essays
Today, we mark Vasant Panchami. Vasant is spring. Although we are in the cold days of January, this day is celebrated in the hope of the arrival of spring 40 days later. We pay homage to Goddess Saraswati, that fount of knowledge and learning. She flows from the locks of
essays
We mark this day each year. The Day of the Teachers. Twice a year. Once on Guru Purnima and once again on S. Radhakrishnan's birth anniversary. We 'pay' respects to teachers on the day and then duly disregard them, put them in the their place of
essays
A word game and an image game. A word game of creating portmanteaus of Greek origin words suffixed with phobia. An image game of finding these phobias in imaginary tales. We live our lives in fear or in search of fear. We look for them in other people and in
philosophy
Photo essay of a journey through forgotten towns. Pictures and words by Mohit Patel, original published on Nov 24, 2019. It takes 2 hours and 5 stories to reach the "village-at-no-place". Some of these stories are told out loud, while some play out in your mind. The words
essays
A melody, a harmony, a rhythm, and a poem. A Veena called Northstar. A sequence of chapters forms a book, a sequence of classes forms a school day, a sequence of units makes a curriculum, and a sequence of musical notes makes a melody. And when there are underlying notes
essays
A Phantasmagoria of colours, and sounds, and smells. A reverie called Northstar. "Where we come from, the birds sing a pretty song and there's always music in the air..." The dance of the little man from Twin Peaks is a mad, surreal phantasmagoric scene from David
education
A lullaby to put us to sleep, so that we may dream. A song called a Northstar. The gesture of sleeping - where does it occur? Head bouncing on the window of a bus; hands folded on a bench and the head resting on it, a class perhaps; a baby
essays
My recent photo exhibit made me think about and revisit some ideas that I have about images and text. Roland Barthes had much to say about text and image. I have been thinking about text as technology and photograph as a medium, alchemical almost, for imagination. The photograph, or the
essays
There was a time when I found pilgrimages to be an unnecessary exertion. One could find all that is to see within one's self. And perhaps that may be true. But I have found myself to be going on pilgrimages. Sometimes, I know I am going on one.
essays
Like a child has tools and objects to play, I have words, images, and dreams to play. Words and images come to me from somewhere, and I am a mere vehicle. They flow, rarely and spontaneously, triggered by a phantom or a spectre. They come, at times like a neatly
essays
It is perhaps wise to turn to Friedrich Schleiermacher (a German theologian and philosopher) occasionally. He is one of the founders of pedagogy as a discipline. Pedagogy, as it is used and understood in common parlance, is merely the “technic” of teaching. The content of these technics is prescribed by
poetry
By the will of magick, I found myself in the company of a great old book. Signed anonymously, I decided to keep the name of the book anonymous too, for you, my brother, my sister. One day you will find it too, I pray. In that book was the art