"To the Ordinary Man.

To a common hero, an ubiquitous character, walking in countless thousands on the streets."

- Michel de Certeau

Michel de Certeau, a French scholar who wrote on the themes of sociology, philosophy, psychoanalysis and other such disciplines dedicates his book, The Practice of Everyday Life to the anonymous hero, the ordinary man, and the everyday where millions of faceless individuals "live down below, below the thresholds at which visibility begins". As de Certeau's quote shows us, those whose lives are never spoken of are the same individuals whose pattering feet you hear that define the daily thrum of urban existence. But most urban cities, particularly Bengaluru in Karnataka, India - the place referred to as the Silicon Valley of India - is defined singularly through the lens of its corporate offices, IT infrastructure, and pub culture; with little to no mention of the markets that feed the city and underlie its success.

However, cities are produced not only in terms of foreign investment, globalisation or corporatisation, but in everyday, ordinary negotiations such as examining the channels through which the city receives its food, its availability of water connections, and its waste management systems. Bengaluru is testament to this argument because although it is traditionally associated with modernity, urbanisation and cosmopolitanism, a significant part of the city still maintains its old roots through historical vegetable, fruit, flower and meat markets such as Krishna Rajendra Market, Russell Market, Gandhi Bazaar, AMPC Yard Market, Malleswaram Market, City Market, among others. The markets host a diversity of individuals across class, caste, gender and religious divides. They cater not only to retail customers but also supply commodities wholesale, often with markets bustling before the break of dawn. To further reiterate this point, the public transportation systems in the city are also designed to support the local markets, both in terms of operational timings and proximity to respective locations. Thus, as one can see, they form the backbone of the whole city’s food supply and distribution chain. The markets are also crucial spaces where one can investigate the politics of spatiality, particularly in the context of a rapidly developing Bengaluru.

Interestingly, these multiple identities and facets of Bengaluru bring forth most powerfully what the noted bureaucrat Chiranjiv Singh writes with regards to the city’s cultural background, that is, the culture of Bengaluru is truly a “city of subcultures”. One cannot simply point toward a singular version of the city but must instead engage with it through its pluralities.

Therefore, following this position, this digital archival project dwells upon the ordinary and everyday in the vegetable, fruit, and flower markets of Bengaluru. It reflects upon the ways in which the ordinary individual helps keep a gargantuan city such as Bengaluru alive and bustling; of their contributions to the economy, and their engagements with the politics of spatiality, gender, and labour. This project invites you, the viewer, into some of the most crowded, colourful places that exist in all cities across the world, through the lens of KR Market and Gandhi Bazaar in Bengaluru. It asks that you engage with the “many urbanisms” that one can expect to encounter in Bengaluru and attempt to locate the “ordinary city” within the “global city”.

This archive encourages you to visit the markets in your own regions - wherever you are from!

Let us redefine what it means to be a modern metropolis - through the lens of the spaces that are often invisibilised and neglected in public discourses on urban spaces.

"The city in a complete sense, then is a geographical plexus, an economic organisation, an institutional process, a theatre of social action, and an aesthetic symbol of collective unity. The city fosters art and is art: the city creates the theatre and is the theatre."

-Lewis Mumford, excerpt from "What is a City?"

Sources:

Anjaria, Jonathan Shapiro, and Colin McFarlane. Urban Navigations: Politics, Space and the City in South Asia (Cities and the Urban Imperative). 1st ed., Routledge India, 2016.

Certeau, De Michel, and Steven Rendall. The Practice of Everyday Life. Third, University of California Press, 2011.

Hall, Suzanne M. “Migrant Urbanisms: Ordinary Cities and Everyday Resistance.” Sociology, vol. 49, no. 5, 2015, pp. 853–69. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/44016754. Accessed 15 Jul. 2022.

Mumford, Lewis. “‘What Is a City?’: Architectural Record (1937) | 21 | V5 | the City Re.” Taylor & Francis, 11 Jan. 2011, www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/edit/10.4324/9780203869260-21/city-architectural-record-1937-lewis-mumford.

P, Mahalakshmi Ashish Khokar. “An Officer and a Gentleman.” The Times of India, 29 Aug. 2016, timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/hubballi/an-officer-and-a-gentleman/articleshow/53913743.cms.

Singh, Chiranjiv. “New Shoots and Old Roots: The Cultural Backdrop of Bangalore”, Multiple City. 2008th ed., India Penguin, 2008.