G20 summit

-Lohitha Rao, Unnati Gandhi

The G20 group was created after the Asian financial crisis to foster global economic cooperation. It deals with issues such as international financial stability, climate change, and sustainable development. The annual G20 summit is hosted by a different country each year. India recently hosted the 18th G20 summit with the theme 'One Earth, One Family, One Future' at Bharat Mandapam, Pragati Maidan, New Delhi. Hosting such events helps India establish international connections and networks, contributing to competitive global participation.

The discussions of the assembly turned towards questions of beauty in cities and its portrayal. It stemmed from the green screens and cover-ups that happened in the NCR along the routes of dignitaries to hide the slums and other elements and residents of the city that do not ‘fit the image’. It is important to understand how the production of a glorified image actually impacts people's lives. This includes suppressing wages and confining people to their homes for the sake of maintaining a 'good' image. The artistic representations in the city, such as paintings, statues and murals, often lose their true meanings and become mere symbols of beauty with no depth or meaning. The idea of beautification is always associated with a tourist-y idea of places. Later in the discussion, the discussion also shifted to the design of buildings, or rather ‘beautiful buildings’, and how architectural students read and critique its design and beauty.

Hall of Nations, the building by Raj Rewal and Mahendra Raj that preceded the Bharat Mandapam, held the values of India's period of modernization and development with interconnected large-span cast-in-situ concrete space frames. It was not only a marvel of engineering, but also a representation of the nation's cultural significance expressed visually and experientially. In contrast, Bharat Mandapam, with its imposing structure and glass cladding, embodies an abstract notion of technology and architecture that is almost alien to its context when one takes a critical lens to it. The misconception that huge built structures are inherently great is often justified by various interpretations imposed upon them. The builtform didn't hold the idea of Mandapam in spite of its name. Further, representations like the Smriti Van and the Indian pavilion at the Dubai Expo commodify the country, emphasizing power over cultural and living significance. These representations overshadow the local knowledge, expertise, and wisdom found in building homes and sustaining ways of life in villages, towns, and cities.