Anupama Kundoo: Abundance Instead of Capital - Exhibition at AzW

What if architecture were not a tool of capitalism? The exhibition “The Wealth of Capital Places” (Reichtum statt Kapital) presents the work of Indian architect Anupama Kundoo as a manifesto for a different kind of architecture. Kundoo designs surprisingly beautiful buildings using local resources that consider the needs of people and the entire planet.

Architecture has long been a driving force for innovation and economic growth. It is the embodiment of global capital. The insatiable desire of capital pushes architecture into a position of “never enough.” Natural resources and labor are drained by construction around the world. At the same time, many people cannot afford their housing, which has turned into an investment product. How did construction become so destructive to people and nature, and what can architects do to prevent this? The work of Indian architect Anupama Kundoo is an example of another kind of architecture. Her work resists the logic of capitalism and the normative standards of construction, as well as entrenched norms of beauty that demand architecture to be either innovative or traditional, ecological or uneconomical.

Anupama Kundoo grew up in Mumbai, where she studied architecture at the end of the 1980s. In 1989, when global urbanization dominated India, she moved to the experimental city of Auroville in southern India, where at the age of twenty-three, she established her own office. She has taught at prestigious universities around the world, exhibited multiple times at the Venice Architecture Biennale, and operates offices in Berlin, Mumbai, and Puducherry. The vast majority of her architectural works can be found primarily in Auroville and Puducherry.

In Anupama Kundoo's projects, the potential lies not in expensive materials or perfect industrial processing but in the innovative use of local materials and construction methods common to the area. This is achieved by combining high-tech and low-tech technologies, developing traditional construction techniques, coming up with innovative lightweight structures, and applying regional materials. Her projects are based on local knowledge, where she considers the relationship between time, finances, and materials. The exhibition at AzW allows for a sensory experience of Anupama Kundoo's architecture and calls for a different approach to architecture.

Curators: Angelika Fitz, Elke Krasny
Project Coordinator and Curatorial Assistance: Agnes Wyskitensky
Publication: Abundance Not Capital. The Lively Architecture of Anupama Kundoo, edited by Angelika Fitz, Elke Krasny, and Architekturzentrum Wien, The MIT Press, 2025.
Featuring contributions in the publication by Shumi Bose, Jordan H. Carver, Peggy Deamer, Madhavi Desai, Angelika Fitz, Rupali Gupte, Ranjit Hoskote, Elke Krasny, Charlotte Malterre-Barthes, Shannon Mattern, and Laurie Parsons.
Photographs and texts from the curatorial field research of Angelika Fitz and Elke Krasny, alongside materials from the architectural office, create a new framework for analyzing architecture. Essays by international authors address issues of architecture and capital, CO2-colonialism, working conditions in construction, modernist utopias in urbanism, as well as architectural care and provide insights into the Indian architectural discourse.