Rem Koolhaas? or Tyler Durden?

I found Rem Koolhaas’ Junkspace” to be an impressive rant against modern architecture and the consumerist society. I mean rant in the literal sense of the word: Junkspace is one sixteen page paragraph. The writing style was frustrating, yet appropriate. The way Koolhaas flows from one topic to another is difficult to follow, but embodies the frantic consumerist architecture and society that he is criticizing. 

While I was reading Junkspace, I was constantly reminded of Fight Club’s protagonist, Tyler Durden. Fight Club highlights Durden’s dissatisfaction with our blasé modern society. It argues against our wealth-driven consumerist society and our desire the cookie cutter products from Ikea. Durden gives an inspiring speech to the men in his fight club, stating:

“I see all this potential, and I see squandering. God damn it, an entire generation pumping gas, waiting tables; slaves with white collars. Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don't need. We're the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our Great War's a spiritual war... our Great Depression is our lives. We've all been raised on television to believe that one day we'd all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won't. And we're slowly learning that fact. And we're very, very pissed off.”

Maybe Koolhaas was a member. His writing certainly makes it seem like it. It is easy to imagine Tyler Durden reading one of Koolhaas’ statements to the fight club as his own:

“While whole millennia worked in favor of permanence, axialities, relationships, and proportion, the program of Junkspace is escalation. Instead of development, it offers entropy. Because it is endless, it always leaks somewhere in Junkspace; in the worst case, monumental ashtrays catch intermittent drips in a gray broth… When did time stop moving forward, begin to spool in every direction, like a tape spinning out of control? Since the introduction of Real Time? Change has been divorced from the idea of improvement. There is no progress; like a crab on LSD, culture staggers endlessly sideways…”

Koolaas and Durden share the philosophy of “question everything”. Their evident dissatisfaction with consumerist society is the catalyst needed to make a change. You are not defined by how much money you have in the bank, what Ikea table you own, or what junkspace architecture you inhabit. Perhaps we should all go out and start a fight.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PgU71nWCNeY