Are we enhancing reality?
Rem Koolhass mentions the mechanical track on Coney Island created by George Tilyou. Koolhass writes, "He named it 'Steeplechase'...'an automatic racetrack with gravitation as its motive power...Its horses resemble in size and model the trackracer." He goes on to mention the "steeplechase combined in a single attraction the provision of entertainment with a form of emancipation through machinery- the elite experience democratized through technology."
"Byron Company. Steeplechase. Horseback riding ride at Coney Island, with people on mechanical horses being pulled along a track. Museum of the City of New York. 93.1.1.3391"
http://blog.mcny.org/2011/10/04/coney-island-rides/
When we go into design, how can we keep in mind the experiences of every person who touches the building (through design, construction, or everyday activity) so as to not diminish life as we "enhance" it?
I agree that during many of our attempts to "enhance" the process or design, we lose sense of our identity at the person level and societal level. To delve further into "cheapening the worker", many of the building systems developments over the last decades have all bu destroyed artisans. Brick veneers as one example do allow us to build faster and have greater performance skins, BUT in the process we have all but lost our previous mastery of masonry work, stripping down brick masons really to just brick layers. Most people today see brick as this decoration, when it was structure for thousands of years prior.
ReplyDeleteI wonder why we seem to be drawn to "democratized" experiences? Is it accessibility? Or the commodification of experience that is thrust upon us? Maybe our goal as a designer isn't to "enhance" life, but to provide better space for it to play out. We might be doing architecture and design a disservice by playing into commodified place. It's scary to me that architecture could one day be defined by a series of commercial transactions.
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