An Unlikely Prisoner

Yangon Correctional Facility aka Insein Prison (photo by Manuel Oka)

I just finished reading An Unlikely Prisoner by Sean Turnell. The economist used to be a key adviser to Aung San Suu Kyi and her NLD-led government before the coup d’etat in 2021, which ousted her democratically elected government from power. Continue reading

ARCH+ Contested Modernities

I wrote an article for the current issue (#243) of ARCH+, a German magazine for architecture and urbanism. This special issue is entitled “Contested Modernities” and about the development of postcolonial modernisms in Southeast Asia.

My contribution recounts the works of Raglan Squire and Benjamin Polk, who left their mark on Yangon’s built environment and ought to be rediscovered today. I have written about their work and my research on this blog before.

The edition is in German and has an impressive list of authors, covering a wide geography and breadth of topics. An English edition will be published in the fall.

Tripitaka on my mind

A short but beautiful trip in late 2019 was the last time I managed to set foot in Yangon, visiting the magical Tripitaka Library and being shown around inside. A few photos from the inside below, dug up from the SD card today. Looking at them feels strange, it is February 2021 after all and our friends in Yangon are going through some hard times.

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Tripitaka Library

Originally published on uncube magazine: More than 50 years after it was built, this Buddhist library building in Yangon in Myanmar continues to exude the modern aspirations of its early days, while fulfilling its role as a site for traditional, spiritual learning. For Ben Bansal, one of the authors of a new guide to the architecture of Yangon, it is a building that like its American architect, Benjamin Polk, deserves more recognition.

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The front of Tripitaka Library, shortly after its opening in the early 1960s. The landscaped garden, centred around the artificial lake, give the building a more stately impression than today. (Archival photos © Abhinav Publications)

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