fvuilleumier’s favorites
Life is out of balance. There are two worlds competing, demanding our attention: the constructed world of highly urbanized environments stacked with layer upon layer of technology. And then there is the environment, the natural unbuilt world that we fetishize.
We do not live with nature any longer; we live above it, separated from it. The fetishized nature has become only a resource to keep this artificial or new nature alive. The intention with this manifesto is to express the relationship between this fetishized nature and the new artificial nature. Another focus of the work is how this attitude affects the migration of people from rural environments to highly urbanized cities, this movement (or layering) is from the outside in.
The artificial world of our making tries to refer back to the natural world. But it has become increasingly difficult to re-establish that connection. Layer upon layer of commodities, technologies and reproductions have made the original so far out of reach that we can only long for it. Copy upon copy upon copy layered onto the original has made the original unreachable. It has obliterated our relationship we have with the original, nature itself.
The early avant-garde dreamed of a modernity that would pull humanity out of the mess that was brought upon it by the World Wars of the early 20th century and their consequent destruction of land, countries and people. They were, in essence, seeking the original.
We are animate objects, moving in time. And because of this, we have the ability to view, interact, discover. This is its space, its mystery, and hence, its attraction. Space is free; it stimulates the viewer to insert their own meaning, their own value. Meaning comes exclusively from the beholder, the viewer. Architecture’s role is to provoke, to raise questions that engage the culture, not offer predetermined meanings. Meaning should be gleaned from these encounters. It is experiential. Thus, the encounter, the experience is my interest, not the meaning. Providing cultural meaning should never be the sole purpose for architecture. If distilled to this, architecture will simply become a vehicle for propaganda, advertising and sociopolitical messages.
The native, land-based networks of emerging cultures, such as those that exist in Latin America, provide the framework for how these encounters may be provoked. These native cultures express themselves through hard work and tradition. They represent human-scale endeavors expressed through craftsmanship, spiritual worship, labor and other small-scale creative expressions. At the same time, they are at odds with the pace of modern society, a representation of fetishized nature. Understanding this schism provides a unique testing ground where multiple experiential outcomes may be sculpted.
These potential trajectories and cultures are essentially about contrasting ways of life, specifically, how the layers of mechanization and technology and the growth of mega-cities have negatively affected small-scale cultures.
Images from this research point to a certain lethargy affecting Mexico City dwellers. Yes, they could be the same faces we see in the smaller village. But their faces seem numbed; their eyes reflect caution and uncertainty.
And yet “It's an impression, an examination of how life is changing.” That's all it is. There is good and there is bad. What we sought to capture is our unanimity as a global culture. Most of us tend to forget about this, caught up as we are in our separate trajectories, a fascination with blending these different existences together. To be certain, it is a record of diversity and transformation of cultures dying and prospering, of industry existing for its own sake and the fruits of individual labor, presented as an integrated human.
We do not live with nature any longer; we live above it, separated from it. The fetishized nature has become only a resource to keep this artificial or new nature alive. The intention with this manifesto is to express the relationship between this fetishized nature and the new artificial nature. Another focus of the work is how this attitude affects the migration of people from rural environments to highly urbanized cities, this movement (or layering) is from the outside in.
The artificial world of our making tries to refer back to the natural world. But it has become increasingly difficult to re-establish that connection. Layer upon layer of commodities, technologies and reproductions have made the original so far out of reach that we can only long for it. Copy upon copy upon copy layered onto the original has made the original unreachable. It has obliterated our relationship we have with the original, nature itself.
The early avant-garde dreamed of a modernity that would pull humanity out of the mess that was brought upon it by the World Wars of the early 20th century and their consequent destruction of land, countries and people. They were, in essence, seeking the original.
We are animate objects, moving in time. And because of this, we have the ability to view, interact, discover. This is its space, its mystery, and hence, its attraction. Space is free; it stimulates the viewer to insert their own meaning, their own value. Meaning comes exclusively from the beholder, the viewer. Architecture’s role is to provoke, to raise questions that engage the culture, not offer predetermined meanings. Meaning should be gleaned from these encounters. It is experiential. Thus, the encounter, the experience is my interest, not the meaning. Providing cultural meaning should never be the sole purpose for architecture. If distilled to this, architecture will simply become a vehicle for propaganda, advertising and sociopolitical messages.
The native, land-based networks of emerging cultures, such as those that exist in Latin America, provide the framework for how these encounters may be provoked. These native cultures express themselves through hard work and tradition. They represent human-scale endeavors expressed through craftsmanship, spiritual worship, labor and other small-scale creative expressions. At the same time, they are at odds with the pace of modern society, a representation of fetishized nature. Understanding this schism provides a unique testing ground where multiple experiential outcomes may be sculpted.
These potential trajectories and cultures are essentially about contrasting ways of life, specifically, how the layers of mechanization and technology and the growth of mega-cities have negatively affected small-scale cultures.
Images from this research point to a certain lethargy affecting Mexico City dwellers. Yes, they could be the same faces we see in the smaller village. But their faces seem numbed; their eyes reflect caution and uncertainty.
And yet “It's an impression, an examination of how life is changing.” That's all it is. There is good and there is bad. What we sought to capture is our unanimity as a global culture. Most of us tend to forget about this, caught up as we are in our separate trajectories, a fascination with blending these different existences together. To be certain, it is a record of diversity and transformation of cultures dying and prospering, of industry existing for its own sake and the fruits of individual labor, presented as an integrated human.
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