Warm modernity. Indian architecture. Building democracy. Ediz. illustrata

A protocol drawn up long ago in 1945 by Otto Koenigsberger, adopted in nearly one hundred instances in India and in more than half the world, provides the framework and rules for the planning of the prototypes of planned cities, and tells us that the so-called “Participative Architecture” aimed at intercultural inclusion, originated in the post-colonial territories between India and Africa. The catalogue, the fruition of a 5-year long Italian-Indian research, illustrates the consequences of democratic choice in independent India, its factual existence and its globalized outcomes, present even today. Presented in the installation, are four examples of Democratic New Towns – Jamshedpur, Bhubaneswar, Faridabad and Chandigarh- outcomes of the interface between the experiences of Frey, Drew and Le Corbusier and the ideas of their Indian counterparts, Varma, Doshi, Correa, Rewal. The cities are analytically described and documented through photographs of their present condition, preserved as the modern protected areas in Europe.