Jawahar Kala Kendra

Maharaja Jai Singh, who built the fabled pink city of Jaipur, was moved by two seemingly conflicting sets of mythic ideas and images. On the one hand there was the ancient Navgraha (the mandala of the nine planets) and on the other, the newest myths of Science and Progress. Thus the city of Jaipur, double-coded like Jai Singh himself, is truly astonishing for its synthesis of past and future, of the material and metaphysical worlds. In this, Jai Singh is indeed analogous of another man, born more than 2 centuries later; India's first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru. Thus this Art Centre, dedicated to Nehru, is really a metaphor for both men - and for Jaipur itself. Like them and like the city, it's double-coded: a contemporary building based on an archaic notion of the Cosmos; the very same Navgaraha mandala, with one of the squares moved aside, to recall the gesture that created the original plan for Jaipur.