John Mandeen (passing)

John Mandeen left his body on July 7, 2024.

John Mandeen came to Pondicherry from California in October 1968 as a young man of 24 and was accepted by the Mother as an Ashramite.

He helped set up the first screen printing workshop in the Ashram Press. All birthday cards with the Mother’s symbol in those days were screen printed there, besides book covers.

He took up photography in the late 1970s and got seriously into it by the 80s, extensively documenting Auroville in all its aspects, including the Matrimandir. From 1980 he was part of the PRISMA team with Franz and Tim and they did all the publicity work for Aurelec. In 1994 he took photos for the first Auroville exhibition at the Visitor’s Centre which was updated several times over the years. He also was one of the photographers for the Auroville Today monthly magazine and designed the front cover for its first compilation. He taught photography in Aspiration school to many Auroville children, all adults now, some of who ended up becoming photographers themselves.

Most of the initial publications of PRISMA, like the architecture books and calendars, carry John’s photos. Later he was involved in doing pre-press work for other Prisma projects as well as projects of the Ashram Archives. Recently he had been working with the Ashram Archives on a new book they were bringing out.

John’s extensive work of seeing the Auroville of earlier years, and capturing it for ages to come, is truly priceless.

Add your recollections

If you would feel like, you can send us your recollections or photographs, so they can be added to the page in order to commemorate years of dedication to Auroville and its ideals.

This page has been published in order to create a space of remembrance for all of those who lived, struggled and enjoyed in Auroville, making a conscious effort to manifest the Dream of Human Unity that is in the process of emerging.