… what are we building for the future?

Monday July 6th, Auroville (India).

Pe’s objective, as an adventurer, urbanist, architect, artist, and researcher for the relationship between the arts and science, is to aim for a higher order and knowledge; to be part of the construction of the Galaxy Plan, and to experience and realize the vision of The Mother, formalized by Roger Anger.

As a student in London at the Architectural Association (AA), Pe felt blessed to study with amazing teachers  Harvard University,  their profound knowledge and sense of spirituality led him to the realization of the spiritual sphere of the soul. This, was the beginning of an awakening which then developed into a visionary research project, an experimental animation,  ‘An Analogy Between Light and Rotation’, that explored the relationship between: 1. the third eye and the sun, 2. the material and the metaphysical, and 3. the realization between the part and the whole (1 -Infinite).

Through this exploration, in year 2000, Pe had the ‘vision’ of the galaxy and developed an interior space very similar to the Matrimandir where every one would realize their relationship All.

In the center of this space, which is both a torus and a womb, there was the Divine Mother. But she is also, the Divine Girl of the Future, who is referred to in this Blog as Crystal. She is still to be conceived in Auroville, in this central position, in the center of the World, which is also the Center of the Universe, underneath a ray of solar, but also, Divine Light. She will be the future relationship between All.

That initial research, then became Pe’s focus and priority to search for Her. The objective of this blog is establishing communication with Crystal through Indigo. Who is Indigo? It is a colour, a type of light, a real girl, a medium to connect and conceive Crystal.

The search started, and first led to the professional world. Pe started to work in design studios, coordinating building designs with construction sites; later working independently as a freelance architect.

The recession in Europe, allowed him to further immerse himself  in the theoretical realm and abstract world of the ideas, while teaching and supporting students to experiment in Spain and Colombia.  He facilitated this methodology, he had learned from Martha LaGuess (Harvard).  Together, they would  research and experiment with the relationship between ideas and materials, in search for a coherent and continuous order that related both and their parts, the self and the world.

In Bogotá, Pe was further integrated in an urban workshop of a prestigious Colombian University, directed by Ioannis. The objective was to work with another team of specialized docents and a large group of students; designing – by teams – the “Utopian City of the Future”. 

Pe’s role as a teacher was to facilitate what they called a ‘technology component’ that embraced philosophical issues required for a change of consciousness towards a harmonious society to be constructed. The different components (urbanism, environment, aesthetics and so on) met with the rest of the collective in this urban design workshop that, started with analysis of the existing urban systems (transport, environmental, and so on) of the City of Bogota’s.

Out of this analysis, considering the transport and environmental systems and also macro-architectures that related to them, a new higher order system that would be superimposed over the old one resolving and articulating the city’s fabric from a systemic approach.

The result was a systemic macro-architecture  integrating both transport and environmental systems to architecture and housing typologies, connecting at a larger scale, the City to other larger scale  systems in the territory and the world.

In Bogota, Pe remembers he was already presenting Auroville to the students as a model, while analyzing it’s objectives to be explored and implemented in their designs. He always had in mind and proposed  developing the Auroville Model from this systemic approach.

In other words, to have students’ project the architecture of Auroville’s Galaxy Plan,  with the idea to present their work in Auroville and develop it onsite.

In 2006, Pe had successfully established an exchange program between Polytechnic University of Madrid, Spain and CEPT University of Ahmedabad, India, which still exists today.  The exchange program, between India and Colombia, is perhaps the first of its type between the two countries.

The objective was to build non-existing links in the area of academy and architecture, not only for the exchange of specific knowledge, but for Spain also to benefit of an ancestral knowledge, still to be discovered and implemented in a culture that has forgotten it’s spiritual roots. That program started in 2006, which has lead, not only an academic level, to many successful and high quality architectural final year projects in the area cooperation between countries, but also to professional alliances between India to Spain, and as we will see later, connected to Auroville.

This whole career brought Pe to Auroville, in first instance three years ago. That was the first encounter with the Matrimandir in reality. He then had a deep experience while at the view point. From this satellite position, Pe felt the concentrated energy emanating from its center. The experience was so profound, he did not want to talk afterwards to the local friend who came there with him. He could only listen, but he would not want to talk, so that to stay in silence.

Pe knew then he would be back to build the Dream, the Vision, to be part of a golden future.

Back in Spain, at an AVI meeting in Barcelona, Pe met Alba a young architect working with Anupama, main architect working in the urban scheme of the Line One, also known as the Line of Goodwill.  I was surprised to discover that Alba had come to India as a student through that early exchange program with CEPT University, while also working with Doshi. 

In our exchange program, we also met him with the group of Spanish students. Doshi is the type of professional that we were seeking – to meet and influence our students. He is more than a master architect, he embraces architecture from an interdisciplinary point of view. He is much more than an architect, he is profound, a guru, a guide pointing upwards to something bigger, perhaps the greatness of the human being, perhaps to something even higher. 

Since then (year 2005), Pe has been coming to India regularly. But it is in January of this year that he has arrived in  Auroville; this time, as a SAVI official volunteer, to stay.  He has now found him self, meeting the right people working at different levels towards the realization of the Line of Force. Also other opposing forces, like an individual that had doubts about the realization of the Lake Project, which is such an important element, that it is hard to explain why.  As purity barrier and energetic protection to the Matrimandir, is as important as a moat to defend a medieval castle. Pe knew when he encountered those that doubted about it, that it would get built. With determination, he asked them to step aside, not to waste any time or energy for anyone. Pe asked them to let the experts and professionals do their job resolving the technical challenge. It’s such an important element. He would say to them: ‘just wait, and see it getting built;  then he would get up and leave.

Last week, Pe  was working on this blog while sitting in a concrete table, underneath a banyan tree, at the Matrimandir limit of the gardens. He loves going to work there in secret, in fact, it is the only place where lately he was allowing him self to write, so that to do it in a certain state of mind. It is important what he is transmitting through his words. Thoughts in this place come easily, just flow perfectly, without the need to edit anything. Just clear and calm thoughts get recorded directly into the paper.

Pe was there, by the excavation site when he received a SAVI email about a need for a volunteer to collaborate with the further development of the Lake Project.

It is a project that he believes in, in a site that is inspiring. Working on Matrimandir site motivates him for such collaboration, so that to be able to continue working on this other important personal project – the search of Indigo – which is related to the Matrimandir at one scale, but the Galaxy Plan at anther.

Please find the resume, here structured in the three aspects of time.

The logo, also the model in the middle of the laboratory space.

Auroville Interdisciplinary Research Lab acronym A.I.R. Lab

song ‘Believe in Me’ by Blue Solar