NOTES: Vantage Points

The Problem: Diagram

Excerpt from 'Why Does Modernism Refuse to Die?' Session 3. Modernism and Research.pg 95

"Descriptive Programming in Contemporary Modernism" - Taeg Nishimoto, Texas A&M University

In order for the diagram to exist, there has to be more than two components involved. In architectural terminology, they are from the dialectically related components such as “inside/outside” “public/private” “service/serviced”, etc. to more articulated components such as “entrance” “living room” “waiting area” “lounge”, etc. Therefore, a diagram relies entirely on the definition of each articulated component, which are usually attributed to the spatial conditioning. These spatial terminologies are used to categorize the relative characterization of the articulated spaces. They are relative, because the articulation occurs in different degrees of clarity, as we have other terminologies such as “semi-public” or “living/dining room”, etc. The greater the degree of the articulation, the more impossible it becomes to define, as in the case of “breakfast counter (what about other meals taken at the same place)” or “relaxing area”, etc. In fact, these articulations become somewhat a combination of objects or intended activities and the ambiguous identification of space, such as “bed” “daybed” “reception” “work”, etc. plus “area” “corner” “space” “room”, etc. thus the convoluted invention of “daybed corner”, “reception space”, etc.

Living room, for example, has an inherent definition problem, especially in relationship to “family room” in the same context. “What is a living room?” creates layers of problems in the minds of our daily life. In fact, the accompanying book of “Un-private House” exhibition at Museum of Modern Art in New York, curated by Terence Riley in 1999, uses the word “living area” as well as “bedroom” and “work space”, as the standard index for the showcased different houses. We are also witnessing the symptom these days that the real estate new terminology for the living room is “great room”. Now what is that supposed to mean?

There is an additional way in which programmatic articulation works, and that is to characterize the activities involved, such as “sleeping” “eating” “working”, etc. However, these categorizations are inherently crude, since they require instantly more conditioning to become legitimate for articulation, such as “sleeping for half an hour after the lunch (napping)” or “eating breakfast by oneself”, etc. At the same time, they also involve a particular temporal dimension: “eating breakfast” for either 10 minutes or 2 hours are totally different situations to be articulated separately. That format continues until all the articulated components become quantifiably overwhelming, and there will be another dimension of generalization/categorization all over again.

INDIVIDUAL + STRANGER

Alex Van Es is a systems analyst form the town of Apeldoorn in The Netherlands, who has linked his doorbell refrigerator, toilet, alarm clock,  and cat little box to six cameras within his house. The project is then broadcasted live over the internet. The result is that 400 people a day know a lot of little things about the 25-year old programmer. For instance: At 3:26:37 p.m. on Saturday, someone rang his doorbell for 2.910156 seconds. Since 12 July, he's opened his refrigerator on 1,347 occasions, and yesterday he flushed his toilet 17 times.
(Article source: "Public Viewing of A Private Life". Jeroen Van Bergejick. 11. 16. 98. www.wired.com)


Daily life becomes an endless reflex between voyeurism and exhibitionism, however Van Es's project reminds us that the root of the word regard, meaning to look or gaze at comes from the Old French garder, that is, to guard or watch over. Through van Es's invitation to the public to observe the more intimate aspects of his domestic routines, it is possible to recognize that someone watching is not necessarily threatening. Rather, his position suggests that, in a world of isolation, having someone watching can be comforting. While it remains problematic to reconcile such an attitude with the negative connotations that are associated with Big Brother, the interactive gaze of the media has now come to represent a presence that is reassuring more so than intrusive. 


Obviously, Van Es isn't concerned about privacy. "Whenever there's a reason, I'll simply disconnect the webcams," he says.(Article source: "Public Viewing of A Private Life". Jeroen Van Bergejick. 11. 16. 98. www.wired.com)


Enjoy : http://www.icepick.com/

SURVEILLANCE

Taeg Nashimoto. Plot House No. 1, 1992, Elevation and Section


In Taeg Nishimoto's Plot House projects, the "nakedness" of the house involves both virtual and actual transparencies between the private and public parts of the world within the house. Nishimoto has used the form of a fragmented conversation, which the reader seemingly overhears, to describe an environment that intermingles the idea of scrutiny from outside with that from within:

"6. When I see the shadow of her robe hanging on the bedroom sliding door, I know she is sleeping. 

7. The bed takes up the whole room. 

8. "Bob, don't you think it's kind of embarrassing leaving the box of condoms on the glass shelf?" ,"Our bedroom walls are filled wih all sorts of junk , nobody will even notice" "

(Taeg Nishimmoto, "Just What Is It That Makes Today's House So Different, So Appealing?-Now," unpulbished proect description 1991)

SHARED LIVING SYSTEMS . An Ecosystem Report

SITE SELECTION

negotiating boundaries : 

XL_The Street_ Joining Urban Fabric

M_The Connection_ Between Neighbours

XS_The Room_Between You and Me

east galt, cambridge, ontario

BUILDING

enclosed > single family house + local commercial/church/recreation

ADD-ON

porches + extensions + trailers + garages

ACCESS

physical + visual > car + pedestrian

TERRITORY

marking boundary >

human landscape + intervention

MX Review : In Parts

* adapted from "Negotiate My Boundary!"

* adapted from "Negotiate My Boundary!"

* adapted from "Negotiate My Boundary!"

* adapted from "Negotiate My Boundary!"

* adapted from "Negotiate My Boundary!"

SOURCE: Ramtv, Aljosa Dekleva,Manuela Gatto, Tina Gregoric,Robert Sedlak,Vasili Stroumpakos. "Negotiate My Boundary!". Birkhäuser Architecture; 2nd edition (May 16, 2006)

WAYS OF LIVING

SPATIAL SUSPENSE

Aldo van Eyck proposed that architects plan buildings and cities of "labyrinthine clarity" substituting a strict hierarchy of spaces with a more multifarious order. Labyrinthine clarity would thus grant the individual user of the building or city a relative freedom of choice in the use and discovery of its spaces and places.

It was an approach exemplified in the Kröller-Müller Sculpture Garden...

SETTING UP SOCIAL INFRASTRUCTURE

estudio teddy cruz:
living rooms at the border and senior gardens

Living Rooms at the Border and Senior Gardens are two small housing projects that emerge from the micro-policy and serve as catalysts to anticipate San Diego's needed densities and mixed-uses, while becoming a political instrument to enable Casa Familiar to further transform existing rigid zoning regulation for the border city of San Ysidro.

The informal negotiation of boundaries and spaces typical of this neighborhood become the basis for incremental design solutions that have a stimulating effect on the urban fabric.  In a small parcel where existing zoning allows only three units of housing, this project proposes, through negotiated density bonuses and by sharing kitchens, twelve affordable housing units, the adaptive re-use of an existing 1927 church on the site as a community center, offices for the non-profit in the church's new attic, and a community garden that serves as social armature to support this community's non-conforming micro-economies and improvisational public events.  Connected to the garden and the church, this armature is composed of a series of open-air rooms that contain electricity, serving as site for a variety of neighborhood activities.  The ambiguity of these spaces takes on a different meaning as they are inscribed with social program and community organization managed by Casa Familiar.  The pairing of ambiguity and specificity is the essence of this project.

In Living Rooms at the Border, the tactical interweaving of dwelling units and social service infrastructure transforms the small parcel into a system that can anticipate, organize, and promote social encounter.  Furthermore, Casa Familiar injects micro-economic tactics such as time banking through sweat equity to produce alternative modes of affordability (barter housing units, exchange of rent for social service, etc.).  In a place where current regulation allows only one use, we propose five different uses that support one another, suggesting a model of social sustainability for the neighborhood, one that conveys density not as bulk but as social choreography and neighborhood collaboration.

Senior Gardens is another project inspired by Casa Familiar's distinctive cultural values and attitudes toward domestic and public space.  Focused on bringing two generations together, the central elements of the program are affordable housing for seniors and grandchildren (a form of co-habitation common in this area of the city) and daycare facilities for children with working parents.  The program has been distilled into a system of layers in which private and public spaces are interwoven with the topography of the site.  The design is considered to be prototypical, another provocative instrument through which Casa Familiar hopes to redefine setback, land-use, and density requirements.


direct source : http://www.world-architects.com/index.php?seite=ca_profile_architekten_detail_us&system_id=14396