everything but architecture

The Adaptor, The Creator

2009-10-25T08:18:00.000-07:00

the mART this article is part of a series that attempts to check the pulse of the contemporary art phenomenon, divinating whether the latter will survive its own voracious, self-devouring feast, or not...

Finally, an artist dwells within the boundaries of my home! While I have been expecting for ages the day when I would finally be entitled to pronounce this bold statement, it never occurred to me that the virtuoso would be my Adaptor. My Memory Stick DUO Adaptor.

In an undisputable masterstroke of artificial intuition, HE somehow decided that my own humble attempts to produce art were way too mediocre for HIS exquisite tastes.

The results I think could be counted among the most authentic samples of (authentic) computer-generated (authentic) incidental art. Apparently, all it takes for someone to revel into the serene aesthetics of incidental art is some decent snapshots using a Sony DSC-H10, a 2GB High-Speed Memory Stick Pro DUO, a MSAC-M2 Memory Stick DUO Adaptor, some really diligent bytes, and a MSI ex460 laptop, willing to carve the masterpieces for the future generations to marvel at.

Without any further delay, I invite you to rejoice at the groundbreaking artistry of my Adaptor, urging you however to carefully observe the finesse of its dialectical techniques.

The innocent, gullible human element involved in this larger-than-life artistic tour de force may experience a discouraging bypass feeling, yet should find comfort in the thought that, when it comes to a higher cause, all is fair in love, war, and art.

White Pride

2009-10-18T10:34:00.000-07:00

la menARCHgerie this article is part of a series that attempts to shed some additional light on the contemporary architectural practice, objectively observing the trends and fads of the trade

One has to wonder whether xenophilia is not the most corrupted contemporary embodiment of racism.

If you`re in Asia but yet do not own your personal, custom-tailored white man, you should definitely buy yourself a new one, or else…the competition will get it before you do. The whiter, the better; the blonder, the better; the younger, the better.

The advantages of purchasing a more recent model, instead of just going for the classics, could pile up to form quite an extensive, alluring list. Firstly, the latest white models are producer guaranteed to exhibit enthusiasm and confidence at any given time, avoiding the sporadical aboulic, life-drained look that seems to stick to a considerable amount of models after several decades of prolonged, professionally dissatisfying use. That “utter-failure-in-the-west-hope-to-make-a-killing-in-the-east” kind of look. Furthermore, the less worn-out a model is, the less sexual frustration it is prone to project on its female coworkers, subordinates and clients. Last but not least, the recent white action-figures come way cheaper than any of their rustier counterparts.

Handle with care, unwrap. Place your brand new pokémon on a centrally located pedestal, in a designer flower vase or jardinière, in your retail display window. If all these locations are to be regrettably unavailable, then the company’s best workstations should eventually do the trick: place the white action-figures as close to the front desk as possible (for maximum efficiency, consider purchasing more models to furnish both sides of the reception area), ideally located next to the waiting lounge, so the clients could better marvel at the exquisite, exotic, professionally-looking wonders of the white toppings and western outfits. NB: Place the Indian on the very edge of sightline, just between the white pride decor and the more congested locals` sweatshop.

Commission some fancy-looking business cards for your white pokémon, conveniently designed to accommodate both the original model name and the new, fancy, three-syllable local nickname, in order to encourage the otherwise bewildered natives to socialize with the alien creature.

Send it on a business trip and present it as the foremost, internationally, acclaimed, expert, WESTERN, authority, on the project you are currently elaborating.

NOTES

1. Instruct your personal white pokémon to allegedly present the project in fluent, self-confident English, and to do it extensively, even if it is not familiar with the project – no one will understand a single word anyway.

2. If a rustier model unfortunately possesses an elementary command of local languages, thus being prone to experiencing what some western bookworms awkwardly identify as “hu-mi-li-a-tion”, pour your pokémon some extra 12-years-old whiskey, then gently remind yourself that you are its indisputable master, having just paid a generous price of over 300€ per month (deductible!) for its priceless services. Also remind yourself that pokemons only present faint traces of feelings anyway.
3. In the highly unlikely situation that you had forgotten your pokemon in the sweatshop, be sure to call him as many times as possible, talk to it in standard chinglish, paranthetically boasting about his unparalleled technical and communication proficiency to your clients.

4. The latest, most innocent and gullible models may even be deeply moved by this unexpected display of reverences, his ego visibly swollen by the sudden revelation of his personal prodigiousness. Don’t waste any 12-years-old whiskey on these models.

Whereas the outcomes and dangers of xenophobia are conspicuous enough for everyone to fully comprehend and incriminate, xenophilia indulges itself in keeping a much lower profile, rejoicing in the subtle nature of its discriminative effects. Tricking everybody into speculating profit from its use, it utterly corrupts subject and object of phenomenon alike.

What is generally asserted as a win-win situation, is in fact a dreadfully lose-lose one. The target is tricked into falling back to the dark, but intellectually cozy, dark ages of European fascism, assuming that pigments only are enough to bring out the better man. Mindtwistingly, the source of xenophilia also becomes its collateral victim, constantly understating its own potential, while at the same time torturing itself with a fictitious, larger-than-life, castrating figure.¬¬¬¬

Xenophilia is arguably the new Trojan horse of our contemporary, globally-scaled social environment. Uh, right,… and it is obviously affecting the build environment as well: architecture=0,xx €, urbanism=0,xx $, white pride pokémon=priceless…bad, bad xenophilia!

Public Space? Is this YOU, baby?

2009-10-11T10:47:00.000-07:00

the complete hitchhiker`s guide to what used to be the public space

this article is part of a series that deals with the inconsistencies inherently attached to the ellusive umbrella term of "public spaces", observing the current patterns of its using and eventually establishing new perspectives and practices

„At least the streets here are lively. In my country people don't do anything on the streets anymore”, the finnish girl said, after successfully surviving a 100 meters walk through a an upscale retail district in Xi’an. Whoever has been unlucky enough to ever feel that horrific, fetid smell, would certainly not expect to experience it in an urban setting, and even less that it could ever last for more than the average length of a run-down rural homestead’s main gate. In China however, it sometimes runs on for the full length of an urban block.

All across the contemporary architectural scene, teaching, promoting and heterochronic enactment of public space reconsideration is highly fashionable. Together with green design, these make for the glamorous intellectual avant-garde of the current decades’ paradigmatic cliché, constantly and successfully redefining the way-too-superficial view our last century ancestors had on the urban phenomenon. The nostalgic, if not downright romantic reinterpretation of the medieval street, long dead and buried on the Old Continent, arises plenty of opportunities for schizoid attempts aimed at reclaiming this conspicuously obsolete tradition of street-living. Derelict railways, gloomy docks and shady alleys are all being fortuitously transformed into genuine hotspots of urban regeneration, capable of dramatically altering the urban dwellers’ shallow perspective on the city.

After all these long, scholastic sessions of public-space brainwashing, each opportunity of traveling outside the European cultural space is a true knock-off for any fresh, candid young architect. And a further proof of the total inconsistency of the ideals we choose to pursuit, once the imposing walls of our cute, cozy, comfy medieval cities are left behind.

A proof that this “public space” specter we desperately try to resurrect usually comes at a bitter cost for the civilized, established ways of the Europeans. The “fare” that one has to pay in order to access the public space consists in a long list of considerable concessions in terms of safety, of personal space, of sense raping. And if there is such an extensive fare to be paid, doesn’t this crumble the very essence of the public space?

In the European culture, we tend to make strong distinctions between the public and the private spheres: different behavioral codes strictly apply to each of them. What happens then when these borders are not only crossed, but also irreversibly blurred? Vulgo, what happens when sleeping, cooking, bathing, even spitting and defecating are socially acceptable in what we Europeans call the public realm? Would our eagerness of resurrecting this schizoid chimera remain undaunted still? And is this particular understanding of the public act just a local cultural variety, a rediscovery of the genuine definition of the public space, or the total negation of it?

In Brazil, the comprehensive failure of the social policies has lead to the occupation of the public spaces by different, savant-classified typologies of homeless people. Subsequently, these spaces became non-grata entities of the urban realm, avoided by all but the most intrepid of the city dwellers and the innocent-but-horripilated European tourists. Public institutions build metal stakes in order to prevent the urban pigeons from taking shelter under their roofs and souvenir fairs get hosted inside the twisty, medieval-like alleys of the malls. More than ever, more than anywhere, the agora has become the subject of public loathing. The “public” has violently, but conveniently relocated from the murky roads to the glamorous, all-embracing arms of the corporate hallways. Is this ostracization of the “public” space a remote aberration or the next step in urban evolution?

What is the true dimension of the (ir-)relevance of “public space”today? Is it in fact just a shallow, umbrella term? And if so, what nasty realities is it actually sheltering?

About five years ago, a centrally located Mc Donald’s venue, elegantly fitted with an open-air food-court running 24/7, was serving as the year-round meeting-place for most of Bucharest’s teenagers (yes, that was before the mall onslaught happened). At about three o`clock on a crazy, loud Sunday morning , my friends and I were brutally interrupted by an obviously infuriated 5-years-old kid coming from a nearby table, commanding us to keep our voices down, …her mother was sleeping, God damn it!

24 hours, 15 minutes and 4 airports

2009-10-02T13:33:00.000-07:00

(dis-) (mis-) spelling the (HETERO)gen(heta)eric city
this article is part of a series that tries to stare into the alledged concept of the generic city, wishfully hoping that the latter will not stare back...

Bucharest, 10.45_It’s a ritual. The colored, alluring, consumerist strip that is successfully replacing the depleted typology of impoverished rural dwellings… the short, 20min drive that only augments the feeling that our destination is a derelict village bus stop, and not a real airport… the serene aesthetics of artistically enlarged bananas, papayas and other judiciously assorted exotic fruits, in the greyishest of the grey dusts this side of the Equator… climax of the kitsch, stroke of genius?... my stepfather and his delicious, yet utterly racist Jew-jokes… Ferrari, Lukoil, then the right turn… a steep slope for the car drop off point… all these French… my father pops out of nowhere in a sudden, yet comforting display of paternal instincts… the nervous expectancy of the thick cigarette smoke in the airport cafe… check-in always takes less when a relative of your girlfriend is an airport employee… women crying and men waving…. 10 euros spent on a chewing-gum and a tin can Sprite make for a wonderful pretext if you want to smoke two more Lucky Strike cigarettes… the German lady with her devastating good-looking daughter…. I have left the box... Istanbul, 12.40_Finally, some display of civilized western habits! A full, genuine, non-smoking airport and seven hours of well-deserved torture for a hardened smoker… the dishes in the Irish pub fortunately belong to the Turkish traditional cuisine, making a Romanian feel at home… I linger a little on my Hungarian goulash with Bulgarian salad, proudly listening to a Romanian house music summer hit and contemplating the perfect mix of Prada jeans and Turkish headscarves… the traditional, exotic, comfy (byzantine ottoman) bricky bazaar… internet cafe: cappuccino with some coke… my Greek godfather is continuing his vacation in Romania, a girl is preparing to visit our childhood friend from Romania, the one that recently relocated from US to Paris… frantic transit apparently puts high value on resting, with one hour of Brownian hiatus amounting to up to 60€ in the airport hotel… Starbucks appears being lost in so much open space, probably missing the narrow medieval streets it is so accustomed to… checking in… some Albanian-looking rough-necks are my last connection to the familiar facial patterns back home… it seems that the more a woman speaks Russian, the more narrow her eyes are… EYES…the ultimate proof that a woman may be the most sensual entity you have ever come upon, even if a Louis Vuitton purse, and a small stretch of her face auspiciously accommodating her eyes is all you get to see… an Arabian senior getting his wheel-chair carried around by his submissive-looking wife… their eyes though, they do look the same when lovingly scrutinizing their adolescent sons’ latest additions from Armani… even the black, deep make-up around their eyes is the same… the younger son’s eyes amount for roughly half of his generic face… Dubai, 00.40_The smoking box is 15-20min away, they say, in the other terminal… some young sheiks that could probably buy half of my country with just a flap of their hands choose to use them instead to obstruct my camera lenses from capturing the palmtrees… they giggle, in a generic way… I don’t really care because I can still catch the definitely more flamboyant, golden ones… a lush, tropical garden… I’ve made it in 10…a 5/4 meters box, where the thick smoke only allows us to perceive that the population here is severely multiracial, let’s say 8% black, 12% white, 27% Hispanic, 37% Asian, 6% indeterminate, 10% other… all sharing the same generic cultural trend of smoking their lungs out – that is, despite their obvious multiculturality… a middle-eastern, doctor-looking man is seating on the seat next to me, seriously coughing, suspiciously unaware of his blatant running nose… probably swine flu… damn, i guess I’ve missed on the famous gold bar palmtrees my Philippines-resident friend told me about… Shanghai, 15.30_I have entered the blob…a Chinese lady and her devastating good-looking daughter…I wish I had 10rmb to spend on a chewing gum and a tin can Sprite, that would make for a wonderful pretext if I wanted to smoke two more Lucky Strike cigarettes… women crying and men waving… check-in always takes more when no relative of your girlfriend is an airport employee… the nervous expectancy of the thick air gently moving China’s oversized flag… my Chinese contact pops out of nowhere in a sudden, yet comforting display of volunteer instincts…all these Germans… a steep slope for the bus drop off point… Buick, Sinopec, then the right turn… my volunteer contact doesn’t seem to fully comprehend these delicious, yet utterly racist Jew-jokes… climax of the kitsch, stroke of genius?... the serene aesthetics of naturally enlarged highways, billboards and other judiciously assorted western fruits, in the greyishest of the grey dusts this same side of the Equator… the short, 120min drive that only augments the feeling that our destination is a derelict village bus stop, and not a real city… The colored, alluring, consumerist strip that is successfully replacing the depleted typology of impoverished rural dwellings… It’s a ritual?

“…live in one place long enough and subtle but distinct differences start to emerge. […]No one really lives in a true generic city… . A generic city is the boomtown you visit on business. It’s a transient space that can’t be fully inhabited.” – Richard PROUTY