Embed Size (px)
DESCRIPTION
Guilt has been effectively used to control and manipulate the masses. But it can also be the start of a change for the better: awareness, concern, action. Engagement and guilt are never far apart. Engagement is sublimated guilt. We can build on guilt, but can we build with guilt? Is guilt a material to design with?
Citation preview
To beyond or not to be Gu
ilt
yl
an
d
sc
ap
esArchis 2012 #1
Per issue € 19.50 (nl, b, d, e, P) Volume is a project by Archis + AMO + C-lab + Unknown Fields division …
Kate daviesliam YoungTim Mortonbrendan CormierJohn GollingsPeter SwinnenMichelle KasprzakVincent van VelsenKris Verdonckneil berrettYan ludavid MaiselWill Wilesnele VosMichael brennerTokyo HackerspaceMaarten Vanden eyndeGreg burtonbrandon Mosleyedward burtynskyMichael Madsenbas PrincenGarth lenzMario PetrucciCornelia Hesse-HoneggerAram MooradianWilliam l. FoxMake it Right FoundationKelly nelson doranProteiOliviu lugojan-GhenciuGuy Tillim Susan berger51n4enoero WolffJonathan GalesCaptains of Industrynicole KoltickYou Are the CityRegina Peldszusbryan AllenIlkka Halso
Volum
e 31G
uilty landscapes | spring 2012
V31_omslag_FINAL.indd 1 23/04/12 18:32
2
Vol
um
e 3
1
3CO
NS
TR
UC
TIV
E G
UIL
TA
rjen
Oos
term
an
‘Oftenwespeaksoarrogantlyaboutthosethatservedtheenemy.Right,butwhatdowethinkofthepinesandfirsthatsubmittedthemselvesfullyandstillsubmittoanyenemywhosoever.Lookattheimageswheretheenemyisbusy:thetrees,theystandtherelaughinginthebackground.Andnotonlypinesandfirs,theothertreesaswell.
Shouldn’tsomethingbesaidaboutthis?
I’dsayso,becausesometimestheyarestillthere,thetrees,theforest‘sedgeandthetrees,thesameplacetheywereatthattime;donotthinkthey’vemovedon,they’restillstandingtherelikeindifferenteyewitnesses.Iobservethem,Ilookatthem,andsomethingfrightfuloccurs:theyarebeautiful,Ithinkthembeautiful[...]Thebeautyofsiteswheretheenemywas,wheretheenemywaslocated,wheretheenemyhousedandravaged,wheretheenemyexercisedterror,wheretracesoftheenemy’sterrorarestilltobefound.Rightthere.Beautyshouldbeashamed.’
Armando,19881
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 2 24/04/12 17:01
2 3
Vol
um
e 3
1ofinformationhasincreasedexponentiallywithindecades.Andthereissomuchmoreknowledgeontheeffectsofwhateverwedo.Doesthisimplywe’remoreguiltytoo?Itlookstobeso.ItatleastsupportstheideathatthehumanspeciesbyexistingatallisjeopardizingnatureandtheEarthatlarge:soguiltybydefinition.Notborninnocent,butbornguilty.
Thereisanotheraspecttoit.Ifconviction,deter-mination,andbeliefproduceguiltascollateraldamage,thesedaystheabsenceofconviction,determination,andbelief,leaveuswithonlyguilt.Aslongasideologyruled,inflictedpainordestructionwassupposedtobetheother’sproblem,hisorherownfault.Nowweknowthatwe’reallinittogether,blamingtheotherfortheconsequencesofone’sactionsisnolongerproductiveandtosilenceandbypassone’sguiltyfeelingsforthesakeofthegoodcauseisnolongeranoption.
Guilthasbeeneffectivelyusedtocontrolandmanipulatethemasses.Butitcanalsobethestartofachangeforthebetter:awareness,concern,action.Engagementandguiltareneverfarapart.Engagementissublimatedguilt.Sowecanuseguilttoimproveandtransform.Wecanbuildonguilt(interestingly‘guilt’and‘debt’arethesamewordinDutch:schuld),butcanwebuildwithguilt?Isguiltamaterialwecandesignwith?LastyearVolume,incollaborationwithPremsela,exploredtrustasagoalandatool.We’llcontinuetodoso,butherewewouldliketoproposeguiltasamaterialtoworkwith.Happinessisbeyondthearchitect’scapacities,buttrustandguiltmightnot.
1 Armando,Destraatenhetstruikgewas[StreetandScrub]
(Amsterdam:DeBezigeBij,1988),pp.245-247[transl.AO].
2. BasHaring,Plasticpanda’s[PlasticPandas](Amsterdam:
Nijgh&vanDitmar,2011).
For this issue of Volume we’re indebted to Liam Young and Kate Davies and their Unknown Fields Division program, and to the Architectural Association for host ing this in their AA Visiting School program. And to all the participants in last summer’s field trip to the former USSR exclusion zones in the Ukraine and Kazakhstan.
‘Guiltylandscape’isanotionborrowedfromtheDutchpainter,sculptor,writer,andmusicianArmando,whowroteaboutsuchlandscapesmorethanonce.LivinginAmersfoortbefore,during,andaftertheSecondWorldWar,closetoaconcentrationcampsituatedinthewoods,hewasveryawarethattheinnocentforestofhisyouthhadwitnessedthehorrorsofwarandtheHolocaust.Asthequoteindicates,theexperienceofthisplace(andofsuchplaces)iscomplex;thebeautyofthesiteisintensifiedbytheknowledgeofwhathappened.Natureasaplaceofretreatandrelaxation,experienceofbeautyandpeace,iscomplicatedbymemoryandknowledge.Theresultingaestheticexperienceproducesfeelingsofguilt;oneshouldn’tallowoneselftobeaestheticallymovedbysuchscenes,itdoesn’tseemright.
Thiscapturesthefirstimpressionofmostoftheguiltylandscapesincludedinthisissue:shockinglybeautiful.Mostofthemnotrelatedtowarfare,buttoexploitation.Sometimeswithknownconsequences,sometimeswithunpredictedones,sometimeswithveryvisibleimplications,sometimeswithoutperceptualtraces,butmostlytheresultoftheapplicationoftechnology.
Whatstartedasanexplorationoflarge-scalehumanimpactonnaturesoonbecameresearchintothemodalitiesofguilt.Therearetwoassumptionsunder-pinningthisissueofVolume:
1. Globally,we’rerunningoutofplacestostartanew.Thehabittodumportodestructandleaveittonatureto‘deal’withtheresultingsituationisnolongertenable.We’resimplywithtoomanysoulsonplanetEarth.
2. Guiltisaproductiveemotion.Likepain–anearlywarningsystemalertingtothedestructiveimpactonthebodyorinternaldisturbances–guiltcanbethoughtofasawarningsystemandtriggerbehaviortoreducetheimpact,toprevent(further)spread,andtoundotheeffectsofadisturbance.
Guiltcanbethoughtofasoneofthemechanismstorestoreandmaintainbalance–maintainingtoo,sincethereisalsoaformofpre-emptiveguilt.LikeMarcelDuchamps’snowshoveltitled‘InAdvanceoftheBrokenArm’,thereareguiltyfeelingspreventingonefromactingnegatively.Butmostlyguiltisaboutsomethingnegativethatcannotbeundone.Hiding,restoring,andcompen-satingarethenthemostusedstrategiestoreducethestresslevelsconnectedtoguiltyfeelings.Rarer,butusedtomuchgreatereffectisthestrategyofinterpretingthenegativeelementasneutral,orevenpositive.Takebiodiversity.Itiscommonunderstandingthatmorebio-diversityisbetterthanless–andthattheextinctionofaspeciesistragicandproblematic.Sowe’reguiltywhenwehearofyetanotherfishormammalbecomingextinct.InhisbookPlastic Pandas,philosopherBasHaringex-plorestheoptionthatlessbiodiversityisnotsuchabigdeal.2Apity,maybe,butnothingdramatic.Atleastnotsomethingwecan’tdealwith.Interesting.Inonemoveweareliberatedfromourguiltyfeelings.Wecanenjoyagainwhatwe’redoing,behappyandrelaxedandnotchangeatallourbehaviortowards,orimpactonthisworld’snature.
Thisclearlyshowshowinfluentialandpotentguiltasabehavior-correctingmechanismis.
Knowledgeisatthecoreofguilt.Withoutknowingandawarenessthereisnoguilt.Thisseemstosuggestthatweliveinguiltiertimesthanever.Thegenerallevel
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 3 24/04/12 17:01
14 15
Vol
um
e 3
1 Co
mm
od
ify
Str
ateg
y:
Co
mm
odif
y
Pro
ject
: N
atu
rale
(P
hot
o S
erie
s)
Au
tho
r:
ilkka
Hal
so
It is
typ
ical
for
hum
an b
eing
s to
mou
ld n
atur
e, ju
stif
ying
th
eir
acti
ons
by t
heir
aes
thet
ic a
nd
econ
omic
asp
irat
ions
. But
nat
ure
cann
ot e
ndur
e ev
eryt
hing
.
In H
also
’s p
hoto
grap
hs, c
ontr
ol o
ver
natu
re h
as a
cqui
red
a co
ncre
te f
orm
. The
ele
men
ts o
f na
ture
have
bee
n re
thou
ght
and
have
, for
logi
stic
al p
urpo
ses,
bee
n pa
cked
into
mod
ules
tha
t ar
e ea
sier
to h
andl
e. T
he w
hole
of
natu
re is
sto
red
in a
gig
anti
c w
areh
ouse
com
plex
and
the
mos
t co
mm
on
type
s of
nat
ure
from
soi
l and
flor
a to
fau
na c
an b
e ea
sily
ass
embl
ed in
to w
orki
ng e
cosy
stem
s.
Wha
t is
hap
peni
ng?
Has
nat
ure
been
eva
cuat
ed t
o aw
ait
bett
er t
imes
, or
has
it b
een
sim
plifi
ed
into
mer
chan
dis
e an
d ab
surd
tab
leau
x? W
hen
Hal
so is
look
ing
into
the
fut
ure
she
does
n’t
like
wha
t sh
e se
es.
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 15 24/04/12 16:30
16
Vol
um
e 3
1
17
Isn’t it a pity now, isn’t it a shame How we break each other’s hearts and cause each other painHow we take each other’s love, without thinking anymoreForgetting to give back, isn’t it a pityGeorge Harrison1
In this essay, I shall be distinguishing between guilt and shame. I take guilt to be the sense that one has done something wrong, the ‘call of conscience’ that reminds me of my out-of-joint, uncanny existence. I take shame, on the other hand, to be the sense that I am something wrong, that there is something disgusting that is an irreducible part of me. I am not yet convinced that guilt is ecologically useful. But if forced to choose between guilt and shame, I would pick guilt, even though this would make me unpopular with some postmodern philosophers. Shame is the go-to affect in the contemporary academy, a sign of its increasing removal from the things of this world.2 Anyone who has recently experienced shame will assure that it drove her to murderous or suicidal thoughts. Sure, it’s a way to realize you are caught in the gaze of the other, just as a bullet embedded in your chest is a way to realize that there is more to life than what you make of it. Shame says ‘I am wrong’, and humans have had quite enough of this kind of exceptionalism – humans for a certain kind of ecological philosopher are a unique or uniquely attuned virus, a stain that needs to be wiped out. The so-called critique of anthropocentrism thus runs along strictly anthropocentric rail tracks towards annihilation of the race.
Guilt, however, proclaims ‘I have done something wrong,’ and thus it brings up the possibility of redress. It is not surprising that some ecological thinkers value shame, since it is possible to mistake ecological guilt for shame. Why? The particular kind of guilt with which ecological awareness is associated strongly resembles the realiza tion at the heart of a noir detective story: the detective himself is the guilty party. The person who is looking is the one who is ultimately seen. The experience of having-been-seen is, without doubt the phenomenological es-sence of shame. Derrida experiences a moment of shame when he feels seen by his cat, for this reason.3 In the case of noir, however, it is important not to collapse the two levels of seeker and seen, the one who investigates and the one who is investigated, even when they are exactly the same person: Philip K. Dick’s A Scanner Darkly gives a particularly tightly looped rendition of this theme.4 The tension in guilt depends precisely on this unbreach-able ontological cut between being seen and seeing.
It is, however, quite clear even from this very cur-sory analysis that shame is more primal than guilt – hence the emergence of shame cultures before guilt cultures. Shame as it were is the phenomenological reduction of guilt, what guilt contains, like a chocolate wrapped in paper. Shame is the primordial fact of being-held-by some other entity, enclosed in it or held in its force field, gazed at. A radical passivity, a having-been-given to something. There thus arises the potent danger that in exploring ecological guilt, we will be caught in shame, since shame is more primal and thus more powerful than the guilt that wraps it, makes it manageable and work-able. A shame culture, for instance, doesn’t do well with rape: a raped woman is liable to be killed for besmirching the family’s honor. If Earth has been raped by humans – to use a common image – does this not imply that the G
uil
t, S
HA
me
, SA
dN
eS
S:
t
uN
iNG
to
Co
ex
iSt
eN
Ce
Tim
othy
Mor
ton
Gu
ilt, s
ham
e an
d s
adn
ess
as n
otio
ns
are
not
on
ly in
terr
elat
ed, t
her
e
is a
lso
str
uct
ure
an
d h
iera
rch
y in
volv
ed. t
im m
ort
on
su
gg
ests
th
at t
his
co
uld
be
mad
e p
rod
uct
ive
to c
on
fron
t th
e b
ig c
hal
len
ges
of
this
pla
net
.
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 16 24/04/12 16:30
16 17
Vol
um
e 3
1the social hierarchy by putting the pity-er higher than the pity-ee.
To get to this liquid center we must traverse a region of solidity that is like the sugar crystal coating that keeps the liquid center in place in a Swiss chocolate. This region is known as melancholy, depression. So the sequence goes:
Guilt >> Shame >> Melancholy >> Sadness
Where >> represents ‘reduces to’. Reduction it simply meansas the bracketing off of ‘noise’ caused by a certain conceptualization of subject–object relations. The phenomenological reduction is precisely this: I look directly at the attitude with which I hold a thought, strip-ping from my attention the ‘object’ about which I am thinking. I study the weather in my mind as I think, rather than the view ‘outside’ it. This seems counter-intuitive from an ecological philosophical point of view, which is precisely why I suggest it. There is a tendency to look away from the mind that is experiencing the tree, the cloud, the polluted lake, the radiation. Shouldn’t I be ashamed of myself even for suggesting that we look away from the cloud, the fallout, the mutagenic insect? Pre-cisely – normative environmentalism wants me to feel guilty or ashamed, and in doing so it scratches at the itch of human being, an itch that is already rubbed raw by the very modernity that created the current ecological emergency. Instead of scratching the itch, I suggest we isolate and study the itch. What is it? Why scratch it? I suggest we look at the mind that is looking at the tree – away from the ‘object’ and back towards the ‘subject’. We will discover that this seemingly perverse intro-spection bears fruit.
Let us proceed, then, with the phenomenological reduction of ecological feeling. We shall descend from guilt to shame, then below shame to what is here called ‘sadness’. Thus when I strip from the feeling of guilt my relation to some abstract voice of conscience, I find myself confronted by the nakedness of shame. Likewise when I strip from shame the gaze of another who fixes me with the shaming look, I find sadness. With this sad-ness it appears as if we have arrived at an attunement that is less conditioned by a conceptual relation to another. Sadness is based on the unconditional, insofar as it is an attunement based on the fact that something cannot be grasped by our ego. In other words, sadness is close to things that are not-me, that are not conditioned by me such as opinions and thoughts and habitual patterns. Sadness just is the attunement to the ungraspability of a thing. For this reason one Buddhist scholar calls it “the genuine heart of sadness,” his translation of the Sanskrit bodhicitta (awakened heart, enlightened mind).7 Sad ness is the footprint of coexistence in my inner space. It is unconditional, since it lacks an object – it is the lacking of an object, the sense that no object can be known or held fully.
Sadness is thus predicated on richness, but a strange richness that can’t be possessed entirely: “Noth ing of him that doth fade, / But doth suffer a sea change / Into something rich and strange.”8 Ecological coexistence requires such sea changes. Because things exist, they touch me: ‘I am touched’, a term that reso-nates between a physical and an aesthetic event. Quite deliberately: the physical proximity of a thing is aes-thetic, but this aesthetic dimension is causal, insofar as the proximate thing affects me, yet this causality is not
logical shame culture solution would be to annihilate Earth altogether? Or perhaps to annihilate ourselves, to erase the possibility that we humans could witness our rape? Shame is attractive to scholars because it guarantees the existence of the social, as if it needed guaranteeing – but at what cost?
There is a problem that is the inverse of this problem of shame, having to do with the fact that as the wrapping of shame, guilt doesn’t know what to do with shame except to contain it. Thus in guilt cultures such as Protestantism there arise all kinds of endlessly repeated compulsive rituals, which ward off the shameful essence by wrapping and re-wrapping it over and over again. How can we know, how can we prove adequately, that we have successfully atoned for our guilt? Doesn’t guilt imply a potentially infinite series of compensations, and wouldn’t this series be the very opposite of a biologically or eco-logically homoeostatic feedback loop – in other words, isn’t guilt a positive feedback loop of the most dangerous sort, that could multiply infinitely, so that the more guilty I feel, the more I must atone, which makes me feel more guilty, and so on? Isn’t guilt in this sense an undead specter that haunts my biological being and drives me on and on to do ever more ridiculous feats to satisfy its irrational lust? The irony of ironies would be to destroy the planet in the very process of trying to atone for our guilt. Stranger things have happened.
Rather than trying to escape shame by moving outwards from shame towards guilt, perhaps it would be better to tunnel into shame, to try to reduce the reduction, as it were, to get inside the chocolate and see if there was a liquid center that was not subject to the violence of shame and guilt. Wrapping shame in guilt and dispos ing of it by shelving it is an endless task. Staying with shame is intrinsically destructive, either of self or of other – and murder–suicide is also a popular combination. Trying to get back ‘behind’ guilt is rather like trying to fold a piece of paper more than five or six times – it is possible but very difficult; immense pressures are involved. Thinking tends to break down and philosophy begins to look use-less. We encounter what esoteric practitioners such as yogis and mystics encounter, because we are operating at an ontological depth below the normal seen–seer boundary. So what we find in there, down there, must be regarded with some skepticism and treated as a spec-ulative discovery, like realizing that the Earth is not the center of the universe: it’s true, but everything in my ontically given experience (sunrise, the revolution of the stars) tells me otherwise.
Shame is perhaps the right track: ‘humiliation’ after all means being brought down to earth. Darwin is one in a series of great humiliators of the human, the being who arose from the humus, from dust and spittle. Some contemporary ecological philosophers think so, such as William Jordan.5
There is a liquid center inside shame: it is a liquid center of sadness. This liquid center is present in phrases such as ‘What a shame’, which don’t seek to pin the tail of shame on the donkey of the addressee. Rather such phrases express something more like disappointment and loss: the loss George Harrison gets at in ‘Isn’t It a Pity’. This isn’t shame, if shame means the intense judgment of others, the registration in my body of the social bond, and murderous–suicidal feelings. Nor is it pity, if by that term we mean what Blake means when he writes “Pity would be no more, / If we did not make somebody poor” (‘The Human Abstract’).6 Blake is saying that pity sus tains
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 17 24/04/12 16:30
18
Vol
um
e 31
19
incompletion, this fragility of a thing. It is thus a highly realistic attunement in a biosphere of necessarily vulner-able beings. It is almost shameful: “It must feel very awk-ward to have those soft, lumpy growths on your head.” But one does not stop there. Shame is only retroactive in relation to the more primordial sadness, the feeling of vulnerability and the courage to face it. To be ashamed is to have been open to shame, which is to be tender and sad, that is, open to the coexistence of other beings. Thus “you no longer need to feel shy or embarrassed about being gentle.” Shame is nowhere near adequate to get humans through imagining the 24,100 year time span appropriate to plutonium 239, or the 100,000 year time span of global warming. What is required is the ‘rawness’ that Trungpa describes here.
Guilt is to shame as the sugar coating is to a choc-olate. But sadness is to shame as the liquid center is to the chocolate. If we want to progress ecologically, for instance if we want to have more people accepting the reality of global warming, then we need to walk them through an experience that is phenomenologically equiv-alent to accepting global warming, rather than bludg eon-ing them with facts or trying to ‘guilt them out’ or shame them, which will only breed denial. The best way to do this is to make contact with the liquid center of sadness, often frozen into melancholy, at the core of sentient be ing. This liquid core is the trace of coexistence, shorn of coexistents, unconditional, strange, palpable yet with-drawn, uncanny, sad. That way, no bludgeoning is required: we will have poured people into the right psychic space to accept the very large-scale, long-term issues that beset this planet.
1 George Harrison, ‘Isn’t It a Pity’ All Things Must Pass (Apple, 1970).
I would like to thank Barbara Smith for sparking this essay’s line
of thinking for me in 2006.
2 See for instance: Jacques Derrida, The Animal that Therefore
I Am, ed. Marie-Louise Mallet, tr. David Wills (New York: Fordham
University Press, 2008); Phil Hutchinson, Shame and Philosophy:
An Investigation in the Philosophy of Emotions and Ethics
(New York: Palgrave, 2008), 123–155.
3 Derrida, The Animal that Therefore I Am, 1–11.
4 Philip K. Dick, A Scanner Darkly (New York: Houghton Mifflin
Harcourt, 2011).
5 William Jordan, The Sunflower Forest: Ecological Community
and the New Communion with Nature (Berkeley: University of
California Press, 2003), 46–53.
6 William Blake, The Complete Poetry and Prose of William Blake,
ed. David V. Erdman (New York: Doubleday, 1988).
7 Chögyam Trungpa, Shambhala: The Sacred Path of the Warrior
(Boston: Shambhala, 1984), 42–46.
8 William Shakespeare, The Tempest 1.2, ed. Jonathan Bate and
Eric Rasmussen (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 2008), 37.
9 Tony Kushner, Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National
Themes (New York: Theatre Communications Group, 2003), 167.
10 Trungpa, Shambhala, 49.
me chanical, but rather a matter of appearance, the aes-thetic. There are other beings, and they withdraw from me: the more I handle them, the less I am sure of them, the more richness they reveal. Anyone with a long-term partner can attest to that – your boyfriend or girlfriend is one of the weirdest people you know. Knowledge makes things more uncanny, because it discloses the dark futurality of a thing, its unknown unknowable qualities.
Sadness in this sense is a resonance, full-bodied like the note of a cello or an oboe: “The oboe. The official instrument of the International Order of Travel Agents. If the duck was a song bird, it would sound like this: nasal, desolate, the call of migratory things” (Angels in America).9 The ‘full bodied’ quality of an oboe is not a testimony to a metaphysics of presence, but to a weird physicality that withdraws from access. The physical, ‘nasal’ sound tells of the body, of something that is there, yet not there, lost in translation, a migrating bird – an ‘agent’ that ‘travels’. The migratory thing is there yet not for long, it is not here yet it will arrive. It exists – yet it is not directly, ‘ontically’ given to me. It is not nothing – that would be easier; it does not reside in an inaccessible beyond – I can hear it. The resonance of coexistence. Melancholia, which psychoanalysis thinks as the default mode of sentience as such, is only the frozen phase state of this sadness, the rigid print of another in our inner space. Melancholy is an indexical sign, like a footprint, a sign that is a part of what made it: a foot, the call of a bird. Sadness itself is a withdrawn thing, a liquid core. The raw tenderness of sadness resembles what it re-sounds to, the departing of things, which is predicated on the physical incompletion of being. For a thing to exist, it must be fragile, in a weird Aristotelian application of Gödel’s Incompleteness Theorem to physical things. Chögyam Trungpa, thinker of ‘the genuine heart of sad-ness’, describes the attunement of what he calls a “war-rior”, a contemplative committed to “living in the chal-lenge” of existence, which is necessarily coexistence:
The birth of the warrior is like the first growth of a reindeer’s horns. At first, the horns are very soft and almost rubbery, and they have little hairs growing on them. They are not yet horns, as such: they are just sloppy growths with blood inside. Then, as the reindeer ages, the horns grow stronger, developing four points or ten points or even forty points. Fearlessness, at the beginning, is like those rubbery horns. They look like horns, but you can’t quite fight with them. When a reindeer first grows its horns, it doesn’t know what to use them for. It must feel very awkward to have those soft, lumpy growths on your head. But then the reindeer begins to realize that it should have horns … when a human being first gives birth to the tender heart of warriorship, he or she may feel extremely awkward or uncertain about how to relate to this kind of fearlessness. But then, as you experience this sadness more and more, you realize that human be-ings should be tender and open. So you no longer need to feel shy or embarrassed about being gentle. In fact, your softness begins to become passionate. You would like to extend yourself to others and communicate with them.10
Notice how Trungpa describes something asso ci-ated with sexual display, from a technical, Darwinian point of view – the growth of horns – to evoke the genuine heart of sadness. Sexual display is pure expenditure, pure gift, a sub-Kantian aesthetic of purposelessness. There are aspects of the physical being of life forms that are pointless. Sadness likewise has no object, no ‘point’. The feeling of ‘Isn’t it a pity’ is attuned to this structural
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 18 24/04/12 16:30
88 89
Vo
lum
e 31 Co
ll
eC
t
an
d S
ha
re
Str
ateg
y:
Col
lect
an
d S
har
e
Pro
ject
: m
easu
rin
g r
adia
tion
Aro
un
d f
uku
shim
a
Au
thor
: to
kyo
Hac
kers
pac
e an
d S
afec
ast
loca
tio
n:
Jap
an
Saf
ecas
t is
a g
lob
al s
enso
r ne
twor
k fo
r co
llect
ing
and
sha
ring
rad
iati
on m
easu
rem
ents
to e
mpo
wer
peo
ple
wit
h d
ata
abou
t th
eir
envi
ronm
ents
. To
help
mea
sure
rad
iati
on a
roun
d
Fuk
ushi
ma,
Tok
yo H
acke
rspa
ce d
evel
oped
a d
evic
e ca
lled
a ‘b
Gei
gie
’ – w
hich
is b
asic
ally
a g
eig
er c
ount
er p
aire
d w
ith
an
ardu
ino
and
a G
PS
mod
ule
wh
ich
gets
str
appe
d to
a c
ar
and
driv
en a
roun
d. T
he d
evic
e w
as d
rive
n ar
ound
th
e gr
eate
r F
ukus
him
a ar
ea b
y S
afec
ast
mem
ber
s an
d d
ata
was
dir
ectl
y up
load
ed t
o S
afec
ast’
s da
taba
se a
nd m
ade
avai
labl
e on
data
sh
arin
g p
latf
orm
s su
ch a
s P
achu
be.
Pho
tos:
Saf
ecas
t
Bic
ycle
mou
nte
d b
Gei
gie
gei
ger
cou
nte
r
colle
ctin
g m
obile
rad
iati
on m
easu
rem
ents
Kal
in K
ozh
uh
arov
fro
m S
afec
ast
dem
onst
rati
ng
rad
iois
oto
pe
iden
tifi
cati
on u
sin
g a
gam
ma
spec
trom
eter
.
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 89 24/04/12 16:33
90 91
Vo
lum
e 31
ex
Po
SiN
G t
He
oil
SA
Nd
SG
arth
Len
z
Gar
th l
enz
is a
ph
otog
rap
her
wh
o u
ses
his
imag
es t
o
com
mu
nic
ate
larg
er e
nvi
ron
men
tal i
ssu
es a
nd
bro
adca
st
clea
r m
essa
ges
for
ch
ang
e. H
is w
ork
on t
he
Ath
abas
ca
oil
san
ds,
in t
he
ph
oto
ser
ies
Th
e Tr
ue
Co
st o
f O
il, a
ims
at d
ocu
men
tin
g t
he
scal
e an
d s
cop
e of
en
viro
nm
enta
l tr
ansf
orm
atio
n o
ccu
rrin
g d
ue
to o
il ex
trac
tion
. As
the
titl
e su
gg
ests
, len
z as
ks t
he
view
ers
to a
sk t
hem
selv
es w
hat
co
st a
re t
hey
will
ing
to
bea
r, f
or t
hei
r oi
l con
sum
pti
on.
htt
p:/
/gar
thle
nz.
com
/
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 91 24/04/12 16:33
92
Vo
lum
e 31
93
Pho
tos:
Gar
th L
enz
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 92 24/04/12 16:33
92 93
Vo
lum
e 31
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 93 24/04/12 16:33
94
Vo
lum
e 31
95
Pho
tos:
Gar
th L
enz
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 94 24/04/12 16:33
94 95
Vo
lum
e 31
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 95 24/04/12 16:33
18491901
1908
1923
1923
1923
1929
1851
1849
1901
1901
1908
1923
1923
1923
1923
1923
1929
1849
1849
1901
1851
Aesthetics
Ethics
1850 1860 1870 1880 1890 1900 1910 1920
1849
1851
1849
1901
1901
1908
1923
1923
1923
1923
1929
"[Pugin] is not a great architect but one ofthe smallest possible or conceivablearchitects."
Eugène Viollet-le-Duc
Architecture in general
Viollet-le-Duc’s restoration practice is "a destruction out of which no remnants can be gathered: a destruction accompanied with false description of the thing destroyed."
“The technical innovations of architecturesince the Renaissance and particularlythe Industrial Revolution, had subsumedits spiritual content and sapped itsvitality.”
John RuskinVitruvius
"Vitruvius was a mediocre writer"Julien Guadet
The Rennaisance"It is this decadence that we call the Renais-sance. It is the setting sun which we mistake for dawn."
Frank Lloyd Wright
Henri van de Velde
Joseph Maria Olbrich
Loos’ hallmark Ornament and Crime indirectly attacks other practitioners for their use of decoration.
Adolf Loos
Urban PlannersRegularly criticizes the city – and its planners – for its dysfunctionality. Pollution, narrow streets, congested buildings etc.
Le Corbusier
HousingAccuses contemporary housing of ruining our health and morale.
Le Corbusier
Architects
Architects
“Engineers have been busy... architectshave been asleep.”
Le Corbusier
Le Corbusier
Martin Wagner(chief city planner of Berlin)
“Architecture today is no longer aware ofits own beginnings.”
Accuses Wagner of funnellingarchitecture commissions to hisextremist (re:Modernist) friends.
Werner Hegemann(architecture critic)
AWN Pugin
Seven Lamps of Architecture
Vers Une Architecture
Aesthetics or Ethics?Accusations can question both the ethics and the aesthetics of a practicing architect. However the lines between the two easily blur. Often an aesthetic accusation is hyperbolized to such an extant that it takes on ethical implications – at least in the eyes of the accuser. In this sense a decorative element becomes akin to a crime, using traditional iconography makes you a fascist; forcing the question: How productive is it when we con¤ate the two terms? When is an aesthetic crime an ethical crime?
AC
Cu
SiN
G A
rC
Hit
eC
tu
re
Bre
ndan
Cor
mie
r an
d V
ince
nt v
an V
else
n
Arc
hit
ectu
re h
as h
isto
rica
lly b
een
a p
rofe
ssio
n b
ased
on
wel
l-es
tab
lish
ed p
rin
cip
les,
pas
sed
dow
n
from
mas
ter
to a
pp
ren
tice
. th
ese
pri
nci
ple
s h
owev
er h
ave
bec
ome
ever
mor
e ev
asiv
e, v
olat
ile a
nd
ch
ang
ing
. eac
h s
ucc
essi
ve g
ener
atio
n c
asts
aw
ay t
he
pri
nci
ple
s of
th
eir
pre
dec
esso
rs a
nd
dec
lare
s th
eir
own
. dif
fere
nt
mov
emen
ts a
nd
sty
les
stak
e th
eir
clai
m t
o w
hat
is t
he
‘rig
ht
way
to
bu
ild’.
th
is h
as le
d t
o a
hig
hly
acc
usa
tion
al t
end
ency
wit
hin
th
e cu
ltu
re o
f ar
chit
ectu
re; y
oun
g a
rch
itec
ts
are
trai
ned
to
be
adve
rsar
ial a
nd
hav
e th
ick
skin
s. W
hat
doe
s th
is m
ean
for
gu
ilt in
th
e p
rofe
ssio
n?
if
for
ced
to
alw
ays
be
on t
he
offe
nsi
ve w
hat
roo
m is
left
for
hon
est
intr
osp
ecti
on a
nd
sel
f-ev
alua
tion
?
Arc
hit
ects
, eve
r re
ady
to a
ccu
se o
ther
s, h
ave
rare
ly c
onfe
ssed
gu
ilt o
f th
eir
own
.
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 96 24/04/12 16:33
18491901
1908
1923
1923
1923
1929
1851
1849
1901
1901
1908
1923
1923
1923
1923
1923
1929
1849
1849
1901
1851
Aesthetics
Ethics
1850 1860 1870 1880 1890 1900 1910 1920
1849
1851
1849
1901
1901
1908
1923
1923
1923
1923
1929
"[Pugin] is not a great architect but one ofthe smallest possible or conceivablearchitects."
Eugène Viollet-le-Duc
Architecture in general
Viollet-le-Duc’s restoration practice is "a destruction out of which no remnants can be gathered: a destruction accompanied with false description of the thing destroyed."
“The technical innovations of architecturesince the Renaissance and particularlythe Industrial Revolution, had subsumedits spiritual content and sapped itsvitality.”
John RuskinVitruvius
"Vitruvius was a mediocre writer"Julien Guadet
The Rennaisance"It is this decadence that we call the Renais-sance. It is the setting sun which we mistake for dawn."
Frank Lloyd Wright
Henri van de Velde
Joseph Maria Olbrich
Loos’ hallmark Ornament and Crime indirectly attacks other practitioners for their use of decoration.
Adolf Loos
Urban PlannersRegularly criticizes the city – and its planners – for its dysfunctionality. Pollution, narrow streets, congested buildings etc.
Le Corbusier
HousingAccuses contemporary housing of ruining our health and morale.
Le Corbusier
Architects
Architects
“Engineers have been busy... architectshave been asleep.”
Le Corbusier
Le Corbusier
Martin Wagner(chief city planner of Berlin)
“Architecture today is no longer aware ofits own beginnings.”
Accuses Wagner of funnellingarchitecture commissions to hisextremist (re:Modernist) friends.
Werner Hegemann(architecture critic)
AWN Pugin
Seven Lamps of Architecture
Vers Une Architecture
Aesthetics or Ethics?Accusations can question both the ethics and the aesthetics of a practicing architect. However the lines between the two easily blur. Often an aesthetic accusation is hyperbolized to such an extant that it takes on ethical implications – at least in the eyes of the accuser. In this sense a decorative element becomes akin to a crime, using traditional iconography makes you a fascist; forcing the question: How productive is it when we con¤ate the two terms? When is an aesthetic crime an ethical crime?
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 97 24/04/12 16:33
1935
1946
1931
1946 1954
1940
1946
1957
1961
1961
1981
2008
1931
1935
1932
1940
1946
1946
1955
1955
1955
1957
1961
1961
1962
1962
1965
1965
2005
2005
1990
19902012
2012
2008
2008
2008
1981
1977
1977
1968
1968
1954
1977
1932
1946
1930 1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010
1931
1935
1932
1940
1946
1946
1955
1955
1955
1957
1961
1961
1962
1962
1965
1965
2005
2005
1990
19902012
2012
2008
2008
2008
1981
1977
1968
1968
1954
Ernst May
Ernst Bloch Neue Sachlichkeit
Erich MendelsohnBruno Taut
Russian People
CIAMMichel Roux-Spitz
Frank Lloyd WrightPress
Albert SpeerNuremberg Trial
CIAMAsger Jorn
CIAMTeam X
Reyner BanhamThe Smithsons
Asger Jorn CIAM
Death and Life of Great American Cities
Team 10 Primer
Learning from Las Vegas
Ernst May's designs for his Russiancities and housing are lambastedby the Russian people.
Accused modernists of building housesthat reduced people to a 'termite'existence.
Accused of megalomania - of saying hewas the greatest architect in the world. He does not deny it.
Accuses functionalism as being ‘unbearable and senile.’ Functionalism is constructed without desire, only made for dead people.
The Doorn Manifesto critiques CIAM for itsnon-human(ist) functionality: it demands to include the human in architecture.
Accuse Banham of co-opting their ideas to serve his agenda, with his book, The New Brutalism.
The SmithsonsColin AmeryAccuses hypocrisy, for extolling virtues ofworking class street life, but in the endcreating brutal modern apartments(Robin Hood Gardens), all the whileliving themselves in a Victorian house inChelsea.
Nuove TendenzeGiancarlo de CarloAccuses the Nuove Tendenze of being formalists.
Le CorbusierJane Jacobs
Team XLe Corbusier
CIAMTheodor Adorno
“The more functionalism has lost itsfalse aesthetic character, the moreboring it has become.”
Le Corbusier’s ideas are responsible for "the great blight of dullness" and the inhumane planning process she saw all around her.
Accuses Team X of ingratitude "Onmonte sur les épauls mais on ne dit pas merci!"
“The questions of functional-ism do not coincide with those of the practical function.”
ArchigramReyner BanhamCriticizes Archigram’s work as Imagism.
Everyone ElseRob Krier"Vorwärts, Kameraden, Wir Müssen Zurück" Forwards Comrades, we must go back!
Hal Foster Icon Architects“There is now a whole ªock of decorated ducks that combine the willful monumentality of modern architecture with the faux-populist iconicity of postmodern design.”
Dutch ArchitectureRem Koolhaas“Dutch architecture is cowardice, with a straitjacket of modesty.”
MVRDVThe PressMVRDV design of towers in Korea is accused of mimicking the twin towers explosion.
Architects in ChinaDaniel Libeskind"I won't work for autocratic regimes...I think architects should take a more ethical stance": Implying an ethical dividebetween him and those who work in China.
Daniel LibeskindErik van Egeraat“Liebeskind's China boycott is a publicity stunt.”
Mies van der RoheRobert Venturi
“Lesss is a bore”
Belgian ArchitectsRenaat Braem“Belgium is the ugliest country in the world.”
Speer confesses at the Nuremberg trials that he superintended Germany’s wartime military production, masterfully coordinating industry and material and relying heavily on slave labor.
Rou-Spitz refers to "the dangerous formalism of theAvant-Garde": accusing the avant-garde of both super¬cial aesthetics and of somehow being dangerous.
AC
Cu
SiN
G A
rC
Hit
eC
tu
re
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 98 24/04/12 16:33
1935
1946
1931
1946 1954
1940
1946
1957
1961
1961
1981
2008
1931
1935
1932
1940
1946
1946
1955
1955
1955
1957
1961
1961
1962
1962
1965
1965
2005
2005
1990
19902012
2012
2008
2008
2008
1981
1977
1977
1968
1968
1954
1977
1932
1946
1930 1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010
1931
1935
1932
1940
1946
1946
1955
1955
1955
1957
1961
1961
1962
1962
1965
1965
2005
2005
1990
19902012
2012
2008
2008
2008
1981
1977
1968
1968
1954
Ernst May
Ernst Bloch Neue Sachlichkeit
Erich MendelsohnBruno Taut
Russian People
CIAMMichel Roux-Spitz
Frank Lloyd WrightPress
Albert SpeerNuremberg Trial
CIAMAsger Jorn
CIAMTeam X
Reyner BanhamThe Smithsons
Asger Jorn CIAM
Death and Life of Great American Cities
Team 10 Primer
Learning from Las Vegas
Ernst May's designs for his Russiancities and housing are lambastedby the Russian people.
Accused modernists of building housesthat reduced people to a 'termite'existence.
Accused of megalomania - of saying hewas the greatest architect in the world. He does not deny it.
Accuses functionalism as being ‘unbearable and senile.’ Functionalism is constructed without desire, only made for dead people.
The Doorn Manifesto critiques CIAM for itsnon-human(ist) functionality: it demands to include the human in architecture.
Accuse Banham of co-opting their ideas to serve his agenda, with his book, The New Brutalism.
The SmithsonsColin AmeryAccuses hypocrisy, for extolling virtues ofworking class street life, but in the endcreating brutal modern apartments(Robin Hood Gardens), all the whileliving themselves in a Victorian house inChelsea.
Nuove TendenzeGiancarlo de CarloAccuses the Nuove Tendenze of being formalists.
Le CorbusierJane Jacobs
Team XLe Corbusier
CIAMTheodor Adorno
“The more functionalism has lost itsfalse aesthetic character, the moreboring it has become.”
Le Corbusier’s ideas are responsible for "the great blight of dullness" and the inhumane planning process she saw all around her.
Accuses Team X of ingratitude "Onmonte sur les épauls mais on ne dit pas merci!"
“The questions of functional-ism do not coincide with those of the practical function.”
ArchigramReyner BanhamCriticizes Archigram’s work as Imagism.
Everyone ElseRob Krier"Vorwärts, Kameraden, Wir Müssen Zurück" Forwards Comrades, we must go back!
Hal Foster Icon Architects“There is now a whole ªock of decorated ducks that combine the willful monumentality of modern architecture with the faux-populist iconicity of postmodern design.”
Dutch ArchitectureRem Koolhaas“Dutch architecture is cowardice, with a straitjacket of modesty.”
MVRDVThe PressMVRDV design of towers in Korea is accused of mimicking the twin towers explosion.
Architects in ChinaDaniel Libeskind"I won't work for autocratic regimes...I think architects should take a more ethical stance": Implying an ethical dividebetween him and those who work in China.
Daniel LibeskindErik van Egeraat“Liebeskind's China boycott is a publicity stunt.”
Mies van der RoheRobert Venturi
“Lesss is a bore”
Belgian ArchitectsRenaat Braem“Belgium is the ugliest country in the world.”
Speer confesses at the Nuremberg trials that he superintended Germany’s wartime military production, masterfully coordinating industry and material and relying heavily on slave labor.
Rou-Spitz refers to "the dangerous formalism of theAvant-Garde": accusing the avant-garde of both super¬cial aesthetics and of somehow being dangerous.
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 99 24/04/12 16:33
130 131
Vo
lum
e 31
mA
rt
yr
St
re
et
Pho
togr
aphi
c w
ork
of G
uy T
illim
and
Sus
an B
erge
r
lab
elin
g a
mar
tyr
is, i
n a
way
, an
exp
ress
ion
of
colle
ctiv
e g
uilt
. m
arty
rs a
re a
sim
ult
aneo
us
rem
ind
er o
f th
e h
opes
an
d id
eals
th
at a
n in
div
idu
al s
tood
for
, an
d a
lso
the
opp
ress
ive
nat
ure
of
hu
man
kin
d t
o sm
oth
er t
hos
e id
eals
. mem
oria
lizin
g m
arty
rs
then
is a
way
of
aton
ing
for
th
is c
olle
ctiv
e g
uilt
an
d t
o g
ive
re
new
ed h
op
e th
at t
he
dre
ams
of t
he
falle
n c
an s
om
ehow
b
e re
aliz
ed.
A p
opu
lar
way
of
mem
oria
lizin
g m
arty
r is
to
nam
e st
reet
s af
ter
them
– c
reat
ing
a p
oten
tial
ly d
iffi
cult
juxt
a pos
itio
n. t
o w
hat
ex
ten
t ca
n a
str
eet,
su
bje
ct t
o a
ll th
e p
ress
ure
s of
th
e ci
ty, l
ive
up
to
the
loft
y id
eals
of
an in
div
idu
al?
An
d w
hat
doe
s it
say
of
us w
hen
a m
emor
ializ
ed s
tree
t it
self
bec
omes
a s
ymb
ol o
f b
roke
n
dre
ams?
Gu
y t
illim
an
d S
usa
n B
erg
er h
ave
bot
h c
reat
ed p
hot
o se
ries
th
at e
xam
ine
this
dee
p ir
ony.
t
illim
look
s at
Pat
rice
lu
mu
mb
a, t
he
gre
at h
ero
of A
fric
an
ind
epen
den
ce, w
ho
was
mu
rder
ed b
y h
is c
olle
agu
e m
obu
tu S
ese
Sek
o; a
fter
tak
ing
pow
er o
f th
e C
ong
o m
obu
tu s
ub
seq
uen
tly
can
on
ized
him
as
a h
ero
an
d w
as r
egar
ded
so
th
rou
gh
ou
t
con
tin
ent.
Sev
eral
Afr
ican
nat
ion
s w
ere
qu
ick
to m
emor
ializ
e lu
mu
mb
a’s
ho
no
r b
y n
amin
g s
tree
ts a
fter
him
. to
day
, till
im’s
sh
ots
of t
hes
e av
enu
es d
isp
lay
a h
eavy
sad
nes
s –
fad
ed s
ign
s
of t
he
hop
es o
f an
ind
epen
den
t A
fric
a em
bod
ied
in d
ust
y st
reet
s,
top
ple
d o
ver
stat
ues
, an
d s
tain
ed c
oncr
ete
mod
ern
ism
.o
ver
in t
he
un
ited
Sta
tes
Ber
ger
tak
es o
n m
arti
n l
uth
er K
ing
Jr
. an
d t
he
man
y m
lK
Bou
leva
rds
acro
ss t
he
cou
ntr
ies
that
w
ere
bap
tize
d in
his
wak
e. t
hes
e st
reet
s ar
e of
ten
sit
uat
ed in
so
me
of t
he
mos
t d
esti
tute
inn
er-c
ity
nei
gh
bor
hoo
ds
– a
sig
n
of t
he
gre
at w
hit
e fl
igh
t th
at e
mp
tied
ou
t m
any
Am
eric
an c
itie
s in
th
e la
tter
hal
f of
th
e tw
enti
eth
cen
tury
an
d t
he
syst
emic
ra
cism
an
d p
over
ty t
hat
per
sist
s to
day
.
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 131 24/04/12 16:34
132
Vo
lum
e 31
133
Pho
tos:
Guy
Till
im
Sta
tues
of
Kw
ame
Nkr
um
ah,
rein
stat
ed a
t th
e N
atio
nal
mu
seu
m in
Acc
ra,
Gh
ana,
aft
er h
avin
g b
ein
g t
orn
dow
n d
uri
ng
a m
ilita
ry c
oup
in 1
977
, 20
07
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 132 24/04/12 16:34
132 133
Vo
lum
e 31
Ath
énée
roy
al H
igh
Sch
ool,
lu
bu
mb
ash
i, d
r C
on
go,
20
07
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 133 24/04/12 16:34
134
Vo
lum
e 31
135
Pho
tos:
Guy
Till
im
Ave
nu
e B
agam
oyo,
Bei
ra,
moz
amb
iqu
e, 2
00
8A
par
tmen
t b
uild
ing
, Bei
ra, m
ozam
biq
ue,
20
08
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 134 24/04/12 16:35
134 135
Vo
lum
e 31
Gra
nd
e H
otel
, Bei
ra, m
ozam
biq
ue,
20
08
Ap
artm
ent
bu
ildin
g, A
ven
ue
Bag
amoy
o, B
eira
, moz
amb
iqu
e, 2
00
8
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 135 24/04/12 16:35
136
Vo
lum
e 31
137
Pho
tos:
Sus
an B
erge
r
mac
on, G
eorg
ia, u
SA
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 136 24/04/12 16:35
136 137
Vo
lum
e 31
New
ark,
New
Jer
sey,
uS
A
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 137 24/04/12 16:35
138
Vo
lum
e 31
139
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 138 24/04/12 16:35
138 139
Vo
lum
e 31
Pho
to: S
usan
Ber
ger
Nor
th C
hic
ago,
illi
noi
s, u
SA
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 139 24/04/12 16:35
140
Vo
lum
e 31
141
Pho
tos:
Sus
an B
erge
r
Au
stin
, tex
as, u
SA
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 140 24/04/12 16:35
140 141
Vo
lum
e 31
Jers
ey C
ity,
New
Jer
sey,
uS
A
V31_001-005_015-160.indd 141 24/04/12 16:35
