamless aberration called life.
I always wonder why some people can see more magic in the world than others- why isn’t it more obvious to everyone how mind-blowing this existence really is?
Yes, yes, Quantum Mechanics helped explain a lot, but more importantly the field has made us stretch our imaginations with a little more abandon- and demonstrates the improbability that plagues what seems mundane.
The sorcery is delightful, and delight must be shared. Wherever this road may lead, I walk it seeking something beautiful…and hopefully sprinkle some of the magic along the way.
Where are the rest of you who seek something beautiful and won’t settle for anything less?
here and there
August. 29. 2009
A little bit of nostalgia…written years ago- to be continued, but who knows when-
The valley in the foothills of the Himalayas was white in the winter and shades of green otherwise. The Mango trees that grew along winding paths bore fruit in the summer when it was hot, and then the hills were a shade of bottle green worn by soldiers of the Border Security Force, who lined the outskirts of the town. The river came down from beyond these hills and ran behind the old stone temple. And sunlight soaked its water and drenched the children flying in the white sand, running barefooted and free. And though the water in the cups of our palms was colourless, the river flowed with blue and green and purple and gold.
And while we picked smooth rounded pebbles from the shore and threw them back into the river, in efforts to reach the opposite bank, the river silently deposited its load of starfish and seashells and small translucent green stones onto our feet, soaking our soiled toes and making them twiddle.
