F*** REALITY

or how architecture must be completely self indulgent




The Parallax view describes a curious condition when the apparent conditions of the observed object changes due to the varying position of the observer(s). As perfectly as each of the individual observation is conducted, their results differ, not only quantitatively but qualitatively. Zizek may have proposed that to grasp the essence of the object we should not exhaustively embrace all of the views but rather concentrate on the process of shifting, of going from one position to another; but in reality how much a person has to be able to negate his own subjectivity and his own standpoint to pursue the endless task of floating in between, and remain post-critical?

Which comes to the role of the architect. Generations of architects assign a very important role to themselves in that their work should be obliged to reflect, comment, or criticize on the conditions of the society. From something as detailed as the order of Roman columns used in a temple, to as broad as a social and cultural movement such as post modernism, architects want to get a piece of the action. Then somewhere came the generation of architects who deliberately did not offer any response and ride with the flow of capitalism. Or whatever ism. The pragmatic bunch. The rise of such prominent architects in this genre such as Koolhass should not be a problem for the whole profession, for they are but a branch of big tree, until every major job in the world has been taken away, every spotlight stolen, and every publication is written about/by them. Suddenly one opens a magazine of new Tokyo architecture and sees nothing but the same monolith over and over again. Whatever happened to the voices?

The reasoning behind the phenomenon is simple. In the current world there's only one measurement of success, Money. London was described as such an amazing city with endless possibilities, two years ago, when the banks were thriving; and now that the banks have collapsed, the city suddenly comes to be depicted as a city of sin and greed with poor people exploited by the rich bloodless elite. Although London itself is pretty much the same. When all the clients in the world measure themselves with such a standard, architects don't have a choice but to follow. It's more about survial instinct.

But Money, when you really think about it, is but a derivative expression of supply and demand, which, now we know, may not even have anything to do with the real supply and demand, let alone other more intricate and complicated measurements in our societies and cultures. That is why, unfortunately, the traditional architect couldn't fit in. Forever he is looking through his eyes at this big Real that is so mythical and unattainable, but opens the window only to face a world which looks at reality from a much more superficial and simpler viewpoint. There is your impossible parallax gap.

One day, however, the modern architect decides to give up the self struggle and frustration, walks out of the ivory tower and submits himself to the rules of the Money game. A losing match is immediately guaranteed. As a purely mathematical function of supply and demand, the building industry simply does not need architects. We are possibly the only party involved in the construction process that do not contribute anything material to the pool; builders have their physical strength, client has land and capital, developer has basically everything, and even engineers have their concrete measurements that make sure the building does not collapse; but we, the architects, come up with form, that most of the time only contribute to higher costs. Our criticism and aesthetics have been abandoned by ourselves, and our expertise, as so highly we valued it, is being replaced by computers and repeatable templates.

So how should architects wake up each morning and view themselves in the mirror?

Somewhere along the five years of education in this university, among the endless existentialist conversations and postapocalyptal imaginations of our own futures, it suddenly occurs to me the beauty and power of architecture, at this age, is no longer the final product of the creative process, but rather the process from which the final product is born. In any other faculty, no groups of young people in their 20s will be awake 2 o'clock in the morning constantly discussing the juxtaposition between urbanity and modernity, society and history, computer graphics and presentation. Whereas the product of architecture can never stir the same social response as much as the Pyramid, the Forbidden City, or even the stupid CCTV tower once did, this process is on the other hand something much more than a mere degree: a completely developed and developing vocabulary, a consistent history and aesthetics, an endless pursuit of novelty, endless self creation of problems and solutions to them through self-justified logic....architecture for us, like JRR Tolkien and JK Rowling, Google and Facebook, has become a parallel reality. The only way to survive and prosper, i.e. Pragmatic, whatever that means, is to engage passionately in this parallel reality with the courage to make no compromises.

My thesis project, the Parallax Tower, building on this firm belief of mine, is hence a complete set of bullshit. I reject the idea of the site, I don't really care about the brief, I am not bothered to put a single human in the presentation and I don't even know most of the numbers in my building. I'm sure they are all about right, but beyond that I just don't really care. I'll in all good faith accept criticism on these grounds. But on the other hand, it's a self justified set of bullshit. It's a world with endless references that I create and I absolutely love it. The only way to convince me that it's rubbish this way is to build it in reality and show me the undeniable facts.

There's no room for compromise. I'm not dwelling on some proud utopian dreams of a soon to be graduate; I'm talking about survival, as the second I give up my own parallel world all that I have is 12 A1 sheets of lines and colour blocks that are never going to be realized or remembered; and in reality, the moment the architect drops his own world, he immediately becomes a business man, usually an unsuccessful one, who doesn't even have a say in anything. There is no shortage of such business men in other parts of the society.

So what about money? Where on earth can a self indulgent architect who engages in his own world get clients and projects? Who would even listen to him? Of course there is no guarantee, and by the sound of it there seems to be much more risks, but it was the same situation for the two self indulgent computer geeks who wanted to download the whole internet onto their hard drive and catalogue it, which became Google. Who says architects can't create fashion, fine food, inter continental logistics modules, or financial investment strategies that actually work, and still, remain faithful to what they indulge in, this parallel universe of theirs? What's the point of calling oneself an architect, on the other hand, if all that one works on is building?

Coming back to the Parallax view, and Zizek's point that to understand and achieve something meaningful, to capture some qualities of the Real, one must be able to shift between the various parallax Views and experience the empty gap. My understanding of this shifting process will never achieve his Heideggerian depths but I consider it be a deliberate, artificial creation of something out of one's world, impossible to the Darwinian logic, but something that does not quite belong to another world either (a self justified circle). Due to its inherent fragility it can be easily negated and denied (e.g. you hate it), but in its brief moment of existence, it creates a unique sense of placelessness (in my case, the over crowded inferno) that gives us an insight into the impossibility of its fairy-tale quality; and from this negated impossibility (the inevitable fallacy of my tower), one is able to contemplate on its Other, i.e. the It. (negation of negation). To view one's own reflection, we use not bones and skin in the image of ourselves but rather something metallic with a smooth surface; sorry for the clumsy metaphor.

At the end I have been talking about my design method without really talking about it. But I think the point is made. As kids we like things that are unreal: marry-go-around, see saw, slides, monkey bars, and sand castle. Don't you just wonder what architecture can be more stupid and pointless, yet more radical and unique, than a ladder that directly leads to a slide, or a circular steel plate that transport you to exactly the same spot over and over again? But it's all about the existentialist process, isn't it?

m.