SPATIAL DEMOLITIONS
There are spatial demolitions uninterruptedly. A pandemic has been needed to realize this, and not only that, but to propose many more. There is always some pee on the street corner. Something, in fact, not that different from the virus when it comes to environmental construction. They both emerge from the body as an instrument of social control and surveillance, and drastically disrupt the established spatial organization, leading to perceptible and mutable consequences that clash with the permanent and fixed scenario.
The pandemic has just highlighted the existence of a previous discordance. However, most of the spatial proposals that have emerged over its course are once again prescriptive; they determine how people should behave within the space. Thus, all these initiatives and urban plans reinforce a tendency that was already prevalent before the pandemic: the domination of the space in order to repress the uncanny patterns and the spontaneous conduct that take place in daily life. That is what really needs to be overturned. If drinking urine can save you in an extreme emergency, Covid-19 could also bring about such an opportunity.
The city is full of virus. The city is full of pee. There is no doubt that they both participate in environmental construction.
THE UNCANNY PATTERNS ALTER THE FIXED-FEATURED SPACE
Fixed-feature space is one of the basic ways of organizing the activities of individuals and groups. It includes material manifestations as well as the hidden, internalized designs that govern behavior as man moves about on this earth. There is a clear interest in specializing the space according to daily activities, although there is a sort of clash between the personality of the inhabitants and the fixed-featured space. Traditionally, the role of architecture has had to do with the visual aspects of structures disregarding that people carry around with them internalization of fixed-feature space that have been forged early in life. Therefore, spatial disposition is not coincidental.But such a scenario co-exists with daily and spontaneous intrinsic motivations which compete with the imposition of a plan in a way that they alter the order that is being sought. No matter how much effort it is put into establishing a static and single panorama, this can be demolished rapidly and unexpectedly. The pandemic has been a shocking and exceptional accident that illustrates such a situation; it has perforated spaces and has discovered new internal places beyond the built geometry, questioning the previous construction, structure, order and life. This proves that the complexity of contemporary society is shaped by the uncanny patterns, and indeed, from the confrontation between the intersection of the multiple spheres that compose them and the homogenization that is being pursued.
Nevertheless, the demolition is not always visible. It can take place in an imperceptible way. From here on, it is suggested to follow an alternative approach that could be effective for change and transformation: putting oneself literally in uncertainty through doubt. Entering into a complete state of confusion could become a potential strategy for dealing with reality in itself.
THE DEMOLITION OF THE ENTRANCE DOOR
Commonly understood as a physical limit that divides two spaces, the entrance door was imperceptibly demolished as soon as the Videotelephony appeared. It seems to be an apparently harmless element, but it could upend the spatial organization in the midst of the 21st century. The entrance door is not usually considered to be removed or to be replaced by a different element. It is installed wherever the regulations require without further ado. But the pandemic has pointed out that there are endless possible entrance doors. That they can adopt miscellaneous positions. That they can involve endless dimensionality. And that they can even agglomerate and separate a multiplicity of unmanageable spaces all over the world. It is also common to differ on the nomenclature that is used to refer to both spaces that it delimits: public/private, domestic/community space, exterior/interior, protection (towards the pandemic)/unprotection (towards the pandemic), etc. But the issue is not primarily about discussing the specific nomenclature as to define the two spheres that are being separated (which at the same time are being connected), but rather to discuss and to contemplate the possibility that other spheres and spaces are entering the scene. When an individual virtually enters the interior of a property which is located on an X-point in the space, the concept of the entrance door as a limit between two spaces disappears. The protective function against external agents attributed to the door is being altered in a way that the frame, the hinge and the lock gain another dimension. At this point, the entrance door is not static and fixed anymore. It is, in fact, one of the most mutable tectonic elements. Up to now, its physical demolition has been imperceptible; I propose invoking it. The destruction of the door is not a threat, it is a warning of the real threat: the idea of being controlled.
As soon as the entrance door is questioned, the walls that constitute the building are questioned as well as they limit and organize space, from physical to virtual. This clearly exemplifies, again, how terminological debate can sometimes be exerted in vain; for example, in the dichotomy that is established between domestic and public. Calling into question the tectonic elements as they are commonly understood could give clues how to face a planetary-scale phenomenon through design, and from here, to disengage a part (not that small) of the complex contemporary reality.
THE DEMOLITION OF THE LOBBY
Similarly conceived as the living room (there is a lamp, a side table, or even a magazine rack), the lobby of the residents’ staircase is petrified from long ago. The space remains almost intact as if its demolition had already taken place, as if it were in ruins, the result of the failure to gather together community neighbors. However, its demolition is still to come. This has led to reviewing the traditional spatial configuration of certain spaces designed to be sociopetal, but that have ended up being sociofugal, and vice versa. Something that, again, Covid-19 has reinforced. Because sociopetal spaces tend to bring people closer together, they have in fact ended up keeping people apart. While in contrast, sociofugal spaces, the ones that typically kept people apart, have embraced social interaction, although always from afar. In this case the suggestion of the demolition is (again) not synonymous with threat; it is a vector for possible change.
THE DEMOLITION OF THE ELEVATOR
When it comes to the elevator, its unexpected demolition announces possible danger. Designed to inevitably agglomerate people within an intimate distance, the elevator signifies peril, unsafe when it is shared with others. This fact accentuates two more threats at the same time, directly related. First, man’s presence in the face of technological progress becoming even more dangerous than the technical accident itself. Second, and probably the most evident, the deformation that the informal space has undergone. Man’s presence is dangerous in the face of another man and Hall’s entire classification of distance falls apart. Intimate and personal distances have experienced sensory losses. The social and the public distance have digitally appeared as personal and intimate. People sit at forty-five centimeters from their computer screen. So ninety centimeters altogether set the distance of impersonal affairs, placing the other around a virtual intimate or personal distance where facial details are more than discernible.
Man is not only in danger in front of another man. Man is a threat itself. Its skin becomes unsafe instead of providing protection. Furthermore, clothes become even more threatening than skin as the virus can remain on them during several days. At this point one can feel safer entering at home naked rather than dressed.
AN ACCIDENT HAS SUDDENLY DISRUPTED THE BUILDING, BUT THE BUILDING WAS ALREADY A THREAT. THE BUILDING IS THREATENING.
AN ACCIDENT HAS SUDDENLY DISRUPTED THE CITY, BUT THE CITY WAS ALREADY A THREAT. THE CITY IS THREATENING.
MAN BECOMES A THREAT. MAN IS THREATENING. BUT MAN WAS ALREADY A THREAT.
Man fights the building. Man fights the CITY. Man fights the other man. Man fights its skin. Does skin fight transparency? Is transparency a threat?
The pandemic has brought about a very specific materiality as if it were a premonition. It is mainly composed of diffusion, translucence and transparency: hand sanitizer, plastic wrap, gauze, plastic dividers, gloves, etc. Curiously enough, a pattern repeats itself including three factors which are closely linked in such a thorough manner: the transparent materiality, the uncanny patterns and the convention challenging. Whatever this is, it remains to be seen if a paradigm shift will take place, and if that will lead to a post pandemic materiality 2.0.
ACCIDENT OR INTERVENTION
Everything that has been mentioned above is reflected in a project which was developed during the first period of severe confinement: Intervention or accident. Following a wide range of methodologies that were interspersed throughout the process, a vast comprehension of how Covid-19 is transforming space, interaction and humans emerged. Artistic theories, architectural practices and studies of human use of space were contrasted with a huge series of contemporary events captured from field work during daily life as the pandemic went on. Those events were experienced first-hand and experimented through a series of actions that put standard and convention to the test in order to evoke doubt. Uncertainty spread out from physical limits (such as elements that constitute building from body skin) up to invisible limits, accentuating the narrow relation that exists between both groups. From here, a manifesto is being presented and accompanied by hybrid disciplines and multiple formats compatible with each other.
CONCLUDING NOTES
Aesthetics, art, design and other disciplines are often being proposed as transgressive against the standards, defending chaos with the intention of evoking new sensations in the face of the established order. From here on, a bond among chaos, aesthetics and materiality is being forged seeking the stimulation of different senses and responses by the observers. Even so, this fact is not always accepted in terms of spatial organization where daily chaotic and accidental urban situations are being rejected. In conclusion, an alternative is being proposed in order to study, analyze and incorporate the accidental phenomena through spatial design which in the majority of the cases provides reflection, change and transformation.
THE POWER OF THE HAPHAZARD PHENOMENON, BRUTALLY REPRESSED BY THE ORDER, COULD AWAKE THE INNER LOOK IN ALL THOSE WHO YEARN TO CREATE A SOCIETY BEYOND THE STANDARDS…
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