IN-PERSON: Prague – Section B

Abstract

Visual pollution is an aspect seen and assessed highly in the context of the city scale. This paper sheds light on the visual distortions and vandalism that heritage facades suffer due to inappropriate conservation techniques and weak rules that impact the visual aspect. In order to address deformations that affect the heritage facade, revitalise them, and increase their sustainability, architecture plays a significant role. It is possible to identify several manifestations of visual pollution that have contributed and continue to contribute significantly to the confusion and pollution of the heritage façade and visual image through careful analytical studies of fabrics and architectural patterns. Sirpur is a village located at the banks of the Mahanadi River, which has a collection of Buddhist, Hindu, and Jain temples and monasteries that make up the Sirpur Group of Monuments dating from the 5th through the 12th centuries. The monuments include several extraneous, asymmetrical, and irregular architectural elements that have been added to their facades, which can confuse the viewer. The study presents the most significant findings on heritage facades that resulted in an unfavourable change in the facades’ components, resulting in visual pollution, which creates what is known as visual distortion or the occurrence of duplication in the perception of the visual image, as a dual meaning of the architectural facades.