Landscape - American Institute of Architects

Transcription

Spring 2011
Published by
The American Institute of Architects
The Architecture and Design Journal of the National Associates Committee
FORWARD 111
LANDSCAPE
FORWARD MISSION
To be the architectural journal of young, aspiring architects and designers of
the built environment specifically targeting design issues.
Spring 2011. Volume 11, No. 1. Published biannually by the AIA.
THE AMERICAN INSTITUTE OF ARCHITECTS
1735 New York Ave., NW
Washington, DC 20006-5292
P: 800-AIA-3837 or 202-626-7300
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www.aia.org/nac
NATIONAL ASSOCIATES COMMITTEE (NAC) OFFICERS
William Turner, Assoc. AIA - National Associate Director
Ashley Clark, Assoc. AIA - Chair
Wayne Mortensen, Assoc. AIA - Advocacy Director
Clarice Sollog, Assoc. AIA, LEED AP BD+C - Community & Communications Director
Tu-Anh Bui, Assoc. AIA - Knowledge & Programming Director
NAC COMMUNICATIONS COMMITTEE
Christina A. Noble, AIA, LEED AP - Forward Director
Sarah Sobel, AIA - Forward Assistant Director
Jesse Wilmoth, Assoc. AIA - AssociateNews Assistant Editor
ISSN 2153-7526
Copyright and Reprinting: (C) 2011 AIA. All Rights Reserved.
SUBMISSIONS
Forward welcomes the submission of essays, projects and responses to articles. Submitted materials are subject to editorial review. All Forward issues
are themed, so articles and projects are selected relative to the issue’s specific subject.
Please contact the Forward Director, Christina Noble, at
[email protected] if you are interested in contributing.
FALL FORWARD 211
Adaptation
NATIONAL ASSOCIATES COMMITTEE MISSION
The National Associates Committee is dedicated to representing and
advocating for Associates, both mainstream and alternative, in the national,
regional, state, and local components of the AIA.
FORWARD 111
FORWARD
Christina A. Noble, AIA, LEED AP - Director
Sarah Sobel, AIA - Assistant Director
3
BORDER LINES
by Eddie Jones
6
MEDELLÍN PUBLIC SPACES:
PERCEPTIONS + RECONNECTIONS
by Ernest Bellamy with assistance from Carlos Bueno Rivero,
Emerson Marín Parra, Avni Patel and Sophia Tan
14
CARTOGRAMS OF MEMORY
by Saskia Jordá
20
ART, EXPERIENCE, MEMORY
by Aaron Herring
30
CONVERSATION: AN INTERVIEW WITH
THE ARTIST, CHRISTO
interviewed by Christina Noble and Aaron Herring,
edited by Christina Noble
37
CONNECTING THE DOTS: INTERSTITIAL LAND USE
AND THE IMPLEMENTATION OF COLLECTIVE DESIGN
STRATEGY
by Jenna Didier and Oliver Hess
49
THE UNSEEN SITE
by Ted Shelton and Tricia Stuth
59
LANZAROTE, A CHANGING CLIMATE, THE
‘ENVIROGRAMMIC’ RESPONSE
by Mark Smout and Laura Allen
70
NETWORK TRACE-UNTRACE
by Claire Sheridan
80
TOPICS
by Christina A. Noble
FORWARD 111
LANDSCAPE
TOPICS
LANDSCAPE
by Christina A. Noble
“Landscape architecture is not simply a reflection of culture but more an
active instrument in the shaping of modern culture.”1 James Corner
Landscape is often ignored as passive and neutral – something that just
is. Perhaps we take landscape for granted because we rarely recognize
its importance to our daily lives – we see it as a tree here, or a bush
there. We think of it as only vegetation. However, when we glimpse
the larger view – like when we fly and look out our window at the city
below – we can ascertain landscape’s ubiquity. We can imagine the
opportunities offered by landscape’s expansive scale to shape our cities
and drive progressive change.
For example, the High Line stretches through lower Manhattan,
repurposing abandoned industrial rail lines into a manufactured landscape
with wild plantings, lounge chairs and auditorium seating suspended
over a busy Manhattan street. The project generates a pedestrian-friendly
city amenity by turning an abandoned and no-longer functioning raised
rail structure that divided one neighborhood from another into an artpiece that celebrates the uniqueness of what the abandoned rail had
become over time – an ephemeral and wild landscape forgotten in a city
of 8 million people. Beyond the aesthetics of improving a deteriorating,
non-functioning and out-dated infrastructure, a significant aspect of the
project is its intention to incentivize economic development along its
1.45-mile length. New York City officials anticipate that the park will
bring $900 million in revenue over 30 years and as of 2008 had generated
over $4 billion dollars in private investment. The High Line illustrates
the fundamental shift in our economy from one that builds into one
that manages, offers services, and designs. Former industrial rail lines
that shipped goods now offer a place of leisure in an information and
service-based economy. The shift in our economy and how we work has
transformed how we view the world – amenity spaces such as public parks
are the new infrastructural investment for a creative class of workers.
The High Line illustrates the power of one project to encourage
economic investment on an urban scale within the modern economy.
In addition to economic development, we can also consider how
the practice of landscape design can assimilate, comment upon and
address challenging issues related to geo-politics and cultural identity.
For example, the article “Medellín: Public Spaces Perceptions +
Reconnections” asks: How has the city of Medellín, Columbia emerged
from decades of fear driven by drug cartel violence to create new public
plazas as “instigator[s] for transformation and possibility”? J. Felipe
Uribe de Bedout designed tactile and whimsical beach-like surfaces
within a public plaza to pique the curiosity of residents enough to
emerge from their barricaded homes and participate in public life and
public space. Landscape is more than greenery that heals decades of
violence and fear – it is a strategically designed plan that opens civic
society both physically and metaphorically.
In another example of the power of landscape to shape and comment
upon issues critical to contemporary society, Eddie Jones discusses his
office’s design for the Mariposa Port of Entry. He asks: Can an “oasis
in the sky” alleviate the wounds along a politically charged ArizonaMexico border? Must the border be a harsh line dividing the two
countries? Jones Studio contends that this need not be the case and
instead understands the border as flows – flows of people, money and
goods that are critical to both countries. The Port of Entry is responsible
for managing these flows every day across an imposing wall that clearly
defines the political boundary but ignores how blurred the border
condition really is. The border is more influenced by the economic rules
of supply and demand – the US has a strong demand for workers and
goods while Mexico has a surplus – than the imposing height, length, or
security measures of a wall. Expanding upon Jones’ ideas of flows, just
as the economics of the border are more complex than a simple “mine
vs. yours” stance, so are identities along the border. Southern Arizona
wasn’t acquired by the United States from Mexico until the Gadsden
Purchase in 1854 when Mexican families suddenly found themselves
to be US citizens regardless of their cultural and familial ties to Mexico.
Mexican and American families shared their communities and everyday
spaces. Some early territory leaders were of Mexican heritage (Arizona
didn’t become a state until 1912). Today’s political climate, however,
ignores the complexity of the shared history between the two countries
and instead magnifies fear already exacerbated by our own recent
economic struggles. Although building cannot solve racism or political
intractability, perhaps design can become a process of social and cultural
change. Through design we can question why our borders manifest
themselves in a particular way and if that is how we want to represent
ourselves to our neighbor and economic partner. By purposefully
making the Mariposa Port of Entry a welcoming and calming contrast
to the harshness of the border wall and desert environment, perhaps we
can generate conversations regarding our attitudes and biases toward
Mexico and understand the border condition not as a divisive boundary,
but blurred cultural identities and economic cooperation and codependence.
Artists Christo and recently passed Jeanne-Claude face boundaries headon. Their projects’ expansive scale stretches across legal borders to force
collaboration between a multiplicity of citizenry, governmental agencies
and institutions. Running Fence, located in Sonoma and Marin Counties
in California required the granting of a temporary easement across
private property belonging to fifty-nine farmers and ranchers as well as
approval of building permits by two county building departments. One
of the results, intended or not, was to use property ownership regulations
to impose upon governmental agencies and local citizens with a more
practical mindset to question, consider, and judge what is and what is
not art and whether it should be constructed regardless of one’s opinion
of the specific piece. Neighbors, individual property owners, and
governmental agencies all had to agree and cooperate in order for the
project to proceed. Although the piece would only be in place for two
weeks, the process and surrounding discussions lasted forty-two months,
eliciting a discussion of what is and is not art to a population that
otherwise would not have taken the time to participate.
As Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s practice illustrates, art, architecture and
landscape need not be a passive background to our everyday lives – it
can be a process that forces discussion, questions the status quo and
transforms society. Design is strategic thinking on a multiplicity of
scales that engages economic, cultural, political, legal, and geographical
processes to actively shape and transform our communities.
Christina A. Noble, AIA, LEED AP
Forward Director
Ms. Noble owns her own practice, Contour Architecture,
located in Phoenix, Arizona. She believes in the power
of design to incite positive change for the betterment of
local communities. Christina graduated from Rice University with her Bachelor of Architecture.
BORDER LINES 6
BORDER LINES
by Eddie Jones
Border Lines
A weight carried by two
Weighs only half as much.
The world on a map looks like the drawing of a cow
In a butcher’s shop, all those lines showing
Where to cut.
That drawing of the cow is also a jigsaw puzzle,
Showing just as much how very well
All the strange parts fit together.
But in truth we live in a world made
Not of paper and ink but of people.
Those lines are our lives. Together,
Let us turn the map until we see clearly:
The border is what joins us,
Not what separates us.
Alberto Ríos, 2003
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Which way we look at the drawing
Makes all the difference.
We seem to live in a world of maps:
One can surround him or herself with a
border of preconception and prejudgment,
thereby limiting communication and personal
growth. Nations, however, find the concept
of borders a necessary control device relative
to commerce, trade and labor pools. Make no
mistake; crossing a border is big business! Up
until 1963 the US/ Mexico border and the US/
Canada border were less about security and
more about monitoring imports and exports.
Then, President John F. Kennedy was assassinated and for the first time in history, the
borders were closed… because of the ultimate
human motivator: fear.
Nevertheless, a fundamental labor shortage
in the southwest United States remained, and
a surplus of labor in Mexico weakened the
Mexican economy. To understand the directions of immigration one must understand
the balance of push/ pull. The US encouraged Mexican labor to move north, matching
Mexico’s inclination to push its surplus north.
It is mathematically and socially predictable
to expect any geopolitical balance to eventually run its course. As we have experienced in
Arizona over the past 20 years, the imaginary
cow line which once joined us with Mexico
has morphed into the butcher’s line which
separates us.
Fig. 1. Earthrise by Frank Borman, 24th December 1968 from Apollo 8
Still the Mexican, Central and South American crops get harvested to supply the USA
with 65% of the produce we consume. It all
arrives in trucks, having been processed and
inspected at the Mariposa Land Port of Entry.
This flow is big business. (Fig 4).
Mariposa Land Port of Entry:
Nogales, Arizona/ Nogales, Sonora
Christmas Eve, 1968 Astronaut Frank Borman,
Apollo 8 Commander, snapped “Earth Rise”
… the picture that launched the environmental movement. (Fig. 1) The image of the Earth
as a “big blue marble” remains imprinted in
my mind. Its appearance from space made
clear to me the artifice of political borders
- there are no countries, no politics and no
borders.1
Coming of age in 1960’s America influenced
my intellectual filters to lean left. I now consider it amusingly ironic to find myself lead
architect in a project hell-bent on negotiating
the politics of immigration, economic inequality, national security, law enforcement and
“Welcome to America” at a time when national debate is escalating regarding the nature of
our borders and the future of immigration in
the United States.
Given the negative alliance of our state legislators, one could assume Jones Studio would
be subject to partisan political pressure inhib-
FORWARD 111
There are eight official land ports of entry in
Arizona. The third busiest port in the USA is
Mariposa, located 5 miles west of downtown
Nogales, Arizona with its neighboring Mexican border town Nogales, Sonora. Nogales is
70 miles due south of Tucson, Arizona. Jones
Studio has redesigned and expanded the entire 57 acre port.
BORDER LINES 7
Border Lines [Líneas Froterizas] was commissioned in 2003 by then Governor Janet Napolitano in honor of the visit of Mexico’s President Vincent Fox to Arizona. Ríos wrote these
words for “public purpose,” and in it, Ríos
reminds us of our responsibility to each other,
despite and because of, the invisible borders
we draw around ourselves each day.
Fig. 2. Mariposa Land Port of Enry
rendering by Jones Studio
iting a sympathetic design approach. Fortunately, the development of American ports is
under Federal, not State jurisdiction. Furthermore, and to America’s credit, we have what’s
called “The Design Excellence Program,”
which mandates that new federal buildings
be of the highest representation of democracy
and dignity. We have to do a great job; it’s
required.
What to Do
Marilu Knode, then senior curator at the
Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art,
wrote in 2009:
“While many government buildings hide
behind dense bureaucratic processes and an
urban context to conduct their business, the
Mariposa Port project is an exposed, lightening rod of building, sitting on one of the most
contentious borders in the Americas, at the
eye of the maelstrom of debates over liberty,
migration and trade.” 2 (Fig. 2)
Despite architecture’s limited abilities to
directly address the inevitable changing patterns of global politics, security operations
and commercial trucking, it is undeniable that
architecture’s connections and influence must
not be ignored. To address these border conditions, the design team aspired to replace anxiety, danger and extreme temperatures with
expressions of respect and extensive modulated shade. We wished to embed ourselves
in the unique opportunity to effect debate.
The experience of the present Mariposa Port
is one of inescapable heat, dirt, intimidation,
danger and fumes – not only for the visitor,
but also for the customs agents who experience this all day, every day. For the inbound
traveler, both American and Mexican, there is
the added anxiety of being on the defensive.
A more sympathetic environment can mitigate
these experiences. As a design team, rather
than perpetuate fear, we instead asked, “What
if this gateway to America was a walk in the
park? What if our gestural gift at the border
could be a garden?”
A Desert Oasis
The Arizona border’s topography is a carved
maze of hilly landforms and arroyos. The
BORDER LINES 8
FORWARD 111
For 200 years the United States celebrated
and symbolically embraced diverse immigrants. “Melting pot” describes what I believe
underlies America’s perceived cultural preeminence. However, despite lip-service to a
multi-cultural society, an intimidating, metal
fence meets our southern neighbors, appearing in valleys and disappearing over hills as
far as the eye can see (Fig 3).3 Most lines of
demarcation express abstracted conceptions
of separation, like the lines of the butcher’s
cow drawing. Often, the lines only exist as an
ideal without a physical reality. However, in
the southwest United States, a tangible fence
clearly identifies the usually invisible separation between nations rather than serving as a
line of connection as Rios’s poem suggests.
BORDER LINES 9
Fig. 4 After the NAFTA treaty, Mexican, Central American and South American imports increased exponentially to the point of ten-hour wait times
during harvest season
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Fig 3. Border Fence along Arizona-Mexico Border. Photography by David McNew
Fig. 6. Mariposa Land Port of Enry gabion walls of recycled,
demolished concrete paving. Photography by Jones Studio
Fig 7. Mariposa Land Port of Enry. Rendering by Jones Studio
Imagine extending your arm, hand out, wide
palm up, towards an approaching stranger.
This is a universal signal, a positive gesture.
It is as if you hold the word “welcome, bienvenida”. Your hand is the plinth, the implied word the garden, the oasis, the big blue
marble. It is also notable that when one is
inside a land port, you are, legally speaking,
nowhere. Not in one country or the other. You
are suspended.
Although the postcard depiction of the famous Sonoran Desert typically and accurately silhouettes the mighty saguaro cactus
against a brilliantly colored sunset, our site
also represents the reality of a parched, hostile
landscape - still beautiful but a challenge to
human survival. An obvious architectural solution would recall the romantic notion of oasis,
inherent to the experience of these conditions.
Although we strived to create an oasis in the
desert, offering a welcoming respite from the
extreme heat, (Fig. 7) a man-made oasis in
an arid climate would be irresponsible unless
it was self-reliant. Therefore, a major design
determinant was rainwater harvesting and
reclamation of building system condensate.
We have found that most people assume there
is not enough precipitation in the desert to
be a dependable irrigation source. However,
those who experience the desert monsoon
season will recognize the potential for storing
huge quantities of water. Mariposa has a one
million gallon underground water storage res-
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Fig. 5. Walpi, Hopi Village; Ansel Adams, 1941
BORDER LINES 10
original Mariposa Port of Entry’s 45 acres is
a balance of cut peaks and filled valleys. To
physically enlarge the site to 57 acres for the
expanded program, engineered fill was excavated from a nearby supply and compacted
behind massive gabion retaining walls, utilizing demolished concrete paving (Fig 6). The
facility now under construction integrates
new environmentally responsible structures
with the image of building on a plateau. It
conceptualizes a garden with distinct edges
that would appear elevated on a plinth, like a
landscape “in the sky.” (Fig. 5) 4
BORDER LINES 11
Fig. 9. The oasis will be visible from the pedestrian processing lobby and will be the foreground view for all administration and port busines offices.
Mariposa Land Port of Enry rendering by Jones Studio
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Fig. 8. Centralized safe zone, fully landscaped and scaled to a small town street Mariposa Land Port of Enry
BORDER LINES 12
ervoir. The hundreds of newly planted trees
will not require any potable water. All on-site
trees will be watered from the 267,000 square
feet of collected roof rainwater stored in the
underground tank.
ture. Therefore, we have included a 2,500
kilowatt photovoltaic array to offset electrical
demands, and are on track to have the first
net zero and Platinum LEED port in the world
(Fig. 10).
The new, self-reliant and sustainable oasis will
mark a centralized safe zone in the Mariposa
Land Port of Entry that is fully landscaped
and scaled to a small town street (Fig. 8).
This oasis will be visible from the pedestrian
processing lobby and will be the access and
foreground view for all administration and
port business offices (Fig. 9).
Jones Studio was, from the beginning, well
aware of our inability to affect policy in
Nogales, Sonora. However, we always believed we could extend a metaphorical open
hand. This gesture takes the form of an architecture that honors the dignity of all people
while respecting the seriousness of law enforcement. In this way, we propose that Mariposa could represent a dignified and benevolent aspect of the United States (Fig. 11).
Additional forward-looking and sustainable
strategies were incorporated into the Mariposa
project. Power needs for the new expanded
port could place a negative demand on the
already under-designed local utility infrastruc-
“Cultural renewal in America’s melting pot has
reached a new place: perhaps the country is
no longer able to absorb everyone who comes
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Fig. 10. Photovoltaic canopies at the Mariposa Land Port of Enry
Fig. 11. Mariposa Land Port of Enry Rendering by Jones Studio
here. If that is the case, then it is likely our political policies need to understand that strong
economies to our south are crucial to stemming the tide of migrants to the country. While
NAFTA was primarily about a less restricted
flow of money and goods across borders, allowing for easier return travel at sites such as
the Mariposa Port of Entry recognizes the desire immigrants have in keeping connected to
their homes. As a new administration grapples
with incontrovertible issues of trade, migration
and crime, new ways of thinking about our
permeable border must be found.
Political policies shape borders, but it is individuals who must negotiate them every day.”5
NOTES
1. Borman, Frank. “Earthrise.” December 24, 1968. <http://tlr05.wordpress.
com/category/adventy/>
2. Knode, Marilu. “On Boundaries and Lines, Buildings and Politics: Reflections
on the Reality of Project Development Process and Ideas in the work of Jones
Studio, Inc.” March 18, 2009.
3. McNew, David. “Border Fence.” < http://www.zimbio.com/
pictures/74bSjESudg9/Construction+Continues+Border+Fence+Drug+Violence/
FpDeBakb98>
share a studio.
Eddie was born in 1949 Texas and moved to
the Sonoron desert in 1973 after graduating
from Oklahoma State University. He founded
Jones Studio, Inc. on June 8, 1979, 3 months
before his 30th birthday. It was not until
years later, he realized he had begun his
professional career on the birthday of his two
major heroes… Frank Lloyd Wright and Bruce
Goff.
For the past 30 years the Jones Studio family
has grown to include 20 highly motivated
and enthusiastic individuals. They enjoy an
unusually broad list of building types - the
list includes museums, research facilities,
performing arts centers, golf club houses,
an NFL training facility, town halls, softballsoccer stadiums, and an entire college
campus.
Having been honored with over 183 design
awards, the small studio was recognized
during the summer months of 2006 when they
were asked to be an exhibit in the Scottsdale
Museum of Contemporary Art. To the best of
anyone’s knowledge it was a precedent setting
first time example of an architectural exhibit
involving the relocation of an entire firm to a
museum gallery. They were the exhibit… fully
functioning, on public display for 4 months.
Eddie has the privilege of lecturing
frequently and sharing his love for discussing
architecture around the United States and
abroad.
BORDER LINES 13
Eddie Jones, AIA
Edward (Eddie) Jones, with his
business partner and brother
Neal, were raised in the oil
fields of Oklahoma. From a
very early age the two bothers
aspired to be architects and
com/2009/01/09/>
5. Knode, Marilu.
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4. Adams, Ansel. “Walpi, Hopi Village.” 1941. <http://sadredearth.
by Ernest Bellamy with assistance from Carlos Bueno Rivero,
Emerson Marín Parra, Avni Patel and Sophia Tan
Plaza Cisneros: pathways, rows of bamboo and benches are interspersed throughout the clusters of light poles.
Photography by Ernest Bellamy.
MEDELLIN PUBLIC SPACES PERCEPTIONS RECONNECTIONS 14
MEDELLÍN: PUBLIC SPACES
PERCEPTIONS + RECONNECTIONS
Helping to evolve a metropolis away from conflict and towards unity,
newly constructed Medellín public spaces are evoking safer ideals and
a freer public lifestyle. During a month-long stay in the fall of 2009, I
experienced the newly built public spaces and studied how each project
has become an instigator of change, breaking down previous existing
physical and social barriers that have pervaded over the past 30 years.
These new spaces have developed out of a past dominated by the global
use of illicit drug that rose during the 1970s followed by the Columbian
government’s subsequent outlawing of the crops used to produce those
drugs. Throughout this period, drug cartels have altered the way of life
for many Columbians.
In Medellín, a coincidence of efforts gathered momentum towards a
turnaround when the Colombian government invested heavily in the
public safety of the city during the mid 90’s, leading to the fall of the
Medellín drug cartel. An independent effort by the local government in
the late 90’s for better governmental regulation and improved programs
for citizens’ welfare partnered with the initiatives of private sector
FORWARD 111
With abundant violence occurring on the streets of major cities like
Bogotá, Medellín and Cali, people became more defensive and
less willing to coalesce outdoors beyond need. This phobia lead to
decreased interest in communal spaces and more conservative attitudes.
Parque de los Pies Descalzos, 1999
by J. Felipe Uribe de Bedout, Giovanna Spera
and Ana Elvira Velez
Parque de los Pies Descalzos, Bare Feet Park,
is a tactile escape from the urban confines
of the headquarters for EPM, Empresas
Públicas de Medellín, Medellín’s public
utility company. Designed by J. Felipe Uribe
de Bedout, Giovanna Spera and Ani Vélez,
Parque de los Pies Descalzos was a private
venture embedded with public activities,
intended to be a midday retreat carved out
of the desert of parking lots surrounding
EPM’s headquarters. Instead of designing an
unadorned oasis in the asphalt, the designers
established a new convention of open space
for the public and a client open to new ideas.
“The project was a break point in the history
of public spaces... prior to this, Medellín
didn’t spend a lot on public spaces... quality
and design came as a major selling point of
the project for the client.” 1
What resulted was a park full of tactile
experiences for the feet, most of which mimic
the sensation of being on the coast, an inverse
experience to the corporate or urban lifestyle
previously dominant on the site. Although
Medellín rests only 130 miles from the nearest
coast, the trip is a lengthy seven-hour journey
down the mountainous terrain of the Andes.
Parque de los Pies Descalzos takes elements
of the beach to the front door of the central
business district and challenges all to remove
their shoes and experience the world with
their feet. In addition to the park’s sensory
facets, the site incorporates other programs
that aide in retaining a constant flow of
visitors in circulation – for example, a row of
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leaders to promote a unique change in the
people’s consciousness.
Parque de los Pies Descalzos: child playing in the plaza fountains. Photography by Ernest Bellamy.
“Because of the lack of public spaces
within the city, [Parque de los Pies Descalzos]
gained public notoriety as a regional
metropolitan park. Given the multitude of
people who came to the site, the project
stimulated the city government’s interest for
more spaces [of quality] like this.”2
Parque de los Deseos, 2003
by J. Felipe Uribe de Bedout
With a successive era of progressive mayors
taking power, long-stalled projects geared
toward improved quality of life gained
momentum. A concerted effort to revitalize
the establishments bordering the Sevilla
and Moravia sectors was a crucial part of
the new city redevelopment plan. With a
University, Botanical Garden, Planetarium and
recreational park all located across from one
another, city planners seized upon the area’s
potential synergy to develop an expansive
leisure and learning zone for the city.
“In the new north, at the historic
border between the city center and the
northern slums, we’ve made a great urban and
social transformation... Zona Norte presents
the most powerful example of the concept
of Social Urbanism, in which great works
are located in the heart of communities most
in need. Fully designed and implemented
simultaneously, these projects are the
means to make profound cultural and social
changes” 4
- Alejandro Echeverri, Director of City
Planning 2002-2006
Following the success of Parque de los
Pies Descalzos, Uribe was approached
by EPM to work on renovating the aging,
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eateries and an EPM-sponsored, interactive
children’s museum.
Building throughway and view towards office building. Photography by Ernest Bellamy.
Parque de los Pies Descalzos, photography by Ernest Bellamy
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Parque de los Deseos, photography by Ernest Bellamy
Plaza Cisneros, 2004
Biblioteca by J. Felipe Uribe de Bedout |
Plaza by Juan Manuel Peláez | Pylons by Luis
Fernando Peláez
Plaza Cisneros has a long history in Medellín.
When locomotive transportation dominated,
Plaza Cisneros served as Medellín’s front
door and main crossroad for commerce and
travel. With urbanization and the subsequent
transformation of the way people and goods
travelled, Plaza Cisneros lost its prominence.
In early 2002, an effort was made to redesign
“The project is part of the revitalization
process of the sector of Guayaquil which
has represented one of the sectors with great
energy within downtown. Guayaquil has an
important historical architecture; the gradual
abandonment of some buildings made the
sector significantly degrade to the extent that
the sector would disappear from collective
memory.”3
- Juan Manual Peláez
Juan Manuel Peláez designed a contemporary
plaza that broke from the historical context of
the surrounding neighborhood. Conveying a
conceptual theme of the plaza’s relationship
to the city as analogous to light in
architecture, Peláez formalizes the site of the
plaza’s former market shed. Where the former
shed sat, Peláez demarcated openness by
facing city hall and connecting to programs
directed at illuminating the mind. One of
these is the Biblioteca EPM by J. Felipe Uribe
de Bedout with implanted pieces meant to
brighten the night, like sculptural pylons
by Luis Fernando Peláez. With the use of
soft colors, grey stones, reflecting pools and
bamboo gardens, the Plaza provides moments
of tranquility within the bustling traffic
enveloping the site.
What began as a simple planetarium
renovation expanded into a broader park,
retaining the planetarium while housing the
intended exposition gallery plus a host of
other amenities ranging from practice facilities
for the city’s music students to a gallery
of eateries. This project’s greatest success
and inherent power lays in the social and
interactive experiences it enables.
and redefine the lost luster of the former hub.
These three projects have aided in striking a
renewal of derelict sectors of Medellin’s city
center. Not only have they spurred change
with political decision makers, they’ve
fostered a culture of leisure and tourism in an
atmosphere once stigmatized by violence.
The success of these public spaces stems
from their abilities to offer unique spaces that
cannot be found elsewhere in the city’s system
of parks and plazas. Much like the public
space treasure troves of Chicago’s Millennium
Park, Miami Beach’s Lincoln Road, or Paris’s
Centre Pompidou, these projects incentivize
citizens to interact with and reinvest in their
FORWARD 111
poorly attended, planetarium into a crosstown extension of the popular interactive
museum located within Parque de los Pies
Descalzos. Instead of replicating past ideas,
Uribe proposed an alternative approach
centered on extending the planetarium
outdoors while adding additional exposition
space. His plan appropriated the remainder
of the Planetarium’s block to create a subtly
sloping plaza dividing the spaces of the old
planetarium and the new exhibition space.
Over the course of the day, the central
plaza plays multiple roles in education and
entertainment. Evening outdoor activities
are worked into the site’s facilities - guided
stargazing of the night skies, cinema star
gazing on the big screen as weekly movies
are projected off the planetarium’s façade.
The evening activities have a way of instantly
displacing visitors into a serene sense of
escape from the surrounding city, and into a
world beyond.
Casa de Musica, Parque de los Deseos, photography by Ernest Bellamy
NOTES
1 Uribe, J. Felipe, interview by Ernest Bellamy. Felipe Uribe Interview
(September 21, 2009).
2 Ibid
3 Peláez, Juan Manuel, interview by Ernest Bellamy. Plaza Cisneros Questions
(July 28, 2010).
4 Alcaldía de Medellín. “Medellín cambia de piel.” Chap. 8 in Del miedo a la
esperanza, translated by Ernest Bellamy, 290. Medellín, Colombia: Alcaldía de
Medellín, 2007.
Ernest Bellamy, Assoc. AIA
received his B.Arch with a
minor in urban studies from
Illinois Institute of Technology,
where upon graduating in
2009 he won the AIA-Chicago
sponsored Martin Roche Travel Scholarship,
which he used to investigate the striking
changes in Medellín. Ernest currently works
on design competitions while working as a
consultant for TSAO Design Group in Miami,
FL.
FORWARD 111
surrounding neighborhoods. In the past 2
years since these projects’ implementation,
Medellín has experienced an uptick in
violence. All hopes are that this is in part due
to the city’s remaining gang’s struggling for
supremacy amongst their ranks and the global
economic downturn. With local politicians’
and planners’ efforts to create a more safe
and sociable atmosphere, only time will tell
if these projects and the city’s greater urban
planning and political efforts will have the
staying power to truly aid in a continued
reduction in violence and routing of negative
perceptions.
by Saskia Jordá
Bound – Size 7, 2010 (Detail with model)
Industrial Eco-felt and hand embroidery.
Image by Saskia Jordá
CARTOGRAMS OF MEMORY 20
CARTOGRAMS OF MEMORY
Cartograms of Memory, 2010
Industrial felt and cord. Dimensions Variable.
Installation view at Modified Arts, Phoenix, Arizona Photograph by Saskia Jorda
“A map is made so we can find our way from one place to another whether
in nature or in the mind, not only once, but also again and again.”1 - Yiannis
Christakos
Mapping has been part of my work for the past ten years, weaving in
and out like a meandering road. I collect maps: aerial maps, road maps,
geological maps, urban planning maps, and more. I am interested in the
spaces these maps invite us to navigate, the way the eye interprets the
graphic informational display, and the emotional yet analytical response
maps evoke. However, my ends are devious: I am not interested in reading,
following, or making a map accurately or precisely; on the contrary, I want
to extract, dissect, and recombine the information into a fictional map, one
that becomes a personal map or a map of memory.
Cartograms often represent geographical space in unique ways, distorting
the typical view. They can be thematic: graphing travel-time or a country’s
population. This distortion intrigues me. I use maps of places I have lived or
have traveled through to build abstract and distorted sculptural cartograms
that speak of mobility, migration, displacement, and in the end, the finding
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Cartograms of Memory uses the experience of ‘displacement’ as a point of
departure and the vocabulary of mapping as the mode of expression.
Bound – Size 7, 2010 (Detail)
Eco-felt and hand embroidery. Image by Saskia Jordá
of new ‘placement.’ Large forms are cut out of felt, then pieced
together by sewing. A portion of this installation forms a suspended
mesh of abstracted maps, representing ‘displacement,’ while the
opposite end rests grounded on the floor like a topographical map,
referencing the sense of ‘placement.’ The two ends are connected by
a mid-section that acts as a transition, the space between chaos and
order, emotion and rationality, displacement and placement.
Along with this sculptural installation, Cartograms of Memory
features a collection of smaller embroidered maps that are fictional
combinations, extractions, and fragments of land, water, and memory
places. Together they create a story of remembrance.
NOTES:
1. Christakos, Yiannis. Personal Geographies. Translated by Lia Noufarou and Yiannis Christakos. Athens: Futura
Publications, 2005.
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This project is partially funded by a grant from the Arizona
Commission on the Arts.
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Unbound, 2010
Industrial Eco-felt. Approx. 36” H x 92” W x 31” D. Installation view in progress at Optima studio, Scottsdale, Arizona. Image by Joan Baron
Installation in progress, view at Optima Studio, Scottsdale, Arizona.
Industrial felt and hand embroidery. Dim. Variable.
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Industrial felt and cord. Dimensions Variable.
Installation view at Modified Arts, Phoenix, Arizona Photograph by Saskia Jorda
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You are Here – Part I: Migration, 2010
Hand embroidery on mesh. Approx. 83” H x 90” W x 50” D
Installation at the Phoenix Art Museum, Phoenix, Arizona.
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Mar Caribe, 2010
Color pencil and hand embroidery on industrial felt. 12” H x 12” W
Triangulation, 2010
Saskia Jordá
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Lago, 2010
Saskia Jordá is an
interdisciplinary artist working
on site-specific installations,
drawings, and performances.
Scientific research has been
a departure point for Jordá’s work since
her undergraduate studies at Arizona State
University. This relationship developed further
in the work she did for her Master’s degree
at the School of Visual Arts in New York
City. Since then, her work has referenced
obscure anatomy, the evolution of a second
skin, and the body as an alternate artifact.
Earlier this year Jordá received an Artist
Project Grant from the Arizona Commission
on the Arts and in 2009 she was the
recipient of the Contemporary Forum of the
Phoenix Art Museum Artist Grant. She has
exhibited throughout the United States and
internationally and currently lives and works
in Arizona.
Zona Intertropical, 2010
ART, EXPERIENCE & MEMORY:
THE UPCOMING WORK OF JEANNE CLAUDE AND CHRISTO
by Aaron Herring
Over the River, Project for the Arkansas River, State of
Colorado
by Christo
Collage 2010 in 2 parts
12 x 30 1/2” and 26 1/4 x 30 1/2”
Pencil, fabric, pastel, wax crayon, charcoal, enamel paint,
twine, aerial photograph with topologic elevations and
fabric sample
photography by Andre Grossman
Copyright Christo 2010 Ref #135
Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s art career began
nearly 50 years ago using fabric to wrap small
scale items and has since progressed to large
scale ‘fabric sails’ and fabric wrappings of infrastructural items like buildings and bridges.
In those fifty years, Jeanne-Claude and Christo’s artistic endeavors have been arduous and
lengthy. Over the River is the artists’ latest
project to cross laborious political and planning hurdles. Conceived by Jeanne-Claude
and Christo in 1992 and expected to be completed in 2011, this 19-year design odyssey
will result in an exhibit that will last only fourteen days before it will be removed, it’s components recycled, and the physical traces of its
existence gone. Once removed, the project
will remain in fragments, digital photos, Christo’s handcrafted artifacts, and thousands of
individual memories. The political, permitting,
and planning process is a stark contrast to the
short duration of the installation. The exhibit’s
antagonizingly short duration seems more like
a prank than a conceptual tool. In the roughly
Jeanne-Claude and Christo differentiate their
spatial art from the abundance of two-dimensional illustration art by doing something radical - building their fantastic visions. Despite
the changing complexion of the art world and
digital imitation, their artwork distinguishes
itself from illustration in two significant ways.
First, the construction of Over the River means
subjecting an ideal vision to the unpredictable
scrutiny of physics and politics. The physical magnitude of Over the River will affect a
large number of people, institutions, as well
as site ecology. Invariably this work will elicit
opinion, support and resistance. Not so subtly,
Over the River will enter into the public, political and planning spectrums. For instance,
preparation for such a massive undertaking
has taken several years and generated an
Environmental Impact Statement amounting
to 2029 pages. On one of Jeanne-Claude and
Christo’s earlier projects, approval to wrap the
Reichstag, Germany’s parliamentary building,
hung precariously on a vote from parliament.
This sort of entry into public debate has had
the effect of more clearly gauging public sentiment as to role of art in political and public
realms, the nature of what constitutes art, and
reassessing the value of art as it is measured
between necessity and indulgence.
Secondly, the work’s physical existence creates a non-replicable moment. Over the River
is located very deliberately between Salida
and Cañon City Colorado along the Arkansas
ART EXPERIENCE MEMORY 31
50 years it has taken to realize a handful of
their projects, the complexion of the art world
has changed. In that time, could the temporal
nature of their art have been devalued by the
mass reproduction aesthetic of Andy Warhol,
the graffiti art of Basquiat, digital imitation,
virtual worlds and gaming, or the increasing
availability of rapidly consumable and disposable items? Does Jeanne-Claude and Christo’s
art lose relevance in intervening years awaiting political acceptance and logistical resolution?
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By Christo’s account, his and Jeanne-Claude’s
massive sculptures are “irrational, foolish,
and absolutely unnecessary.” Their temporary, environmental-scale installations are
designed without a tangible function. Christo
and the recently deceased Jeanne-Claude,
collaborators of over 46 years, are the artists
responsible for the upcoming Over the River
installation, a fourteen-day, 5.9 mile stretch of
fabric panels suspended along 42 miles of the
Arkansas River in Colorado. The magnitude
of mobilizing the labor, environmental studies, travel, communication, meetings, hearings, and permitting required to accomplish
these artistic endeavors is disproportionate to
the two-week duration of the exhibition. One
could argue that Jeanne-Claude and Christo
are devoted to an egomaniacal fulfillment
of self-expression whose only discernable
achievement is massive intrusiveness. Yet
Jeanne-Claude and Christo carry on enthusiastically with parental fondness for their artistic
labors-of-love.
Over the River, Project for the Arkansas River, State of Colorado by Christo
Drawing 2008 in 2 parts - 15 x 96” and 42 x 96”
Pencil, pastel, charcoal, wax crayon, enamel paint, fabric sample, twine, aerial photograph with topologic elevations and technical data
photography by Wolfgang Volz
Over the River will remain both permanent
and impermanent. Without context, this sitespecific art will cease to exist. It will have
existed once, as a spectacle - an event linked
to a specific time, geography and context.
Its permanence will be suspended by living memory, an evolution of stories and the
faint physical traces left on the landscape. Is
it possible that the significance of JeanneClaude and Christo’s work derives from its
physical and occupiable presence? Are their
spatial artworks formative in the construction
of memory, as opposed to illustration, which
may rely on reference to existing memory?
ART IS NEVER JUST AN OBJECT and
NEITHER IS ARCHITECTURE. Due to largescale public misperception and professional
misrepresentation, it is a radical departure to
consider architecture’s primary intent as creating opportunities for experiences rather than
constructing objects.
“For instance, a chair is a practical thing. You can see it, use it. It’s
there. But when he wraps it, that’s another
thing. With every great painting, there
FORWARD 111
River. Several physical and operational criteria influenced the selection of this particular
site. The steeped banks of the river, the eastwest orientation exhibiting dynamic sun light
at sunrise and sunset, the elevation change
across the installation’s length, the ability to
view the installation from above along an adjacent access road, as well as the possibility of
viewing it from the rafting waters below. The
artwork relies on the surrounding landscape
and topography as a co-contributor to the production of the artistic expression. Thus, the
relationship created permanently links unique
place with event, artifact with landscape. The
artistic world of illustration is much less physically imposing and less integral with ecology.
is a moment, a very special moment like
when the sun sets and dusk comes. That
is the moment of art.” - Christo’s brother, Anani, attempting to explain his brother’s work. 1
The effectiveness of art depends on the establishment of an intellectual and emotional
connection. The inconsistency of art to make
a personal connection could explain our inability to agree on what art is, and what it is
not. This may also help explain some more
perplexing pieces of work that have garnered
critical acclaim. For instance, why is it that
Marcel Duchamp can display a urinal, “Fountain” – 1917, (replica displayed 1964 Tate
Modern, London) and it is considered art,
while other urinals scattered across public
bathrooms all over the world are either disregarded as simply utility or viewed with disgust? If we were to repeat the exhibit in an art
museum would it be considered art? Marcel
Duchamp’s piece has many interpretations,
but this work is certainly concerned with the
Christo, Jeanne-Claude and collaborators survey the Arkansas
River to select a site for “Over the River.”
Photpgraphy by Wolfgang VolzCopyright Christo and Jeanne-Claude, 2000
relationship of the object (urinal) with its cultural context (the selective and sacred space
of an art museum).
Over the River depends on site and time as
collaborators in the production of the artwork.
If you were to consider the installation Over
the River on the basis of its physical components, the sails and cables alone, you would
miss the contextual relationship between the
insertion of an alien object and a geographically unique place.
“Jeanne-Claude and myself borrow space and
create little disturbances for a few days. By
borrowing that space, we inherit everything.
Everything that is inherent to that space becomes a part of the art.” (Christo Interview).
Bureaucratic, ecological, and political complexities are as entrenched and as influential
in informing Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s
work as the physical limitations imposed by
site. Such examples are abundant, yet unique
to all of their projects. Over the River inherits
very detailed constraints such as appropriate
locations for anchoring cables. An installation with large fabric sails of this scale might
have to accommodate certain migratory bird
patterns or a specific rock outcropping. Over
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Art is the confluence of three acts – a transformative experience, a vehicle that sparks such
an experience, and memory. Art may rely on
objects, visuals, performances, sounds, tastes,
odors, or textures, as a means of connecting to
an audience. For many artists and architects,
the very detailed construction of objects and
buildings are the byproducts of a result driven,
object fixated profession. It is, however, the
transformative and enriching connection
forged with an audience that constitutes art.
The unique construction of an object or a performance may be the means for eliciting such
a connection between art and audience, but
a connection to an audience may also rely on
memory and personal references. The hardest part to come to terms with intellectually
is that intangibles, such as serendipity, timing
and luck may be just as essential in making
connections that enable art to reach full resonance. As much as material and place, timing
is a strategic component in art.
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Over the River, Project for the Arkansas River, State of Colorado by Christo
Collage 2008 in 2 parts - 12 x 30 1/2” and 23 1/4 x 30 1/2”
Pencil, fabric, pastel, charcoal, wax crayon, enamel paint, aerial photograph with topographic elevations
the River is also obliged to consider existing
dynamic systems affected by their installations
as well as unknown systems such as crowd
mitigation, navigation of expected traffic and
unexpected visitors. This project must consider, plan and accommodate all of these without
harming native vegetation or local business.
The political process surrounding these “inherited” concerns, specific to time and place,
often initiates lengthy debate. Context and
timing are explicitly intended, public reaction
is left to chance.
Jeanne-Claude and Christo’s installations
have taken centuries to realize as a result of
a lengthy political, permitting, and planning
process. The political resonance of their work
however, has been contingent on fortunate
timing. Christo admits that the fortuitous timing of their work has a great deal to do with
luck. Jeanne-Claude and Christo may have
to trust the political process to proceed with
their art, but they certainly do not leave the
length of their exhibits to chance. What is it
that constitutes lasting value in the temporary
installations of Jeanne-Claude and Christo’s
exhibits?
“Do we not have a love and tenderness for
our childhood, because we know it will
not last? We have a love and tenderness
for our life because we know, we will not
last. This quality of immersions or special
tenderness is an additional quality given to
Flexibility, expandability, and adaptability
have become fashionable strategies in the architectural profession for work that anticipates
a long lifespan. The ability to accommodate
ever-changing modes of technologies, pedagogies, lifestyles, social settings, and resources
have prompted the industry to address these
concerns. In turn, architects grapple with
creating durable and flexible spaces. If Over
the River was durability tested, subjected to
the test of time, could it maintain its experiential gravitas? If the names of the fallen soldiers
on Maya Lin’s Vietnam Memorial scrolled digitally across the face of the monument would
it resonate with such solemnity? If we were to
Christo, presents ‘Over the River’
Photpgraphy by The Gazette, Colorado Springs
Jeanne-Claude and Christo believe that an
audience is more likely to connect emotionally and to have fond memories of their exhibits because of a common bond with the
fragility and finality of our own existence. If
we are able to distinguish between making
and referencing memory in art, architecture
shares the advantages of ‘memory-making’
with the Over the River project. The spatial
concerns of architecture, like those employed
in Over the River, are intent on creating a connection to place and time through a palette
of memorable places and experiences. But
how might more permanent architecture
convey the ‘urgency’ that the temporal quality
of Jeanne-Claude and Christo’s works hope to
achieve? If we are to believe that our memory
is empathetic to that which is fleeting, can
architecture achieve endearment or fondness
without temporality? Certainly objects have
the power of permanence, but architecture
has the sophistication of both permanence
and potential of artfully empowering fleeting
moments.
FORWARD 111
our work. The work of art carries all of that
because everybody is aware that the work
will be gone tomorrow.... that this will be
a unique experience and that urgency will
be translated to the public.” (Christo Interview)
I am assured by writing this article and thereby entering into a conversation initiated by
Jeanne-Claude and Christo, that I am making
a small contribution to their art, perpetuating
the debate about their work, circling the purpose of art, and ultimately attending to their
legacy. I have yet to visit one of Christo and
Jeanne-Claude’s works in person, but expect
to visit Over the River. I am anticipating that
the objects will be well-made. At the same
time, I expect the scale of the installation may
seem intrusive, intimidating, and awesome. I
expect to arrive with some uncertainty and
discover some surprises. I certainly hope that
my expectations are exceeded amidst all these
predetermined expectations. My desire to
experience Jeanne-Claude and Christo’s work
is compelled by art that exceeds materiality. I
want to find art because transformative experiences are extraordinary. We trust art to have
that power - might we trust that of our architecture?
NOTES:
1 Chernow, Burt. Christo and Jeanne-Claude: a Biography. St. Martin’s Press
Aaron Herring, Assoc. AIA
Aaron Herring is an artist and
architectural designer. He
led two finalist design
competition entries: Urban
Grass (2009), for the City
of Phoenix’s Gimme Shelter:
National Ideas Competition for Urban Shade,
and Flip-a-Strip, the Scottsdale Museum
of Contemporary Arts’ New Ideas for Old
Strip Malls (2008). Aaron has also been a
lead designer and contributor to two other
competition entries; Fences and Gates,
an artistic proposal of two enclosures for
the City of Phoenix, and Canalscape, an
AIA sponsored competition to promote
development along Arizona canals. In
spring 2008, he team-taught at Joseph Zito
Elementary School as part of the Phoenix
Department of Arts and Culture ‘Artspace’
program. The curriculum, titled (Re)Play,
engaged students, family, and communities
to “(re)imagine, (re)place, and (re)build
public play space.” An ASU faculty associate
from 2006-2008, Aaron taught second year
Architectural Studio for undergraduates.
Aaron received his BA in Studio Art with an
emphasis in figure drawing & sculpture from
Indiana University Bloomington in 2000,
and his Masters in Architecture from ASU in
2006. He currently works for Gould Evans in
Phoenix, Arizona.
consider architecture a practice of designing
opportunities for enriching experiences, then
perhaps we could have both, lasting objects
worthy of our fastidious craft, as well as artful
experiences rich in meaning and memory –
however fleeting.
FORWARD 111
New York. 2000: p304.
CONVERSATION 37
CONVERSATION:
AN INTERVIEW WITH THE ARTIST, CHRISTO
Interviewed by Christina Noble & Aaron Herring, edited by Christina Noble
The Umbrellas, Japan-USA, 1984-1991
by Christo and Jeanne-Claude
Copyright Christo and Jeanne-Claude 1991
photography by Matt Jalbert
Christina: How do you find inspiration for your more contemporary
projects, let’s say your Over the River project that’s coming soon?
Most of the great rivers in the United States are born in the Rocky Mountains. The Rocky Mountains divide the water, some of the rivers flow to
the Pacific Ocean, some of the rivers flow into the Mississippi River and
Gulf of Mexico. In the summer of ’92, ’93, Jeanne-Claude and myself
and our friends investigated eighty-nine rivers in the Rocky Mountains
in the states of Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, and New Mexico.
From the eighty-nine rivers we identified six possible sites...
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Christo: …Sometimes we have the site - like we had Central Park [for
The Gates]… But sometimes we have the idea, like the Running Fence
or Umbrellas or Over the River, for example. We titled [Over the River
to suggest the idea of] suspending fabric panels way above the water
and then experience the project from the banks of the river walking from
above, walking down near the water, or rafting to experience the project
above your head…
1935
Bulgarian industrialist family
Jeanne Claude: American French born Jeanne Claude Denat de Guillebon June 13 1935
Casablanca of a French military family educated in France and Switzerland Died November 18
2009 New York City
1952
1956
1957
1958
1960
1961
1962
1952
Jeanne Claude Baccalaureat in Latin and Philosophy University of Tunis
1953 56
1957
He studies one semester at the Vienna Fine Arts Academy
1958
Christo arrives in Par s where he meets Jeanne Claude
Packages and Wrapped Objects
1960
B rth of their son Cyril May 11 Cyril Christo is a poet He studied at Cornell Un versity and
graduated from Columbia University in 1982 Five books of his poems have been published In
1998 he married Marie B Wilk nson Their son Lysander Christo was born September 22 2005
1961
Project for the Wrapping of a Public Building
Stacked Oil Barrels Dockside Packages at Cologne Harbor Tarpaulin and rope Duration: 2 weeks
CONVERSATION 38
1935
1962
Iron Curtain Wa l of Oil Barrels Rue Visconti Paris 1961 62 240 barrels Height: 4 3 meters (14
feet) Width: 3 8 meters (13 feet) Depth: 1 7 meters (5 feet 6 nch) Duration: 8 hours
Stacked Oil Barrels Gent lly near Paris
Wrapped Woman 1962
Showcases
1963
1964
1963
Store Fronts and Show W ndows
1966
1966
Air Package 1966 Stedelijk van Abbemuseum Eindhoven The Netherlands Rubberized canvas
balloon and rope Diameter: 5 18 meters (17 feet ) Duration: One month
1964
Establishment of permanent residence in New York City
and Wrapped Tree 1966
42 390 Cubicfeet Package 1966 at the Walker Art Center and the Minneapol s School of Art
Length:18 meters (60 feet) Polyethylene: 720 square meters (8 000 square feet) Manila rope: 914
meters (3 000 feet) Duration: Three days
1968
1968
Wrapped Fountain and Wrapped Medieval Tower Spoleto Italy Polyethylene and ropes Durat on:
3 weeks
Wrapping of a Public Building Wrapped Kunsthalle Berne 1967 1968 Fabric: 2 430 square meters
(27 000 square feet ) Rope: 3 050 meters (10 000 feet ) Duration: 7 days
5 600 Cubicmeter Package Documenta 4 Kassel Germany 1967 68 An A r Package 82 meters
(280 feet) high six concrete foundations arranged in a 275 meter (900 foot) diameter circle
Fabric: 1 980 square meters (22 000 square feet) Weight: 6 350 k lograms (14 000 pounds) Rope:
3 657 meters (12 000 feet) Duration: two and a half months
Corridor Store Front total area: 135 square meters (1 500 square feet)
1 240 Oil Barrels Mastaba and Two Tons of Stacked Hay Philadelphia Institute of Contemporary
Art
1969
1969
Wrapped Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago Tarpaulin: 900 square meters (10 000 square
feet) and rope Duration: 40 days
Wrapped Floor and Stairway Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago House pa nter&Mac226;s
cotton drop cloths 252 square meters (2 800 square feet) and rope Duration: 40 days
Wrapped Coast Little Bay One Mill on Square Feet Sydney Australia Erosion Control fabric:
90 000 square meters (1 000 000 square feet) and 58 kilometers (36 miles) of ropes Duration:
Two months
1970
1970
Wrapped Monuments M lano: Monument to Vittorio Emanuele Piazza del Duomo Milano Italy
Polyethylene and rope
Duration: Two days
Monument to Leonardo da Vinci Piazza della Scala Milano Italy Polyethylene and rope Duration:
Seven days
1971
1972
1971
Wrapped Floors Covered W ndows and Wrapped Walk Ways Haus Lange Krefeld Germany
House painter s cotton drop cloths Duration: 30 days
1972
(1 250 1 368 feet) Height: 56 &Mac246; 111 meters (185 365 feet) Nylon polyamide fabric:
12 780 square meters (142 000 square feet) Steel cables: 49 895 kilograms (110 000 pounds); 800
tons of concrete Duration: 28 hours
1974
1974
The Wall Wrapped Roman Wall Via V Veneto and Villa Borghese Rome taly Polypropylene
fabric and Dacron rope Height: 15 meters (49 feet) Length: 250 meters (820 feet) Width varying
between: 4 and 5 5 meters (13 to 18 feet) Duration: 40 days
Ocean Front Newport Rhode sland Surface: 128 x 97 meters (450 x 320 feet) 13 500 square
1976
1977
1978
1983
1976
Running Fence Sonoma and Marin Counties California 1972 76 5 5 meters (18 feet ) high 39 4
kilometers (24 1/2 miles) long crossing 14 roads 2 050 fabric panels: 192 square meters (240 000
square yards) of woven nylon fabric suspended from 144 kilometers (90 miles) of steel cables
2 080 steel poles each: 9 cm (3 1/2 inch) diameter 6 4 meters (21 feet long) Duration: 14 days
1977
The Mastaba Project for United Arab Emirates in progress
1978
Wrapped Walk Ways Loose Park Kansas City Missouri 1977 78 12 000 square meters (15 000
square yards) of woven nylon fabric over 4 5 kilometers (2 8 miles of walkways Durat on: 14 days
1983
Surrounded slands B scayne Bay Greater M ami Florida 1980 83 Pink woven polypropylene
days
1985
1991
1992
1995
1984
Wrapped Floors and Stairways and Covered Windows Architecture Museum Basel Switzerland
House painter&Mac226;s cotton drop cloths Duration: 30 days
1985
The Pont Neuf Wrapped Paris 1975 85 40 876 square meters (454 178 square feet) woven
polyamide fabric 13 076 meters (42 900 feet ) of rope Duration: 14 days
1991
The Umbre las Japan U S A 1984 91 1 340 blue umbrellas n Ibaraki Japan; 1 760 yellow
umbrellas in California Each umbrella: height: 6 meters (19 ft 8 in) d ameter: 8 66 meters (28 ft 6
n) Valley size in Japan: Length: 19 kilometers (12 miles) Width: 4 kilometers (2 5 miles) Va ley
size in USA: Length: 29 kilometers (18 miles) Width: 4 k lometers ( 2 5 m les) Duration: 18 days
1992
Over The River Project for The Arkansas River Colorado n progress
1995
Wrapped Floors and Stairways and Covered Windows 1995 Museum Würth Künzelsau Germany
the glass of the windows Duration: 3 months
Wrapped Reichstag Berl n 1971 95 100 000 square meters (1 076 000 square feet) of
polypropylene fabric 15 600 meters (51 181 feet) of rope and 200 metric tons of steel Durat on:
14 days
Graphic Timeline by Aaaron Herring
Artwork by Christo and Jeanne-Claude
1998
1998
Wrapped Trees Fondation Beyeler and Berower Park Riehen Basel Switzerland 1997 98 178
trees 53 283 square meters (592 034 square feet) of woven polyester fabric 23 kilometers (14 3
miles) of rope Durat on: 21 days
1999
1999
The Wall 13 000 O l Barrels Gasometer Oberhausen Germany 1998 99 An ndoor nstallat on
Height: 26 meters (85 feet) Width: 68 meters (223 feet) Depth: 7 23 meters (24 feet) Duration: 6
months
2005
2005
2014
panels anchored to 15 006 steel bases on 37 kilometers (twenty three m les) of walkways
Duration: 16 days
2014
Over the River Colorado 1992 2014 5 9 miles of fabric panels over 42m les of the Arkansas River
Durat on:14 days
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1984
CONVERSATION 39
The Umbrellas, Japan-USA, 1984-1991
photography by Matt Jalbert
By the end of ’96, early ’97 we came to consensus that for aesthetical purposes, construction purposes and many other purposes, this 42 miles of
Arkansas River between Salida and Cañon City running east-west was the
most suitable for our project…While we have the site of the Arkansas River,
we start[ed] working on the permissions. And permission is the most difficult part of our project. Everything in the world is owned by somebody…
We [discovered] right away that almost the entire 42 miles of Arkansas River,
98%, is owned by the United States Federal Government Department of the
Interior, Bureau of Land Management… The Bureau of Land Management is
really in charge to manage the land. Basically they rent the land to states,
to corporations, ranchers, … sometimes they even sell the land…Basically,
we need[ed] to get permission from the owner, the old leaser - the states of
Colorado, a variety of different agencies, and two private entities. During
the Clinton administration, we [had] great support from the Department of
Interior - at that time the secretary of the interior was Bruce Babbit, former
governor of Arizona and a big admirer of our work. Mr. Babbit helped us to
move the permitting process.
Actually I remember, [we gave] a presentation about Over the River. He
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Now, you should understand all our projects are temporary works of art,
design[ed] for a particular season of the year. For example, The Gates project was a winter project because we like to have leafless trees so you can
see the gates… The Over the River project was a summer project because
we like to have the rafters. The rafters only go down the river in the summer…
CONVERSATION 40
Running Fence, Sonoma and Marin Counties, California, 1972-1976
photography by Jeanne-Claude
Copyright Christo 1976
summons[ed] all his employees at ten o’clock in the morning that day, so they
could ask questions … but in 2001 something happened for the project we start[ed]
in 1979, called The Gates.
Our application with the Over the River project is called the Christo-Jeanne-Claude
Over the River project the standard/signed planning report. The statement is 2,029
pages and cost us one and a half million dollars. The federal government hire[d]
another independent company that we [couldn’t] talk to – [we could] only pay their
bills to prepare our environmental impact statement. Our environmental impact
statement is part of the very important law signed by the very unusual president for
this time in apparently 1970, President Nixon, called the NEPA, National Environ-
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The project was start[ed] in ’79…and when a friend of ours for many years was
suddenly elected mayor of new York City, Mr. Michael R. Bloomberg, we conserved
our all resources to finally achieve permission for The Gates project, this is in 2001
… and only in 2006, we return[ed] again to working on the permits for Over the
River. At that time it was the Bush administration. We had a very difficult time
with the Bush administration, but a number of employees of the Department of the
Interior [were] still the same and finally the Bush administration accept[ed] our
request for an environmental impact statement…
CONVERSATION 41
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Both Images: The Gates, Central Park, New York City, 1979-2005
CONVERSATION 42
mental Policy Act. That law addressed that any human endeavor of enormous size,
like building airports, highways, dams, or construction of bridges that they will go
to review of national environmental policy act.…This was the first time in the history of the NEPA that ever a work of art had an environmental impact statement.
Actually, in the NEPA, art is not part of the discussion… The 16th of July the Federal
Government release[d] that study for comments [until September 14th]. [The comments] will be compiled, and classified, for example traffic, wildlife, … and will be
given to the federal government, [then] sometime in late April will issue the ROD,
meaning the record of decision…But that is only for the Over the River.
That is, each project has its own story.
Christina: It sounds like your aesthetic considerations help you select the site and
then you deal with all the permitting issues secondarily - is that accurate?
Christo – No. No, not at not at all, like the architect I don’t have a clear vision right
away. No, aesthetically the project is crystallized by the permitting process or to the
working of the site. I can tell you one important thing - I should say all our projects
[have] a unique image meaning that we will never build another running fence,
never build another gate, will never wrap up another parliament. Beneath their image, we do not know how it will look and of course, I do drawings, collages, scaled
models, but scale models cannot substitute the real things. This is why all our projects we [create] in a secret place, somewhere far away where nobody can see us,
life-sized scales, meaning one-to-one scale not of the entire project, a one-to-one
scale section of the project. We can elaborate the materials - the steel, ropes, the
cables, all these things, and I can spend time with all the engineers, Jeanne-Claude
and myself decide what kind of fabric, what colors, how should we build many
things. And, this life-sized test is done for all the projects. For the Over the River,
on a private ranch, far away from Arkansas River, near the Colorado-Utah border,
we had a small brook and lot of similar configurations like the banks of Arkansas
River. We conducted four life-sized tests in the late 90s- ‘97, ‘98, and ‘99 we finalized the material, the cables everything…The project [went] through a lot of work,
very much like a building, a skyscraper, [as] part of the permitting process when we
[made] the application to the federal government all this was part of our application…
Christina: Are there any projects where they’ve asked you to make concessions and
instead you choose not to do it or say well, we’ll just wait and try again.
We always say the work of art [has] two distinct periods, the software period and
the hardware period. The software period is the working of the drawings the
sketches, the scale model, and the mind of a thousand people who try to stop us
and the mind of a thousand people who try to help us. The work does not exist.
And that is the software period. When we get the permission, we [are in] the hard-
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Christo: [This is] why we not do commissions, because the permitting process is
very essential for a work of art. A work of art builds her own identity through the
permitting process…
CONVERSATION 43
Wrapped Reichstag, Berlin, 1971-1995
Copyright Christo 1995-2005
ware period and we are working with the physicality of the work.
But you understand that it is important that it is gratifying for any artist that
the people discuss the work of art before the work exists… All works exist
before they physically exist. Of course that is a very important part of the
work of art. The work of art is all the years of preparation and organization.
There [are] not only the fourteen days of exhibition. All that period of years
- sometimes three years, sometimes twenty years, and sometimes ten years that is all the work of art.
Christo: You’re very right that this project is not only done by Jeanne-Claude
and myself. [It would be] impossible to do the project if we didn’t have
an incredible team of people...For example, we cannot do Over the River
without the team of Mr. Davenport and his wife, Jonita, the project director
of Over the River. He is the chief engineer in construction - you know there
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Aaron: I was wondering how collaboration works for you and your partners
and if you can describe that a little bit for us.
For all our projects we have two types of work force, we have professional people
-[like an] average construction job, we have steel workers, construction workers…
[And, for] the final installation we need non-skilled workers…[The non-skilled
workers will] go one week, then there’s training at the site to learn how to do
things.
CONVERSATION 44
are people you live with who you know for nearly 20 years, and of course now we
have this nucleus of friends. And for Over the River we [hired] professionals who
are all kinds of specialists in Colorado.
Christina: There are also environmental or experiential qualities that surround your
projects…
Christo: Yes, the dynamics of our projects is an important part. [For the Over the
River project] we completed many wind tunnel tests with the fabric, but it became
like cement – [we tried] solid fabric like the domes, like the fabric in the Denver
Airport, but it did not move with the wind…For Over the River we are using a
heavy woven polypropylene fiber because it is very loosely woven…From above,
the fabric will have a silver color that will actually absorb the light of the sun. This
is one of the reasons we chose the Arkansas River - because we have morning light
[at the] east entrance of rosy, pinkish light, we have in the middle of the day the sun
on the top, and at sunset we have we have this gorgeous golden light in the west.
The project will climb from five thousand, eight hundred feet altitude to seven
thousand feet altitude at the western end, with much open sky.
Christina: We’d also like to talk about your ideas of lasting memory with your projects. Your projects are only in place for a short duration of time - what do you think
is the relationship between that short duration of time and what people’s memory of
your work should be?
Christo: Jeanne-Claude [said] the history of art for thousands of years did all kinds
of things - the fresco, television, writing instruments - different qualities of technique, marble, wood, bronze - all kinds of different materials, religious, profound,
abstract - all kinds of art, but they never used tenderness and love. We have some-
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The project will take you one and a half hours to see by driving. It will take three
to four hours to experience the project inside. Inside the project meaning the fabric
is above you - sometimes about eight, nine feet above you and sometimes it is ten
feet above you. And the fabric is not always horizontal because one bank of the
river is higher than another. And this very intricately moves all the time. Through
the fabric you can see a cloud formation and a quarter of the mountain. It is very
different, a totally different perception. And the folds of the fabric [will be] sewn
with the movement of the water [to] create an incredible play of shadow underwater. This is very intricate, [we made a] life-sized test to create the movement of the
wind, meaning that each fabric panel moves totally separately like the waves in the
ocean. …It is incredibly mesmerizing - you see how the wind carries through that
fabric. Actually, the wind became visible, you cannot see the wind, but with the
fabric we can see the wind.
CONVERSATION 45
thing that does not last. We have a love and tenderness for our childhood we know it will not last. We have a love and tenderness for our life because
we know we will not last. This quality of immersions or special tenderness
we like to give to our works of art, it is an additional quality the works of
art will carry because everybody is aware that the work will be gone tomorrow…Because we never do the same things again, this will be a unique
experience and that urgency is translated to the public. The Gates exist[ed]
only once in February of 2005 for sixteen days. I did drawings about The
Gates. There are still photographs about The Gates, the film about The
Gates, the books about The Gates, but The Gates only [lasted] sixteen days.
The same thing for all our projects and this is why we are very different from
other artists.
Some will think that it is a bad thing. I’ll tell you an example, for twenty-five
years we were working very hard to get permission for the wrapping of the
Reichstag. There are many drawings, many scale models, but for fourteen
days in 2005 in June, July there was the Reichstag Wrapped. We see many
FORWARD 111
Wrapped Reichstag, Berlin, 1971-1995, view of West and South facades
by Christo and Jeanne-Claude photography by Wolfgang Volz
Copyright Christo 1995
CONVERSATION 46
films about the Vietnam War - the blood and killing, but there is no blood in the
movie theatre…This is why most of art today is illustration, but our project is not illustration. We borrow - I can tell you this is a very important part of all our works...
The three-dimensional image, the three-dimensional work of art, the painting is a
flat, flat surface on the wall. [With sculpture you can] go around the object, all
around, sometimes the sculpture can be very big, like Alexander Calder, you can go
inside it. But all that space is organized by the artist. The artist has full control of
that space. And this is how the three-dimensional work of art exists. Now, there is
another space we think very little about. The moment you walk out of your home,
you start to walk on the sidewalk. Somebody designed this sidewalk. You cross the
streets, you have a red and green light. Somebody designed this… Jeanne-Claude
and myself, we borrow that space and we create a little disturbance for a few days.
By borrowing that space we inherit everything what is inherent to that space to become a part of the work of art. We did not invent the NEPA environmental impact
statement, it was there, we inherited that. Now, we didn’t invent the decision of
wrapping of the Reichstag or the politics of the Reichstag, we inherited them by
doing that project, meaning that the work of art is so big, so complex that we can
never absorb or understand what the work means to the people…And that is the
important part and this is why this unique moment when the work is for fourteen
days it translates that uniqueness.
Christina: Do you see inheriting a site or structure’s qualities or characteristics as
the same thing as highlighting or calling attention to them?
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Valley Curtain, Rifle, Colorado, 1970-1972
by Christo and Jeanne-Claude photography by Wolfgang Volz
Copyright Christo 1972-2005
CONVERSATION 47
Christo: No, we are not masochists. We [would] like to have the project
be as easy as possible…But actually there is a lot of humor in that. There
is a lot of humor, you don’t understand how there is humor, but there is a
very, very delicate humor. Imagine that we [could] get the permission in a
much easier way from the federal government, but the federal government
was caught and we play[ed] games like a fisherman who throws the net, the
hook, we threw the hook and the federal government grabs the hook. That
the permitting process became so complex gave this incredible dimension
to the work that we, Jeanne-Claude and myself, [were] not aware…In the
very end how we go to this seven-million dollar expense is so foolish for 14
days. We paid all the money, [it wasn’t] taxpayer money… During the public hearing just last week, some young man [commented] that this project is
bigger than Louisiana pollution because we’ll never have so much discussion about drilling in Louisiana and…getting permission for Over the River
was a simple project for fourteen days…I always said how the project there
is irrational, foolish, absolutely unnecessary. And the government is caught
and they play our game and we play the game and they see our project go
out of proportion like the case of the Reichstag, [where the project went] to
the parliament for a decision. All that gives this enormous dimension to the
work, enhancing the work. Of course, we [would] gladly like to do it much
less expensively much [more] simply. Well, we try but we fail.
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Artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude displaying “Over the River” in Denver, Colorado. Jeanne-Claude passed away November 18, 2009.
Photography by Ed Andrieski
Christo: Absolutely, yeah, exactly - the same thing with the Reichstag. But that is
why we don’t do commission…Imagine the gratification we have that we synthesize for hundreds of thousands of people through Colorado, outside of Colorado,
to visualize how the project will look beautiful. And actually it was not secret, you
know I would go to many public hearings and when I [went] to speak, I [turned] to
an opponent of the project who was there and said that I was very happy that you
here, because you make my project more important. They [were] very furious.
CONVERSATION 48
Aaron: Do you think that the Over the River project is that much more important
now because of the current events that surround the things you were talking about?
Aaron: So there is a perfect time for each project to be built for you, would you say?
Christo: I think so. I can tell you a lovely story with the Reichstag project. The
Reichstag project was refused in 1977. And there [were] two editorials against the
Reichstag, one was in one of the most important German newspapers – it is the
national newspaper in Germany - who was against the project. Another was the
Pravda in the Soviet Union. Now, I knew very well that I would get permission
before the Wall collapsed in 1989, and of course the Pravda was saying that the
wrapping of the Reichstag is taking down capitalist art. If we wrap[ed] the Reichstag during the cold war, it would be a footnote in the cold war history. But by doing the project after the fall of the Wall the project [had] a much greater dimension
to all of Germany…
Aaron: Are there upcoming projects and/ or have you learned from the projects that
you’ve done in the past and how would you implement them in the in the future?
Do you still have a body of work you want to complete?
Christo: We don’t learn anything in the past…The most terrible, the most stupid
thing is to approach a project with the naiveté that the other project will help you…
We try to apply the things we learned before, but they [are] not as easy, they [are]
not the right way and we need to go another way. This is all [from] our laziness
to be comfortable, we try to apply something we know… But you need to trust
people, how much you can trust people, how much can talk, how much you can
acknowledge you know better, they know better. How you know is very complicated. I cannot give you advice on that.
Forward Director
owns her own practice, Contour
Architecture, located in Phoenix,
Arizona. She believes in the
power of design to incite positive
change for the betterment of local communities.
Christina graduated from Rice University with her
Bachelor of Architecture.
Aaron Herring, Assoc. AIA
is an artist and architectural
designer. Aaron received his
BA in Studio Art with an
emphasis in figure drawing &
sculpture from Indiana University
Bloomington in 2000, and his Masters in
Architecture from ASU in 2006. He currently
works for Gould Evans in Phoenix, Arizona.
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Christina Noble, AIA, LEED AP
INTERSTITIAL LAND USE AND THE IMPLEMENTATION OF
COLLECTIVE DESIGN STRATEGY
by Jenna Didier and Oliver Hess
CONNECTING THE DOTS 49
CONNECTING THE DOTS
In the urban mesh, gaps exist – vacant spots that even the most vigorous
developers have not been able to monetize. Most U.S. cities also lack
open space per capita. Los Angeles, for example, has barely one acre of
open park space per one thousand residents[1]. Los Angeles, like many
cities also has a large amount of apparently abandoned and blighted
piece of land mostly in depressed regions of the city that are especially
park poor. Why do we not use the empty spaces already embedded in
our communities? We suspect that is is because residents and property
owners alike lack engagement and a true sense of ownership over
their immediate environment - this is especially true in badly blighted
communities. Similar to banking and commerce, elaborate mechanisms
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Bubbles, 2007 design by FoxLin, Non Design, Brand Name Label and Axel Kilian. Photo by Coy Koehler. Materials: Steel, concrete, ripstop, mylar tubes, fans and sensors, CNC cut HDPE.
Light Frames, designed by Gail Peter Borden. Opening. Photo by Chris Ball.
In direct response to this crisis of nonengagement, Materials & Applications
(M&A) offers a site for experimentation in
architecture and landscape. Our experimental
courtyard space and community programs
function as a platform for emerging designers
and as an entry point for anyone curious
about architecture’s tools, ideas, and
implementation. These complimentary goals
work to coalesce specialists and enthusiasts
who share knowledge and ideas, while
building aptitude in craft, construction and
problem-solving.
Many of the past decade’s most interesting
architectural designs have existed only as
digital renders. As an early research priority,
M&A sought to realize these elaborate
virtual spaces into actual places, and explore
how they fared once gravity, material, and
budgetary limits were imposed. Exhibitions
in our outdoor courtyard were the starting
point and continue to be at the core of our
programming. M&A accepts proposals on a
rolling basis from architects, artists, or anyone
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control the built environment, leaving the
average person feeling powerless to exert
meaningful influence over even his or her
own street.
Here There Be Monsters, 2006. Didier Hess in collaboration with Workshop Levitas. Photo courtesy M&A. Materials: Bamboo,
zip ties, EDPM liner, submersible pumps, aquatic plants, surveillance equipment, electtronic hardware and software, rainwater.
Over the span of eight years since M&A
opened in 2002, fourteen installations have
been completed on site. Interestingly, from
small budget projects of $5,000 to large
budget projects of $40,000, the costs of
materials and manufacturing did not follow a
simple upward swing of a line chart relating
funding to quality of environment. In fact,
some of the installations that received popular
approval, attention in the press, and AIA
Design Honor awards, like Ball-Nogues’
Maximillian’s Schell or Didier Hess’ Here
There Be Monsters, had the smallest budgets.
Here There Be Monsters evolved when a
hole in our program opened as no exhibitor
wanted to show after Maximillan’s Schell, an
installation that even today defines the genre
that we are interested in. We decided to
create an installation ourselves for the space,
using almost no budget we simply defined the
criteria that we wanted an installation at M&A
to possess and went about creating it as a
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with a great idea that can show sufficient
levels of competence and passion to complete
a project. The courtyard is 40’ x 25’, bounded
on two sides by neighboring buildings and
flanked by a sidewalk in a pedestrian-friendly,
newly-boutiqued neighborhood. Since the
unsupervised courtyard space is open to the
public, free of charge for twelve or more hours
a day, projects must be durable, safe, and sitespecific. A winning proposal challenges the
boundaries of what can be done, even to the
point of risking failure.
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Yakuza Lou, by Eddy Sykes. Photograph by Brian Janeczko
template for future developments. We looked
for experts in various fields to collaborate
with, including Bruce Danziger from Arup
who engineered the bamboo bridge. Drawing
on our own skills, interests, and a volunteer
community we flooded the entire courtyard
with rain water, built the woven bamboo
bridge over it and submerged 48 variable
frequency drive pumps in the 18” deep water
which were all computer controlled. We
spent the summer honing the software that
controlled the pumps to respond with various
patterns of burbling jets to human gestures,
facial expressions, and simple hand or arm
motions. We also analyzed the performance
of the materials we used in the building of the
piece. After a six month run, the installation
was demolished, with nearly all the materials
recycled or reused except some fasteners. It
was a project built for research not just in the
building method but also in the performance,
wear, and after-life of materials. We set a new
standard to demonstrate how we want M&A
to be used for artists and designers. The goal is
to provide an opportunity to explore how the
influence of an installation will extend months
and years in the future. In many ways, that is
what makes architecture an important field,
it traditionally had a responsibility to the
creation of culture through the durability and
significance of construction itself. Buildings
typically are designed to last, and so to the
responsibilities of time, survival and cultural
As an extension of our programming, over
the past couple years, we have developed
a new hybrid approach for both workshops
and exhibitions that encourage hands-on
learning and group collaboration in the
conceptualization and execution of design.
As suggested by Dennis Dollens, we call
the new format MatterAPP and base it on
a meritocracy of social building where the
group focuses on a selected problem, such
as “how could we create shade that is light
and permeable?” A specialist in a related field
begins the first session with a presentation
and guided model making which leads to
the group creating working models whose
strategies can be assimilated or used in
another iteration. The models are passed
around the group, and some may ultimately
develop into an installation at the M&A
courtyard or other off-site location.
MatterAPP resolves problems in a
multidimensional space that cannot
be effectively modeled any other way.
Understood as a kind of social computer, the
organization tackles issues such as fatigue
analysis, fabrication techniques, technical
training, socializing, materials testing,
community insight, and cultural rehabilitation
-- all optimized and balanced for the needs
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Fat Fringe MatterAPP workshop at Fix Gallery led by LAYER, 2010.
Photo by Henry Cheung.
In addition to the exhibition series, M&A has
programs that invite anyone to participate
in the practice and dialogue of architecture
through full-capacity, design-related lectures
and open-air discussions as well as handson workshops covering topics as diverse
as green roof construction or thin shell ice
structures. Our desire to engage architectural
practitioners as well as laypeople led to a
series of workshops where specialists in
related fields taught business and property
owners storm water management and
rainwater catchment design. M&A produced a
bilingual brochure for the series that is still in
use.
merit exists in the work of M&A.
Fat Fringe Origami Experiments.
Photo by Jenna Didier.
Fat Fringe by Layer.
Photo by Henry Cheung.
Fat Fringe by Layer.
Photo by Oliver Hess.
With each project that we undertake
we create workshops that explore the
development of ideas and techniques.
Frequently this means bringing in experts to
There is a procedural form to the adage
“wisdom of the masses” that we try to explore
when we create a matterApp project. By
priming participants with informed research,
talks or lectures, and encouraging the
participation of a variety of people with
differing backgrounds, the average of what
they produce creatively should be useful.
Beyond that, the outlying concepts define
a terrain of exploration that in an iterative
approach a team can effectively traverse. In
the paper folding for Fat Fringe designed by
LAYER, we found during the four workshop
series, a mix of people from greeting card
makers to film sound mixers would attend,
and although on first glance they would
share little in common vis-a-vis the forms
they were creating, a random insight from
any one of them during our frequent critique
sessions would spark the jumping off point
for the next round of development. We
quickly grew a taxonomy of hundreds of
small paper models that illustrated what a
strong, beautiful, easy-to-assemble tile would
probably look like. Because we built so
many and shared all the details, individual
egos were removed from the process - ie.
nobody felt bad about physically ripping apart
a model, or disassembling to trace and make
their own version to add onto. Because there
is no learning agenda and people participate
voluntarily, the quality of social and technical
development is appreciated by everyone
involved.
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of those involved. For example, MatterAPP
explores how the wisdom of crowds can act
as an optimization of evolutionary design
to overcome the creative decomposition
seen in vertical design infrastructures where
bureaucracy and engorged budgets reduce
details and shrink boldness.
inform us about the challenges that lie ahead
with a specific design or concept that has
been proposed. However sometimes it is a
latent interest that we wish to bring to the
forefront for no other reason than spurring
more proposals or projects that share a
particular approach within our community. In
2005 we invited Dr. Robert Lang, the noted
origamist to come and discuss his perspective
on surface folding and shape making. We
recognized that a great deal of the work that
was interesting to M&A was CNC-based
fabrication and we wanted ways to relate
the human process back to the repetitive
construction steps common in parametric
products. Origami seemed like the perfect
bridge for development. Besides the obvious
contrast of a flexible 2D material becoming
a strong 3d form. Numerous projects have
now been produced which reference origami,
some directly and some indirectly; including
Yakuza Lou from Eddy Sykes which developed
into an amazing series of mechanical systems
and Fat Fringe which will no doubt spawn an
interesting lineage of it’s own iterations.
M&A’s next goal extends our programming
to blighted, interstitial urban zones. For
example, a recent case study by Nicholas
de Monchaux[2] for the UCLA WPA 2.0
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Food Pyramid, by Didier Hess.
Photo by Scott Mayoral.
Both The Studio for Urban Projects and
ReBAR have taken action to green parts of San
Francisco that were previously nothing but
asphalt. The temporary Civic Center Victory
Garden these two design-based organizations
created in 2008 is a great example as is
the current Urban Wildflower Meadow
that ReBar is collaborating with Pollinator
Partnership to design. The 2008 Victory
Garden existed in the great plaza in front of
City Hall as a large series of planting beds
that defined by sand bags and over-flowing
with thriving vegetables. All the labor was
provided by volunteers. “Wedged between
San Francisco’s Civic Center, an area that
contains many of the city’s largest government
and cultural institutions, and the Tenderloin,
a neighborhood shackled with significant
poverty, homelessness, and crime, the garden
stood as a true social and political experiment.
Within weeks, this new ‘Garden of
Communities’ was producing approximately
100 lbs of fresh organic produce a week, all of
which was donated to the San Francisco Food
Our experience in this area is focused on
stacking functions - that is, using the effort
it takes to resurface a parking lot, repair
a facility’s gutters, and plant vegetables
and shade trees by pooling resources to
achieve all of these and more. In 2008, we
were commissioned by the Environmental
Resources Department of Los Angeles in
response to the linked problems of polluted
storm water flushing into the ocean from Los
Angeles, the lack of water infiltration in this
city, and the worsening water shortage. Our
solution was to target small business owners
and encourage them to transform their parking
lots from water sheeting and heat amplifying
nightmares into oases that are rimmed with
trees, vegetable gardens, and infiltration
swales that channel stormwater through
vegetated areas before flushing out to the
stormdrain. Over a series of weekends, we
held workshops led by specialists in rainwater
catchment, stormwater management, and
stormwater-friendly landscaping. The result
is now a vegetable and fruit tree garden
surrounding a busy parking lot where both
tenants and employees grow their own
vegetables and herbs, and the parking lot
no longer floods during rains. The facility
captures 300 gallons of its own rainwater
off the roof to use on vegetables, and the
air conditioner off the south facing wall
of the building drips condensation onto a
vine that grows up the wall and reduces the
thermal impact of the sun on this side of the
building, therefor reducing the reliance on air
conditioning.
Building off our experience in the parking lot,
Bank, and subsequently distributed to meals
programs throughout the City.”[3] Their goal
with the Victory Garden was to popularize
urban gardening - encouraging city-dwellers
to grow their own produce and thus shrink
their carbon-footprint. The urban gardening
movement is growing steadily, although the
goal of 100% self-reliance is still a ways off.
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competition sponsored by UCLA Citylab,
(wpa2.aud.ucla.edu) mapped the blighted,
government-owned properties of San
Francisco to reveal that these areas also
defined the areas of highest heat island effect
and problematic stormwater runoff - as well
as higher crime rates and poorer health of the
communities bordering each site. Taken as a
whole, these areas of San Francisco comprise
a square acreage as large as Golden Gate
Park. Monchaux speculates that addressing
the blight through greening and stormwater
management strategies would decrease if not
eliminate the need for more expensive utilities
upgrades to sewers and electrical supplies to
these areas. By strategically tackling small,
problematic sites, Monchaux could achieve
a much broader goal of providing sustainable
solutions that add valued community space,
eliminate problematic community blight,
and reduce additional loads on community
services.
Many of these areas may be donated or
“leased” to a community for extended
periods of time. This would allow the small
spaces to be fitted with small but significant
improvements to aid the community. We
propose a kind of “urban acupuncture”[4]
transforming these sites in order to stimulate
the local community. Community members
would take an active interest in their
neighborhoods by providing a sense of control
over their surroundings.
Through workshops we would empower
individuals to execute the labor required and
take ownership over radical and exciting new
creations targeted to their neighborhood.
Geospatial analysis and KMZ maps are
integral to this process - for locating potential
sites, and encouraging people in these
neighborhoods to participate in selecting the
best site for a transformation via cell phone
or website. To achieve these goals, M&A
will collaborate with groups who are already
engaged in community-focused uses of the
creative process to inspire neighborhood
building and a sense of place. An updated
call for proposals will anticipate a shift in
expectations such that the M&A courtyard
would become a proving ground for future
installations that would be relocated to a
pre-selected, legally and physically cleared
site. This design strategy would assess the
needs and resources at the remote site to
arrive at a design that encompasses the curb
Regaining a sense of control over our
surroundings can be achieved through
community-engaged transformation of small
areas of blight scattered across every city.
The budgets to transform each site are not
large compared to current impacts upon city
resources, health, safety, and the environment.
Their small, manageable scale makes them
feasible as community projects, to be
completed over several work-weekends. M&A
has proven that unskilled volunteers, when
guided by architects and other professionals,
can design and build high quality, exhilarating
constructions that provide stimulus for
greater civic participation and pride in a
neighborhood. In the future we hope to
continue to serve as a center for exciting ideas
and forward minded people to continue to
grow and transform our built environment.
and landscape conditions to include Low
Impact Design (LID) and greening strategies in
neighborhoods in need of revitalization and
greening.
NOTES
1. The National Recreation and Parks Association recommend 10 acres of park
space per 1,000 residents. Los Angeles barely reached 10% of this national
standard with a mere 1.107 acres per 1,000 residents. In a recent study, the
Trust for Public Land found that only 34% of children in Los Angeles were
within one-quarter of a mile of a park. This compares with Boston where 78%
of children are within one-quarter of a park; New York with 59% and Atlanta
with 43%. Source: Los Angeles Neighborhood Land Trust
2. Local Code : Real Estates uses geospatial analysis to identify thousands of
publicly owned abandoned sites in major US cities, imagining this distributed,
vacant landscape as a new urban system. Using parametric design, a landscape
proposal for each site is tailored to local conditions, optimizing thermal and
hydrological performance to enhance the whole city’s ecology—and relieving
burdens on existing infrastructure. Local Code’s quantifiable effects on energy
usage and storm water remediation eradicate the need for more expensive, yet
invisible, sewer and electrical upgrades. In addition, the project uses citizen
participation to conceive a new, more public infrastructure as well —a robust
network of urban greenways with tangible benefits to the health and safety of
every citizen. Source: http://vimeo.com/8080630
3. http://www.rebargroup.org/projects/victorygarden/
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similar to the UCLA Citylab project, we would
target blighted, interstitial urban zones in a
methodical and rigorous manner that focuses
on the needs and resources of a site to arrive
at the optimum design solution that promotes
community engagement while making
positive environmental impacts. In Los
Angeles, many tracts are too small to develop
and are left over from adding a turning lane
or removing the city’s historic streetcars. A
recent survey commissioned from the County
Assessor reveals color-coded vacant parcels:
Chinese medical theory of acupuncture. Casagrande views cities as complex
energy organisms in which different overlapping layers of energy flows are
determining the actions of the citizens as well as the development of the city.
By mixing environmentalism and urban design Casagrande is developing
methods of punctual manipulation of the urban energy flows in order to create
an ecologically sustainable urban development towards the so-called Third
Generation City(post industrial city). Casagrande has developed the theory at
the Tamkang University of Taiwan. Source: http://helsinkiacupuncture blogspot.
com
Jenna Didier is
in pursuit of a
new approach
to the built
environment. A
lifelong interest in
the creation and
use of public space led her to Los Angeles
and dual careers in water systems design and
public art. In 2002 Jenna founded M&A. She
and Oliver Hess collaborate on public art
commissions. Currently they are working on
several, including a new gateway over the
101 freeway for downtown Los Angeles in
collaboration with Ned Kahn. She received
the 2009 Neutra Spirit Award for professional
excellence.
Professor Marco Casagrande which combines urban design with traditional
Oliver Hess constructs responsive
environments and the technical systems
that support them. He uses skills developed
from his work in visual effects and technical
direction to create art that has been displayed
in galleries around the globe and to assist
other artists, architects and designers with
new media installations. As a partner of the
art collaborative Didier Hess and co-director
of M&A, he oversees technical aspects of
the installations and collaborates on the
conceptualization and design development of
each piece. He was a 2009 TED Fellow.
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4.Urban Acupuncture is an urban environmentalism theory of Finnish architect,
THE UNSEEN SITE 59
DESIGNING FOR THE UNSEEN SITE
by Ted Shelton and Tricia Stuth
The porch ceiling of our recent project, the Ghost Houses, is painted
blue. (Fig. 1) It is a pleasant surprise in a project whose exterior is otherwise relentlessly black and white. For us this act offers more than a visual
counterpoint within the color palette. Painting the ceilings of porches
blue is a regional vernacular practice, a response to a wives’ tale claiming this will deter insects. (We can verify that this is untrue.) Perhaps less
familiar to East Tennesseans, the particular hue comes from Polychromie
Architecturale, a color system created by Le Corbusier. This design act
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Polaroids of the original houses taken by the City Codes Violations Inspector and collected as part of condemnation proceedings in 1987.
Photographs courtesy of the City of Knoxville Archives, Permits and Violations.
ties the project both to a universal discourse
surrounding the practice of architecture since
the turn of the twentieth century and to local
building traditions that predate that strand of
inquiry. We call opportunities like this ‘designing for the unseen site’ and enjoy the reciprocal potential it invites. Whereas the particulars
of the physical site – and mixed residential/
industrial neighborhood just outside of downtown Knoxville, Tennessee - suggest little
connection to the regional vernacular and
none to the work of Le Corbusier, by attaching these ideas to the site we both expand our
understanding of place and allow complementary interaction of otherwise divergent
concepts. Something as simple and affordable
as paint allows the project to exceed boundaries of time and location. The unseen site
is the environment of ideas, histories, and
cultural practices in which a project is immersed. Designing for the unseen site allows
us to augment the physical dimensions of the
project’s location, the “land as it lay this way
and that.”1 The dimensions of the unseen site
Ghost Houses
The aforementioned Ghost Houses grew out
of a contradictory combination of the physical
and unseen site. Yet, the project exists because
of, not in spite of, these challenges. The project’s location is a residential lot in an innerring urban neighborhood. Three nearly identical houses were built on the site around 1915.
When we purchased the lot only the center
house remained, the others had been demolished in the 1980’s despite efforts to save
them. (Figure 2) Due to its age and detailing
the county deemed the house historically significant and assigned a historic zoning overlay to the lot. Yet, the underlying zoning was
typical of suburban residential development,
having little to do with either the neighborhood or the lot’s history. This zoning allowed
no additional construction on the lot. (Fig 3)
Thus, two aspects of the unseen site were in
conflict – how the site was remembered and
valued, and how it was legally described.
While code is typically the most intractable
aspect of the unseen site, the memory of the
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Fig. 1. Blue porch ceiling of the Ghost Houses. Photography by Ted
Shelton and Tricia Stuth
THE UNSEEN SITE 60
can be defined through our own interests and
curiosities or might be attached to the physical
site through the force of statute. By manipulating the unseen site we modify the landscape
in which we are operating to create the possibility of accomplishing something worthwhile,
authentic, and meaningful. This landscape of
ideas, what Carol Burns has termed the “construed site,” escapes temporal limitations and
interacts with the physical site to give rise to
new understandings and readings.2 Working
in this way allows us to transcend functional
and spatial problem solving. While a new
project’s first design moves are always concerned with fundamentals of the physical site
such as view, topography, access, and solar
orientation, often aspects of the unseen site
provide our first significant design foothold.
This article examines the importance of the
unseen site in three of our projects.
THE UNSEEN SITE 61
Fig. 2 - The historic house and lot as it appeared when we purchased the property in 2005. Photography by Ted Shelton and Tricia Stuth
Evocation of the unseen site orders the design of the project as well. We assumed the
massing of the lost houses and developed a
market rate duplex and a single–family home
that oscillate between the archetypal and the
unique in response to timely and timeless
concerns. While the houses’ envelopes are
strictly defined by the form and massing of
the lost houses, matching their floor line, eave
line and roof pitch, their interiors are ordered
by the dictates and desires of their current
inhabitants. Thus, the unseen site creates a
challenge requiring advanced spatial play in
order to define spaces for contemporary living
within volumes originally conceived according to very different economic, technical, and
social constraints. The result is a composition
of three structures, two new and one historic,
whose reading oscillates between now and
then. The unseen “ghost” houses manifest
themselves once more through the new construction. (Figs 4-6)
Fig. 4 - The “light chimney” in the single family house reinterprets a
formal gesture found throughout the historic neighborhood; inherent
proportions however serve alternate daylight, ventilation, and water
heating needs, to begin. Photography by Ted Shelton and Tricia Stuth
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lost houses provided a lever that we used to
overcome restrictions. The historic homes
existed in ephemera such as photographs and
newspaper articles and in the clear accounts
of longtime neighborhood residents and
census data. By repeatedly attaching these
memories to the lot, we were able to acquire
the many variances and approvals required to
proceed.
THE UNSEEN SITE 62
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Fig. 3 - Zoning regulations for the site were reflective of suburban development and inconsistent with the neighborhood’s fabric. More than three
times the lot area is required to build the proposed density. Permission for the project required five public meeting, issuance of a certificate of
historic appropriateness, a rezoning, review and approval of a development plan, and numerous variances for setbacks and off-street parking, to
begin. Illustration by Ted Shelton and Tricia Stuth.
THE UNSEEN SITE 63
FIg. 6 - The west facade of the single family house in context. .) The new structures use traditional materials in a contemporary mode, paying homage to but not being derivative of their predecessor. Photography by Ted Shelton and Tricia Stuth
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Fig. 5 - The porch of the new duplex at night. Thin, steel pipe columns support the hip roof and produce a lightness associated with contemporary
structures that is sympathetic to both the historic and the industrial landscapes in which it is situated. Photography by Ted Shelton and Tricia Stuth
THE UNSEEN SITE 64
Fig. 7 - Left: Aerial photo of Eastern State Penitentiary (USGS) overlaid with plan of prison. Right: Plan of Eastern State Penitentiary, 1994. Dark
grey indicates original cell blocks; light grey indicates cell blocks added subsequently. (©Marianna Thomas Architects) from Eastern State
Penitentiary: Crucible of Good Intentions.
Point | Counterpoint
Haviland’s scheme can be read as an attempt
to control vision, and through this manipulation, alternately empower or isolate the occupants. In the cell, the prisoner’s view is limited
in every direction — held in by the opaque
walls. The only visual outlet afforded to each
prisoner is an oculus that directs one’s view
toward God, if it is free at all. Conversely,
the guard’s view is extended and enhanced
throughout the facility. The guard exercises his
Fig. 8 - Historic photograph of central rotunda, Eastern State Penitentiary. Michael J. Cassidy’s book Warden Cassidy on Prisons and
Convicts (1897) Patterson and White: Philadelphia, page/plate not
numbered but between pp. 38-39.
visual and mobile privilege along the radiating
lines of the prison’s plan. Patrolling the long
corridors flooded with natural light, he is privy
to a world hidden from the prisoner. His gaze
is charged with control and power. (Fig 8)
This scheme is undoubtedly descendant from
Jeremy Bentham’s (1748-1832) Panopticon,
which allowed a central guard to surveil every
cell. While the effect at Eastern State is slightly
different, the central importance of the gaze is
undeniable.
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Built in 1829, Eastern State Penitentiary is a
National Historic Landmark. Operational from
1830 – 1971 the prison is now a museum,
curated as a managed ruin.3 Our installation
there, Point|Counterpoint, was part of its annual arts program and examines the building
as an idealized typology for the purposeful
ordering of space. The installation initiates a
conversation with the prison’s architect, John
Haviland (1792–1852), about Eastern State’s
influential role in establishing an architectural
type — the radial prison. (Fig 7) Based on
Quaker concepts of penitence, Eastern State
‘‘linked solitude with moral and vocational
instruction, exemplified the Pennsylvania
System of penology, and became a model for
over 300 prisons worldwide.’’4
THE UNSEEN SITE 65
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Figure 9 –Turning the Tables –Mirrors placed at 45 degrees to the primary axis of the corridor are concealed within the frameworks of two X-shaped
portals. This arrangement diverts the view of anyone looking down the length of the cell block (green), while also creating a visual link between
the two cells located diagonally across from each other (red ). Thus, the view of the guard is captured and contained while the prisoner’s view is
extended and linked. Color photograph by Barry Halkin Photography, others by Ted Shelton and Tricia Stuth.
Fig. 10 - View Captured – an observer looking down the corridor and “through” the portal is confronted with something completely unexpected
– first a cell door and then, beyond, the solid back of the cell itself. This imposition visually terminates the axis of the corridor. Color photograph by
Barry Halkin Photography, Others by Ted Shelton and Tricia Stuth
THE UNSEEN SITE 66
Fig. - 12 - View Escaping- From certain cells, prisoners are granted a view of the previously unknown light-filled corridor in front of them. Depending on
which cell it is seen from, this corridor leads to one of the two forbidden and highly symbolic places – either outside the prison or the central rotunda. These
escaping views imply two possibilities subversive to Haviland’s scheme. The first is the opportunity to attain a path leaving the prison. The second gains
access to the rotunda, and with it, the power of privileged vision. Color photograph by Barry Halkin Photography, others by Ted Shelton and Tricia Stuth
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Fig. 11 - View Extended – from within the cells, the mirrors visually double the width of the corridor. Monochromatic screens slanted against the back
walls of the cells receive raked sunlight from the occuli. The glowing, seemingly edgeless fields de-materialize the back walls of the cells and extend
views beyond the prison confines. Cells are visually linked, providing prisoners previously forbidden contact and ending their “lateral invisibility…[the]
guarantee of order.” (Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish: The Birth of a Prison) Color photograph by Barry Halkin Photography, others by authors.
Ted Shelton and Tricia Stuth
Constructed within a National Historic Landmark that allows no permanent anchoring or
alteration, the installation was of necessity
light and ephemeral. Yet, this very materiality
becomes part of the counterpoint; deploying
mirrors and screens to dissolve steel and masonry. While the project proposes an alternate
reading, it does so within the relentless geometries and axes of the existing plan. Much like
a rhetorical debate, the seeds for questioning
the original thesis are found within its very
logic. The installation serves as a counterpoint
to the ideas embodied in the prison, becoming a device to reveal part of the unseen site.
(Figs 9 – 12)
Kielder Observatory
A RIBA competition entry, the Kielder Observatory serves specialist and amateur astronomers, scientific researchers and school groups
under England’s darkest skies in Northumberland. Despite Kielder Water & Forest Park’s
picturesque setting, the site for the observatory was logged, yielding a forlorn landscape
of stumps. (Fig 13) This tabula rasa provided
little initial direction. We turned instead to
two aspects of the unseen site – the nature of
astronomy and our own associations evoked
by this unusual landscape. The interplay and
reversal of the luminous environment that surround the practice of astronomy form a significant part of the unseen site for this project.
THE UNSEEN SITE 67
Fig. 13 - The site, Black Fell, is a clear felled area within Kielder Forest
& Water Park. Photograph courtesy of RIBA Competitions.
Although visible, the luminous environment’s
phenomenal aspects, changes revealed over
time, obscure their implications from the
casual observer and thus become a part of the
unseen site.
Astronomers, at least while practicing their
craft, are nocturnal. They separate themselves
from the society to observe light that is visible only in the dark and even then may be
extremely faint. This light is old, having been
emitted or reflected as much as billions of
years previous. The astronomer is engaging in
the optically tenuous practice of looking back
in time. This idea structures what is typically
the most mundane part of a program – the
parking lot.
In our proposal a series of photovoltaic panels
orders the parking lot. By day, panels convert
light energy from the sun (a star) to stored
electric power that facilitates the nighttime
observation of light from other stars. Thus the
project participates in the time-shifting nature
of astronomy. Furthermore, the photovoltaic
panels are situated to shield the viewing field
from the headlights of oncoming cars, protecting the precious darkness that is so easily shattered. (Fig 14)
The second aspect of the unseen site explored
in the Kielder project is a literary association.
While working on the project we were re-
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Our project turns the tables. Through an intervention of screens, mirrors, and thresholds,
the view of the guard is captured and contained within a cell; meanwhile, the prisoner’s
view is extended and linked not only to that
of other prisoners but ultimately to an implied
‘‘horizon’’ brought in through the oculus.
This effectively dissolves the back walls of the
cells and extends the prisoner’s view beyond
the walls of the prison while simultaneously
visually linking cells to each other providing
prisoners with forbidden contact and ending
their, “lateral invisibility . . . [the] guarantee of
order.5
THE UNSEEN SITE 68
Fig. 15 - From left, (1) As with Calvino’s city of Thekla, constellations are used as a metaphorical blueprint. Constellations of tree stumps left by
logging stand in as earthly substitutes for patterns of stars; (2) The primary telescope housing, individual viewing platforms and the warming room
are all located on the existing slope; taking their clues from the location of the stumps; (3) The slope is interlaced with pathways that connect the
otherwise scattered locations. Particular stumps that describe the pathways are lit with red LED’s at low level to point the way.
Illustration by Ted Shelton and Tricia Stuth
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Fig. 14 - The telescope housing/court is dynamic, comprised of fixed and movable elements that open and close, hinge and roll, to support daytime
and nighttime uses and visitors. Illustration by Ted Shelton and Tricia Stuth
Conclusion
minded of the following passage from Calvino’s Invisible Cities:
If…someone puts his eye to a crack in a
fence, he sees cranes pulling up other cranes,
scaffoldings that embrace other scaffoldings, beams that prop up other beams. “What
meaning does your construction have?” he
asks. “What is the aim of a city under construction unless it is a city? Where is the plan
you are following, the blueprint?”
“We will show you as soon as the working
day is over; we cannot interrupt our work
now,” they answer.
Work stops at sunset. Darkness falls over
the building site. The sky is filled with stars.
“There is the blueprint,” they say.6
This passage prompted us to reconsider the
stump-dotted landscape. If the organic pattern
of the stumps was understood as an earthly
proxy for the random pattern of stars in the
night sky then they might present a blueprint
for ordering the site as Calvino suggests. Consequently pathways were placed to engage the
stumps and their tops painted white to reflect
carefully shaded low-level red light for wayfinding. Likewise, the circular concrete viewing platforms for amateur astronomers were
inscribed within various groupings of three
stumps yielding a range of sizes and locations.
The literary association linked the ground to
NOTES
1 Annie Dillard, An American Childhood (New York: Harper & Row, 1987), 3.
2 Carol Burns, “On Site: Architectural Preoccupations” in, Drawing/Building/
Text: Essays in Architectural Theory, Andrea Kahn, ed., (New York: Princeton
Architectural Press, 1991), 154-164.
3 James Timberlake and Stephen Kieran, Manual: the Architecture of Kieran
Timberlake (New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2002), 82.
4 Pennsylvania state historical marker outside the entrance to Eastern State
Penitentiary.
5 Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish: the Birth of the Prison (New York:
Random House, 1975), p. 200.
6 Italo Calvino, Invisible Cities (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1978),
127.
7 Michael Pollan, A Place of My Own: the Education of an Amateur Builder
(New York: Random House, 1997), 104-107.
Ted Shelton, AIA and Tricia Stuth, AIA
are assistant professors at the University of
Tennessee and partners in the firm curb. He is
a former Fulbright Fellow. She is a recipient of
the 2010 AIA Young Architects Award.
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Fig. 16 - A star-gazer’s viewing platform hovers between constellations
of stumps and stars. Illustration by Ted Shelton and Tricia Stuth
Michael Pollan suggests that all design can be
understood as a negotiation between “there”
and “here”; that is, between abstract cultural
notions of the wider world and the concrete
reality of a place.7 We agree with this formulation as far as it goes. However, we would add
that this exploration of how the non-physical
interacts with the physical gives rise to a new
understanding of site; one where ideas are
attached to place with each responding to and
modifying the other. It is in this augmented
landscape of the unseen site that we strive to
operate.
THE UNSEEN SITE 69
the night sky and revealed overlooked possibility in a physical site. (Figs 15 - 16)
LANZAROTE, A CHANGING CLIMATE,
THE ‘ENVIROGRAMMIC’ RESPONSE
by Mark Smout and Laura Allen
Ground Cloud. Image courtesy of SmoutAllen.
human impact within the natural world.
Our architectural design research work
explores a design-based approach to
architecture, landscape and climate change
via political, technological and artistic
disciplines. Our work proposes that the
built environment can develop a reading of
and synergy with its changing surroundings,
informed by understanding the complex
interaction of living and artificial systems.
Our proposal for a technological topography
for the Lanzarote lava fields and ash pits is
conceived as drawings laid over and into
photographic surveys of the geographical
curiosities that dominate the island landscape.
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W J T Mitchell’s Landscape and Power
(Chicago University Press, 2002) examines
landscape as an instrument of cultural force.
In the opening page, the author makes
contrasting readings about the ambiguity
and status of landscape, stating, “Landscape
is a natural scene mediated by culture. It
is both a represented and presented space,
both a signifier and a signified, both a frame
and what a frame contains, both a real place
and its simulacrum, both a package and
the commodity inside the package.” These
polarities go a long way to defining the
complexity of our relationship with landscape.
However, unfolding global perils of climate
change in recent years have increasingly
precipitated knowledge of the intricacies of
LANZAROTE CHANGING CLIMATE THE ENVIROGRAMMIC RESPONSE 71
Montañas del Fuego coach tour takes a predetermined route around the most scenic geological features of the Timanfaya National park. Image courtesy of SmoutAllen.
Current Accumulator. Image courtesy of SmoutAllen.
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In this design project, three separate
structures, the Current Accumulator, the River
Reversed and the Ground Cloud use and
adapt emerging and dormant environmental
technologies and vernacular processes to
re-establish the surrounding environment as
the architecture’s energy source. They also
demonstrate the hydrologic cycle — the
model of the movement of water above, on,
and below the surface of the earth. Global
climate change scenarios for the scarcity
of water, drought and desertification, and
conversely river flooding and sea level
rise, reflect the complexity of hydrological
processes and their role in environmental
activity.
The island’s inclusion in the UNESCO
programme can in part also be attributed
to prescient attitudes toward land use. In
1991 the local council adopted a radical
policy for protection of its most precious
natural resources in the form of the Island
Zonation Plan. Conceived under the
influence of artist César Manrique, the plan
curbs excessive touristic development while
utilizing Lanzarote’s extraordinary physical
geography to attract tourism and hone visitors’
appreciation of their surroundings.
In 2008, the International Union for the
Conservation of Nature (IUCN) reported
climate predictions for the regions of
Macaronesia (The Azores, Madeira and the
Canary Islands), of a 0.35m sea level rise, a
2.1°C air temperature rise, a decrease in the
power of the north-westerly trade winds and
an increase in the prevailing eastern winds
from the Sahara . Lanzarote’s vulnerability
to climate change is compounded by both
the island’ s high ratio of coastline to land
area, which means that sea level change
will affect a large proportion of land mass,
and by its relatively small size resulting in a
lack of both habitat diversity and availability
which reduces the chance of plant and animal
species being able to successfully relocate
into suitable local environments.
Curious traditional land use and farming
practices, in addition to the unique geology,
are the focus of touristic activities. The
Timanfaya National Park (fig. 2) was
established in 1974 and covers the extensive
Lanzarote is the only whole island to be
designated a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve
recognized under UNESCO’s Man and the
Biosphere Programme, which innovates and
demonstrates approaches to conservation
and sustainable development. The island is
still under national sovereign jurisdiction yet
it shares its experience and ideas regionally,
nationally and internationally, within the
World Network of Biospheres. Lanzarote’s
designation is due to its unique combinations
of volcanic, geothermal, and extraordinary
agrarian landscapes, (fig. 1), its bio-diversity,
genetic resources and endemic species of
flora and fauna, as well as its moratorium on
touristic development.
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Lanzarote has firmly established the built
environment as an active component in the
rewriting of our experience of landscape.
Through the island’s careful governance of
its unique and dramatic landscape it has
acted as a model for managing development
in a sustainable manner and shown how
landscape can be critical in providing a
summarized or abbreviated vision of nature’s
complexity and beauty.
and inhospitable lava fields that were created
over 6 days of volcanic activity in the 1730’s.
This field of craters and craggy rope lava is
protected from human alteration and therefore
acts as a living laboratory for the study of
slowly emerging flora and fauna. To protect
this fragile environment, the coach tour’s
designated route restricts visitors’ experience
of the landscape to the purely scenic. The
visitor experience is choreographed into vistas
that enable controlled, distant views of the
elemental force and biodiversity of nature.
Lanzarote Lava Fields
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Le Geria vineyards, thousands of semi-circular hollows harbour individual vines planted in black volcanic gravel
(picon) to preserve moisture from dew. Image courtesy of SmoutAllen.
River Reversed. Image courtesy of SmoutAllen.
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Solar ponds, reservoirs of saline water, exploit
naturally occurring extreme gradients of
salinity and water temperature to generate
power using specialised turbines. This energy
source is typically used at small scale in
developing countries to power local industry.
In the Current Accumulator power is gradually
built up as a store of potential energy in large
tensioned armatures and a network of cables
that suspend the ponds from the surrounding
rock landscape. As energy is released the
ponds are elevated and slowly shift, rise, fall
and rotate, mimicking the flows and cycles of
ocean water.
River Reversed
Lanzarote is a dry island receiving an average
of 200mm rainfall annually. Through history
the islanders have adapted the landscape
and built environment to harness water
for agriculture and drinking; fog and dew
catchers, cistern fields, check dams, storage
tanks, banked and cross-terraced fields can
still be seen throughout the island. More
recently, to meet increasing fresh water
demands from tourism and urbanism, the
River Reversed (fig. 4) responds to the
island’s precarious reliance on industrialised
processes and its own hostile environment.
Lanzarote has no surface and groundwater
in the form of rivers or springs and what
water there is remains as droplets of dew
or fog. Our projects aims to materialise
flowing water from apparently ephemeral
material. The project also alludes to the flow
of water through the hydrological cycle via
the transient process of evaporation as well
as to the geomorphological phenomena of
‘endorheic’ or salt lakes where topography
prevents drainage out to sea, and where
instead the basin loses water by evaporation.
The scheme adapts Henri Coanda’s
“Apparatus for Purification of Undrinkable
Water” which he devised and patented in
the 1950’s but which was never adopted
for use. The system exploits the technology
of solar chimneys where an updraft tower,
more commonly used to provide ventilation,
condenses water extracted by evaporation
from a glass covered saline pond. The tower
has a reflective internal surface to multiply
available light whilst absorbing radiation on its
external surface to minimise heat loss through
its mass. The chimney therefore superheats
the moisture-laden air to vastly increase the
volume of air passing through the system and
therefore the quantity of condensate collected.
The emerging flow of fresh water is directed
into a culvert cut from the surrounding rock
landscape that transforms it into an artificial
river flowing in a compressed meander
through the site. The river is exposed to
the sun’s heat, while it also seeps into
the concrete structure. What began as a
torrent becomes a stream, then a trickle,
fractioning out minerals as it travels. As the
The Current Accumulator (fig. 3), a landscape
of solar ponds, mass walls, walkways and
connecting structures, acts as a representation
of the power of environmental forces and the
complex pattern of dynamic ocean currents
that flow around the globe. This global
movement, influenced by many factors such
as wind, heat, salinity, gravitational pull and
the topography of the ocean floor affects
climate, biodiversity and the environment
even far inland. The Canary Current, a
cool and nutrient-rich branch of the North
Atlantic Current that is responsible for the
enhancement of West African fisheries,
tempers the Lanzarote climate by bringing
cooler seawater than would otherwise be
expected at this latitude.
islanders have constructed energy inefficient
and costly desalination plants that produce
97% of the islands water although they are
only able to build up a water reserve of 5.6
days.
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Current Accumulator
Ground Cloud
Lanzarote’s climate is a microcosm of
contrasting weather systems. It is defined as
subtropical in respect to temperature and
dry and sub desert in regard to rainfall. Cold
ocean currents and trade winds moderate
temperature, but Sirocco winds from Africa
regularly cause temperatures to peak and
smother the island in a haze of Saharan sand.
Unlike other Canary Islands, the topography is
too low for Lanzarote to take full advantage of
the ‘sea of clouds’ that can provide orographic
precipitation. However, around the northern
hills airborne moisture can be harnessed with
fog nets suspended high against prevailing
winds. This technique is currently being
tested as a means of reforesting Lanzarote’s
barren slopes and produces between 2 and 5
litres of water a day that can be fed to saplings
via a pumped drip irrigation network .
Our Ground Cloud proposal for an array of
framed fog nets is deployed up the hillside
facing towards the sea mists. The frames are
constructed from a laminate of two materials
with different rates of thermal expansion and
which are held in a curved position whilst
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course reaches the basin, the river runs dry,
representing in reverse the hydrological cycle
from rainfall to ocean.
Ballistic Devices. Image courtesy of SmoutAllen.
Each of these three designs for Lanzarote,
the Current Accumulator, the River Reversed
and the Ground Cloud, attempts to explore
the tangibility of technology and physical
laws and phenomena that are inherent in
the local and global environment. We have
chosen Lanzarote as a test sight for these
conceptual pieces as its extraordinary physical
and cultural contexts allow us to contrast
and magnify political and geographical
environments to better illustrate the synthesis
between the natural and the synthetic worlds.
They are designed to challenge assumptions
of architecture as an inert body and instead
propose a positive and responsive interaction
between the built and natural environments.
We intend our demonstrations to provide a
heuristic context for the understanding and
advancement of architecture as an ecological
system that can function through apposite
principles of sustainability for the future of
urban and rural landscapes.
they accumulate moisture in the early hours
of the morning. At sunrise, when there is a
significant change in air temperature, the
differing thermal properties within the frames
cause them to tension and in doing so apply
pressure to a sprung release mechanism.
When the pressure becomes too great the
spring release gives way and the frames
shake and jerk into new configurations. A
cloud of droplets is instantly airborne and an
‘atmosphere’ of vapor momentarily created.
Microclimates and even verdant environments
are created where the droplets fall. During the
night, as air temperatures decrease, the frames
relax back and reset for the following day.
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Envirographic Prototype. Image courtesy of SmoutAllen.
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Reterating Village. Image courtesy of SmoutAllen.
Laura Allen
and Mark
Smout are
Senior
Lecturers at
the Bartlett
School of
Architecture,
UCL where
they run Postgraduate Unit 11, Direct the
Postgraduate Thesis and Undergraduate
Architecture Programme. Their Architectural
Design Research practice concentrates on
conceptual and theoretical design projects
that operate with the ephemeral and enduring
forces of change in our environment.
Vernacular techniques and passive systems
are reinvented to enhance the latent
qualities of the site and the architecture that
inhabits it. New strategies for inhabiting
territories of change, such as disintegrating
coastlines, provide a model for an unfamiliar
architecture that adapts with the restless
landscape. Meticulous drawings and intricate
models that propose synergies between
architecture and landscape, representation
and instrumentation, technology and vulgar
knowledge typify their work.
They recently published the best selling
book Augmented Landscapes, PA28, in the
prestigious Pamphlet Architecture Series.
Their contribution to architectural design
and technology teaching is acknowledged
by numerous national and international
accolades for innovation and excellence
in education awarded to themselves and
their graduating students, including 4 RIBA
President Medals winners and the Royal
Academy of the Arts Architecture prize in
2005. Smout Allen lecture and run teaching
workshops internationally and their new
work, “Envirographic Architecture” will be
showcased at the Nevada Museum of Art,
Reno in 2011.
by Claire Sheridan
NETWORK TRACE UNTRACE 80
NETWORK TRACE-UNTRACE
In the first half of the 20th century, “America at Large” was born. The
population spiked, the economy boomed and a new domestic urban
fabric was constructed: the strip mall. It was designed and planned
as a driver-friendly-parking-lot urban form, taking advantage of the
blossoming car culture and consumerism. It came for convenience
and ease and now exists anywhere and everywhere. The first strip mall
opened in Kansas City, Missouri in 1922. Regardless of its origins, it
has been reproduced and reworked to exhaustion. Through nearly
endless iterations across the American landscape and in the collective
imagination, the strip-mall and its attached parking lot have exhausted
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The Strip Mall and the Light Bulb offer a cultural lens to critically analyze and display positions of culture and society. Together they provide
scenarios that trigger recognition and embodiment enhancing traces of times past and present. Image by Claire Sheridan.
Image by Claire Sheridan.
Previous Page: The ambiguity of these atmospheric and spatial conditions separate the strip-mall from its once ideal urban development and aims
to project alternative histories. They also seek to consider the tension between aesthetic value and ethical value and invite consideration of the
strip-mall and light bulb as archive. Disinterested satisfaction through time and economic downturns allows us to disregard these banal conditions.
This work intends reconsider these monotonous conditions as places and objects. A recovery of rich ambiguity? A critique of mass banality? An
archive of America at large? Image by Claire Sheridan.
The contemporary world is electrified
and digital, fast and sleek. It is a world
both tangible and intangible. The light
bulb, invented in 1879 by Thomas Edison,
profoundly changed how human existence
interacted with our surrounding environments.
The act of illumination changed our everyday
conveniences and connected our lives to an
intangible network of electricity forever. The
light bulb’s role in this work is its metaphoric
ability to shed light on issues of invisibility
and its object-hood. While existing as a
designed object in a designed world, light
bulbs are also disregarded and forgotten after
use.
Network trace–untrace utilizes the logic of
the archive and the strip-mall to investigate
spacial traces and ask: “Are we moving from a
visible past to an invisible one?”
The work began with the journal article,
Between Memory and History: Les Lieux
de Memoire, by Pierre Nora. His writing
challenges the factual truth of history and
memory, and considers how we treat the
experience, or traces, of history. He states:
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their presence in the city; and this mass
ubiquity has led to its now near invisibility.
This project takes issue with history and place
and how we individually, nationally, and
globally record and process it. The work is
challenged by current trends of corporation,
storage, globalization and information
science. It aims to contend with the
generalizations of American spaces and bring
cultural discussions of banality and value to
the surface. It considers the digital networks
we rely on, and questions the objects these
networks tie us to. This work intends to
expose issues of embodiment, to re-frame the
ubiquitous and banal, and make conditions of
quantity and quality visible.
Gillian Rose writes in her essay Building a
Restless World: “Our sense of place has gone
global. So interventions have to happen not
in the local, or at least not only in that, but
in a world stretched out and strung around,
a world patched together by a wide range of
differentiated, variable, and erratic processes
in which the human and the non-human are
hard to distinguish.”2
Network trace–untrace: challenges
Traces left behind, infrastructure exposed, repetitive spatial tendencies,
tangible and intangible spaces are created that are now revealed through
networks and displays of light.
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“No society has ever produced archives
as deliberately as our own, not only by
volume, not only by new technical means
of reproduction and preservation, but also
by its superstitious esteem, by its veneration
of the trace. Even as traditional memory
disappears, we feel obliged to assiduously
to collect remains, testimonies, documents,
images, speeches, any visible signs of what
has been, as if this burgeoning dossier were to
be called upon to furnish some proof to who
knows what tribunal of history. The sacred is
invested in the trace that is at the same time
its negation. It becomes impossible to predict
what should be remembered–whence the
disinclination to destroy anything that leads
to the corresponding reinforcement of all the
institutions of memory. A strange role reversal
has occurred between the professional,
once reproached for an obsession with
conservation, and the amateur producer
of archives. Today, private enterprise and
public administration keep everything, while
professional archivists have learned that the
essence of their trade is the art of controlled
destruction.”1
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The transformation of the strip-mall into strip-malls on top of strip-malls
is both its death as a strip-mall and its transformation into documented
archive. Images by Claire Sheridan.
Using the space of strip-malls to position
ideals of ‘America at large’ allowed me to
take issue with how we currently construct
place, what we value, dispose of, and what
we disregard. The strip-mall as archive is
structured to provide moments of pause and
contention, as well as interest and debate;
these investigations are both value laden
and archival. For me, the strip-mall in its
sheer abundance and repetitive existence
confronts ideas of place, quality, as well as
duration and lifespan. As our built conditions
change, adjust and transform, the role of
“privatization” is changing as well as the
role of “collective” sharing in our spatial
and digital frameworks. This work aims to
challenges different levels of intimacy and
nostalgia, while critically commenting on our
current spatial practices and the mass of their
existence.
Objects (light bulbs) have the ability to reveal
history based on their lifespan, materiality,
and inherent qualities. Objects, for me,
circulate questions of value, importance,
duration and purpose. While some are
lost and then found or passed down from
generation to generation, others connect us
to intangible networks, while still some are
purchased, replicated, and disposed of. I
intend to raise discussion about what holds
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the physical experiences of our spatial
environments to intervene, linger, and engage
us at multiple scales. The context of these
inquiries is the strip mall and the archive.
Archives allow exploration (in a physical
realm) into the ideas of collection, storage
and our own manifestation of objects. They
also can address the ever-increasing amount
of data and objects that float in and out of
our existence everyday. While the strip-mall
provides a critical eye to look at American
spaces, their quality and more importantly
their mass quantity. Currently, strip-mall
vacancies are reaching the highest they have
ever been with more and more strip-malls
closing their doors and boarding up their
windows than ever before. The strip-mall
and their parking lots are dieing and leaving
behind the question: what are we to do with
them?
Light as object and bulb remembered, and light as atmospheric conditioning
(designed). This translation hopes to preserve, reveal, and curate essential
visual and spatial ambiguities and redundancies. Image by Claire Sheridan.
The light bulb is treated both as object and
as network, to trigger thoughts about physical
objects and the invisibility of the networks
that structure our daily lives. The scale of
an object and the network that is inherent
to it is just as important to my work as the
scale of the strip-mall and its relationship to
our urban environment. Spatial importance
and experience is driven from that which it
contains, where it sits, and at what magnitude
it interacts with our everyday experiences.
Spaces have the ability to evoke feeling and
emotion. My work and interests here, draw
from historical contexts and practices, yet,
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economic value versus those that rely on
personal value. The cultural conditions of this
will be explored through the utilization of the
light bulb as an object of importance, as it
applies to the strip-mall site, and finally how it
has been challenged and altered by the digital
age of today.
Images by Claire Sheridan.
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Twelve typical typologies of the often disregarded strip-mall have been drawn in plan, overlapped and merged to reveal concepts of America, our
spatial conditions, stereotypes, demographics, and material pallets to question, provoke and display issues concerning the quantity and quality of
the domestic spaces that surround our houses, neighborhoods, cities and suburbs. Images by Claire Sheridan.
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The banal. The alike. The Same. The Copy. The strip-mall as archive of mass urbanity. Images by Claire Sheridan.
FORWARD 111
What can the light bulb do to the light bulb? What can the Strip-Mall do to the Strip-Mall? What can the light bulb do to the Strip-Mall? The light
bulb and our reliance on what it provides attaches us to an intangible network. This object and network is sited together with the strip-mall to represent the strip-mall to frame and display aspects of our cultural disposition to render it more visible. This re-presentation invites us to look again,
in effort to make the strip-mall and light bulb conspicuous. Through new conditioning by representing elements in both familiar and unfamiliar
ways. Image by Claire Sheridan.
NOTES
1. Nora, Pierre. “Les Lieux de Memoire.” Representations, Volume 0, Issue 26
(Spring 1989): 7-24.
2. Rose, Gillian. “Building a Restless World.” Augmented Landscapes / Smout
Allen. Pamphlet Architecture, no. 28, ed. Mark Smout and Laura Allen (New
York : Princeton Architectural Press, c2007): 22.
Claire Sheridan, Assoc. AIA
is a recent graduate from
the University of Michigan:
Taubman College of
Architecture and Planning,
where she received her Masters
of Architecture and a Masters of Science
in Architecture: Design Research, with
distinction. She assisted in teaching Design
Fundamentals 1 and Architectural Theory.
Claire was a Booth Fellowship Recipient in
2009 which took her to Rwanda to assist in
the building and documentation of a hospital
in the northern region of the country. Claire
aspires to establish herself as an educator and
architect that challenges design to be better
as well as smarter. She grew up in Santa Fe,
New Mexico, where the land of enchantment
continues to ask her questions about
landscape, design, site and place.
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focus on the global “flatting” of place and
culture everyone is experiencing. Vacancy,
and nondescript spaces highlight the object
and network into archival conditions. This
re-presentation of the (un)familiar invites us to
look again, to consider the built world and the
standards that it increasingly is built up with.
The intention here is to question and explore
what can be gained from these moments of
mass urban banality as well as to consider
what is being lost: are we moving from a
visible past to an invisible one?
SPRING
LANDSCAPE
FORWARD 111

Landscape - American Institute of Architects

Transcription

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