Pune: A team of students and professors of Department of Digital Architecture of Dr Bhanuben Nanavati College Of Architecture for women (BNCA) has revamped the famous Karve statue located at Kothrud by creating an artistic urban installation using digital architecture designing, which is one of its kind concept used in architecture. The installation is in a form of ‘Giving Tree’. It is abstracted into a parametrically generated canopy that will adorn and accentuate the statue from all the three roads at the cross-section of which it is now situated.
The statue with the canopy is 27 feet high, which has been developed by Professor Swapnil Gawande, an architect who led the project along with students of Masters of Architecture including Khusboo Agarwal, Sneha Yerunkar, Vinita Wagh, Sania Bhamra, Mughda Gandhi, Netra Medankar, Radha Mallawat and Rajesh Pawar. The project was guided by BNCA’s Principal Anurag Kashyap and head of Digital Architecture Department Dhanashree Sardeshpande.
This is probably for the first time in Pune that the Municipal Corporation has collaborated with academia for developing and renovating of an urban interface, stated the BNCA officials.
Gawande explained the design of the statue, which involved rigorous use of advanced mathematical logics and computer programming. “The canopy resembling a tree required 900 triangles, 150 squares and 3,600 joints, which was a skillful task. The iron material was cut in the required shapes by laser beams and joined using advanced welding techniques. 150 LED lights have been fitted on the canopy,” he said.
The idea is to depict the revolutionary change brought in by the great visionary, he added.
“We tried to conceive the persona of Maharshi Karve as the one who struggled, gave, developed, nurtured and radicalised his contemporary society. These keywords helped us manifest Karve as a ‘Giving Tree’ whose different parts symbolises his life and how it has changed and benefitted the lives of people who are associated with him,” said Gawande.
