A reaction or a critique?
"Architecture is not an isolated or autonomous medium, it is actively engaged by the social, intellectual, and visual culture which is outside the discipline and which encompasses it... It is based on a premise that architecture is inevitably involved with questions more difficult than those of form or style."
Somol and Whiting, Notes around the Doppler Effect and other Moods of Modernism
Autonomous architecture, at its most idealized form, can only exist in theory. Even when focusing the language and its manipulation, something universal and timeless such as rhythm and order, the context of time and societal outlooks will squeeze its way in. Elements such as building methods, materials, and technology will become integrated into the work. It is when critique is applied to only one of these elements, the language or the context, that the critique fails and it becomes commentary.
This idea of commentary as the result of a failed critique can be seen in the shopping mall. The mall can be viewed as a reaction, or commentary, to the social changes of the time and white flight to suburbia. The mall created a utopian oasis in suburbia, providing all the "density and bustle of a city's downtown... devoid of the city's negative aspects: weather, traffic, and poor people" (Crawford, The World in a Shopping Mall). Because this was a simple reaction to social changes, without the application of language and building upon what came before, the mall becomes "Junkspace". Koolhaas defines Junkspace as a "Bermuda Triangle of concepts, an abandoned petri dish: it cancels distinctions, undermines resolve, confusions intention with realization".
Without a true critique architectural intentions and goals cannot be realized in a meaningful way. The shopping mall reflected back issues of suburbia, an artificial and subpar redundancy of the city, instead of realizing a true architectural solution. Commentary such as this leads to architecture as something to consume rather than something to experience.
When architecture is used as a reflection, commentary, or reaction and without linguistic rigor, how do we move forward? Is there still merit to this architecture as Crawford would argue or is it truly Junkspace? Can we, and should we, critique Junkspace or by doing so would we continue to "stagger endlessly sideways"?
Your comments on the necessity of a critique are so right. The strip mall and the typical outlandish shopping mall was a consumer-driven product with no true thoughts on the future and resiliency of the design. Developers get caught up on the best current investment without considering the better, more resilient long-term investment sustainable design practices offer.
ReplyDeleteI was really struck by the juxtaposition of "architecture as something to consume rather than something to experience." I think the practice of architecture often gets lost between the two. And while there will probably always be functions of architecture that speak to some form of consumption, the overarching goal of the profession should be to create experiences that meet practical needs without neglecting the role of a changing future.
ReplyDeleteMalls and what to do with them nowadays is a really interesting conversation in contemporary architecture, since there's not often many commission for new malls, and we're more often left over with the built and cultural ruins of a dying mall. Is the challenge to reinvigorate an existing mall for more commerce, more retail, more mallrats - or is the challenge to convert the existing landuse into a new service that supports the community?
ReplyDeleteYou pose the question "how do we move forward" from architecture as commentary without rigor. In regards to malls and consumerism, we are in the middle of it; I don't think we can even move forward until we can abandon capitalism and the 'need' for more. The mall as we know it is dead, we can all agree, but it just got revived in the METAVERSE
ReplyDeleteVery interesting stuff here - I think that the idea of the shopping mall and the architecture of convenience is changing, maybe in a good way, maybe not. I think in large part, the shopping mall has been replaced by the outlet mall or these neo-urbanist locations, both of which are trying to encourage a more urban condition. But I think this goes back to what you said about the shopping mall and the architecture of consumption, its just that the method of consumption is changing. This starts to fall apart when these urban spaces are not allowed a high degree of democracy to change and grow, and without that opportunity, these spaces will eventually stall and become undesireable.
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