Re: <documenta X><blast> the image/the urban

Attila Sohar (blast-agent@forum.documenta.de)
Wed, 13 Aug 1997 10:14:40 -0400

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From: "Attila Sohar" <supnurse@hotmail.com>
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Subject: Re: -documenta X--blast- the image/the urban
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Date: Wed, 13 Aug 1997 04:07:43 PDT

Jordan wrote:

" What is the "binding" that holds this
>fragmented space, as well as its inhabiting subject, together? Whatis
>the coherency formation that binds image and urban space, viewer and
>inhabitant, subject and society? =20
>
>It seems that we are witnessing the global triumph of both "the urban"
>and "the image," fueled by rapid economic and technological advancement
>across increasingly permeable borders. A pervasive media space, a
>public space of images, surrounds everyday life and reproduces a
>condition of the urban, as the urban becomes a mobile, interchangeable
>condition that is reproducible everywhere. "Publicational" and "public"
>become inter-convertible. =20
>
>"The image" and "the urban" are embroiled in and viewed through the
>scrims of networking technologies and their representations. They
bound
>and determine each other through the networked image, which helps to
>mobilize, embody, and pace its viewer-inhabitant. The image opens up
an
>inhabitable space, as the viewing subject habitualizes its paces and
>techniques. I wonder what field might be articulated here, and what
its
>historical precedents might be.
>
>An urbanistic approach to the image would foreground these
>dwelling-patterns; an imagistic approach to the urban would describe
the
>construction of the urban through representation. How could we
describe
>these hybrid coherencies of urbanity and image? In formations of
>subject-surface-space-society?
-------------------

I get a sense that in recent years architectural schools abandoned the
urban problematic to only concentrate on the Architectural aspect.But
it's because the urban aspect is striken by a recent taboo,that its
organizing is an inextricable mess.After the folies in the sixties and
seventies about utopia and politics the city gives us the chills because
many realize the crisis it is facing.
The big urban renewal schemes that many modern metropolis engage
themselves into, results in schemes which architectural expression
reduces its final potential because it expresses a finished city,ideal
thus impossible.
I think two type of cities are struggling in our minds to become
reality;the home city:old districts,parochial atmosphere,"no tourists
allowed."and the city-home:mass housing,redefinition of the city
island.This notion of Corbusier'"unite d'habitation"which would give
birth to a city of different nature,is the source of our fear.
The relation of time and space is at the heart of urban planning,where
the former is paramount to organize the urban fabric.It's an element of
disassociation proper to the city.The new technological elements which
assemble the distant are strong factors of disurbanisation.Until
there won't be a solution to solve this corelation between time and
space,there won't be a real urban project,but small architectural
"band aid" projects.
I think the big question is how to provide sociability,urbanity of a
citizen who spends more time in public transports than in the streets?
It's an important issue ,I think,within the confines of habitable space
in real time,but also at a territorial scale.

Attila Sohar

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