ASSESSMENT OF PHOTOGRAPHY AS TOOL IN STUDYING EPHEMERAL URBANISM

Abstract

Permanence and stability stand as the key emphasis of traditional Urban design. However, in reality, especially with organically developed cities of India, it faces challenges from the ever-temporal and dynamic nature of cities – making Ephemeral urbanism extremely relevant. Studying the dichotomy of static and kinetic city concepts needs the urban designer and his tools to embrace flexibility and account for all temporality in urban design - prospects that photography seems to suffice. The research hence tries to understand if and how the tool of photography helps study this extremely unpredictable phenomenon. As a relatively new and less studied concept as of 2023, the approach to conquer this aim began by first crafting a framework for analyzing ephemeral urbanism based on available literature. The framework was then scrutinized to understand the role and relevance of photography in it. A set of recommendations for using the tool was created, along with inputs from interviewing master photographers who have worked with ephemeral urbanism. The recommendations were then validated with a live study of the Roorkee Wednesday Market in India. The study was able to prove the relevance of the tool with the scope and limitations, which are then supported by a set of recommendations that an urban designer can follow to achieve optimum results using the tool.