Calculated Retreat
The argument proposed by Alejandro Zaera that the architecture discipline should focus on the building envelope as a means of social explicitation for the built environment seems like a retreat for the profession as a whole. I think the truth is that we have already been relegated socially and politically to designers of building facades for quite a long time and when the general public thinks of the architect's role in society it's limited to that of making good "looking" buildings from the outside. The sad truth is that the profession has been fighting for decades against the way market forces shape our world. We recognize the importance that our profession has within society but our power to make any changes has been decreasing.
Zaera points out that market forces are increasingly becoming the source of power in our world and government has become increasingly a regulator of these forces. This is clearly apparent in historic places and cities where the government has to step in on a daily basis to prevent market forces from distorting the built environment. Architecture as a profession has little to say in this matter unless we work with the market. The trend to increasingly value engineer buildings is not something that's going to stop, if anything it's getting to get worst after the last economic recession. The building envelope has become almost our last retreat to produce anything that is politically charged.
While I agree with this argument I think it's also a narrowing view of what we are capable as a profession. Although the market is increasingly value engineering our built environment, we have also seen in recent years the power of new technology to give individuals political presence on a global scale, ex. Julian Assange and Edward Snowden. Our position behind the scenes but immersed in the world between market forces and ideology I think is very powerful. We have the knowledge to be agents of social change through other avenues that are not just the built environment. Our ability to imagine and produce visual images is increasingly powerful in our world today. I saw first hand working at an office where images is all we produced, the power of an image to get market forces moving and make changes happen. Value can be given to something within a short time with a powerful image the same way wall street can changes a stock prices within nanoseconds. The same way government has power to regulate market forces through policy we have power to regulate it through images.
The argument proposed by Alejandro Zaera that the architecture discipline should focus on the building envelope as a means of social explicitation for the built environment seems like a retreat for the profession as a whole. I think the truth is that we have already been relegated socially and politically to designers of building facades for quite a long time and when the general public thinks of the architect's role in society it's limited to that of making good "looking" buildings from the outside. The sad truth is that the profession has been fighting for decades against the way market forces shape our world. We recognize the importance that our profession has within society but our power to make any changes has been decreasing.
Zaera points out that market forces are increasingly becoming the source of power in our world and government has become increasingly a regulator of these forces. This is clearly apparent in historic places and cities where the government has to step in on a daily basis to prevent market forces from distorting the built environment. Architecture as a profession has little to say in this matter unless we work with the market. The trend to increasingly value engineer buildings is not something that's going to stop, if anything it's getting to get worst after the last economic recession. The building envelope has become almost our last retreat to produce anything that is politically charged.
While I agree with this argument I think it's also a narrowing view of what we are capable as a profession. Although the market is increasingly value engineering our built environment, we have also seen in recent years the power of new technology to give individuals political presence on a global scale, ex. Julian Assange and Edward Snowden. Our position behind the scenes but immersed in the world between market forces and ideology I think is very powerful. We have the knowledge to be agents of social change through other avenues that are not just the built environment. Our ability to imagine and produce visual images is increasingly powerful in our world today. I saw first hand working at an office where images is all we produced, the power of an image to get market forces moving and make changes happen. Value can be given to something within a short time with a powerful image the same way wall street can changes a stock prices within nanoseconds. The same way government has power to regulate market forces through policy we have power to regulate it through images.
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