Anant National University (AnantU), India’s first Design University, conducted end-semester juries for its undergraduate and postgraduate programmes this month.
“Juries are a very important learning experience for the students in any Design discipline. Each student gets a chance to present her/his semester-long exercises in an interactive manner to jurors-renowned practitioners and academicians, who are invited to provide constructive feedback on students’ work. This helps the students build confidence while presenting their work to the experts from the field. They also gain insights into the design and the concepts they have been working on,” expresses Jasmine Gohil, Vice Principal, School of Architecture, AnantU.
As part of the University’s overarching pedagogy that focusses on the holistic development of its students, the topics chosen for juries invited exploration of multiple themes, careful analysis of external factors, and self-discovery.
For instance, foundation year students of Space Design were asked to think about a habitat/house for themselves and conceptualise spaces from an experiential standpoint – scents and smells, sounds, noise in terms of dimness, shadow, light, exposure, material, colour, texture, joy, sensuality, mystery, motion, etc. They were not taught any measurements, scale or proportions, but were to construct space through their own intuitive sensibilities; the aim was to design through the act of constructing. Thus, to support the objective, model making was used as an investigative tool as opposed to the conventional drawing and programme diagrams . Distinguished experts like Rajesh Sagara, Faculty, CEPT University, Sharmila Sagara and Sonal Beri, Associate Professor, Anant National University, served as jurors.
One of the many positive feedbacks that students of AnantU received for their hard work was by Ar. Prahlad Gopakumar, Faculty, NID, who stated, “The quality and level of work was so high that little critical feedback could be given. It was more of a conversation and round table shared with a special group of talented and remarkably well-guided students.” He served as a juror to Ar. Rocio Jarabo’s module that focussed on methodical explorations of space experience. The central theme revolved around space perception, dynamic parameters, ergonomics in motion, and abstract conceptualisation of architectural morphology.
The juries ended in the last week of May, after serving as a great opportunity for students and faculty to view their work and progress in retrospect. The University is now gearing up for the Summer School, with its diverse list of elective courses, scheduled to begin from 3rd June.