President's Office

CEPT Essay Prize 2025

the thing I came for;

the wreck and not the story of the wreck

the thing itself and not the myth

the drowning face always staring

toward the sun

the evidence of damage

worn by salt and sway into this threadbare beauty

the ribs of the disaster

curving their assertion

among the tentative haunters.

From “Driving into the Wreck” by Adreinne Rich (1973)

CEPT Essay Prize 2025 invites young writers from architecture, urban planning, all fields of design, humanities, social sciences, and other allied fields, to reflect on the theme of Abandon that is ‘a salient beauty of the object in its passage in time (Simmel, 1959). The Essay prize intends to invoke micro-narratives of Abandon, first as a noun, almost as if arrested in time, so the young essayists can pause, capture, view and reflect on the very existence of the aesthetic of abandon. What does a building feel when it lays in abandon, like havelis that nobody visits? How does a forest grow when left alone to the  laws of nature? How do old textile mills or ruins speak for themselves? How does a poet capture the feeling of being with oneself and letting go? Literature too is replete with the motif of abandon and survival, and of rejuvenation through it all.

In life, we tend to see this sense of Abandon as singular. This is probably why psychoanalysis has captured it as a loss of a human attachment resulting in a sense of deep insecurity. But if we see it as a verb, as a ‘thingness at work’, endowed with deep cultural values and scars of life, Abandon becomes a live, thriving sign of life itself. Like the Banyan tree, the Aravali mountain range, the dried river Sabarmati that once was, like old folks living their everyday life in a rhythmic, cyclic continuity unaffected by the lure of aesthetics, perfection or security.

The essential focus of the micro-narratives here is to be on the very character of Abandon. How does it play out in the world, how is it interpreted through mythology or folklore, how is it invested with life and/or death? When people abandon, what exactly happens? What do they vacate in the process? A history? A space? Objects? Relationships? Connections? Reconstruct the idea of Abandon as if one were viewing it in a mirror to see a form, an aspiration, a dream that the abandon refracts. Because only through that refraction can a new world be created.

 

Keywords: abandon, architecture, urban planning, design, humanities, social sciences, literature, cultural narratives, urban spaces, city studies, wreck, damage, relationships, reconstruct, histories, everyday life, art, aesthetics, ruins, time and space, infrastructure. 

Expectations from the abstract: The applicants must submit an original and well-rounded 500-word abstract for the competition entry, clearly articulating the objective and intent of the essay.

Expectations from the second round of evaluation: Please follow the technical guidelines elaborated on the website. The selected candidates should ensure their full essays are suitably edited for language, grammar, consistency in referencing, etc., before submission of the essay. CEPT Essay Prize reserves the right to consider well-written, edited, and well-thought-out essays only.

Important note: The submissions must ensure grammar edits and language corrections as a basic requirement for the first round of selection. 

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