a new year

It's a difficult thing—in the midst of two wars, a burgeoning economic disaster, an escalating conflict in Gaza, and countless other calamities worldwide—to identify things to look forward to in 2009. But if there's one thing that 2008 taught us, it's that hopes are not always left unfulfilled, even in the face of seemingly insurmountable adversity. We forget this lesson at our peril as this new year unfolds.

At some point over the holidays, in between reading about the Rick Warren nonsense and the impossibly delusional phenomenon that is Rod Blagojevich, I was hit by a simple yet profound realization that the status quo in this country has shifted.

Let me be clear: I do not intend to enter the fray of meaningless arguments over whether we live in a "center-left" or "center-right" country; the center is and remains the center. I dare not speak of a political realignment, for I know how fleeting these moments can truly be (see: Karl Rove, 2004). What I'm talking about is a deeper shift in the cultural psyche of a nation, a shift in people's expectations, tolerances, aspirations, and ambitions for what is possible.

Sure, Obama and the incoming administration—as do all governments, by definition—represent the status quo. But, to put it simply: it's a different—and better—status quo than that which governed us a year ago. And that alone merits quiet celebration, even in these uncertain times.

Here's to a hopeful 2009. And stay tuned to this Progressive Reactionary, as we persist in questioning, challenging, and continuously re-imagining our new status quo.

on sustainability (briefly)

Inhabitat recently had an interesting interview with Paul Kephart (part 2 here), the executive director of Rana Creek Habitat Restoration and Living Architecture, the folks behind such green-roof icons of sustainable architecture as the Gap headquarters and the California Academy of Sciences. I must confess a certain anxiety over the term "sustainability," as it seems to have collapsed into a buzzword that too many architects and clients latch onto as some sort of empty badge of progressive merit, without truly understanding the larger issues at stake. Yet while I am certainly no expert on green architecture and sustainable technologies, I understand that sustainable practices must be integrated into the architectural status quo in order for the discipline to have any lasting relevance. It is in this respect -- the interesection of ecology and utopia -- that I value the work (and the comments) of Kephart and his firm.

The most informative aspect of the interview is Kephart's specificity with regard to sustainable methodology (again, in contrast to the mainstream, generic usage of the term). The integration of food production and waste treatment into the architecture of a building particularly seems like a no-brainer. I also appreciate the willingness to extend a building's ecological features didactically into the programmatic realm: the green roof of the California Academy of Sciences building becomes an actual exhibit, an occupiable, living habitat that functions both environmentally and educationally.

One tangential thought: Perhaps a crucial component of an ecologically utopian architecture would be to go beyond the technical details and processes that seem to preoccupy green architects, and to actually project into the future, imagining alternative uses (and abuses) of a building. Maybe designers should include such speculations as a way to grasp the full potential of these nascent practices. In a way, it reminds me of the contemporary architect's need to get over the excitement of flashy forms made possible with digital technologies and to figure out what this new technological wizardy can actually do for architecture and humanity as a whole.
And while I'm on the subject of sustainability, if you haven't seen Al Gore's documentary yet, do so.

link: "Interview: Paul Kephart of Rana Creek", from Inhabitat

a new new media?

Markos Moulitsas Zúniga (the "Kos" in Daily Kos) has a brief piece in the Nation in which he suggests that there is a paradigm shift currently underway that threatens the dominance of traditional media. The rise of blogs, wikis, podcasts, etc. truly offers a new empowerment to individuals, says Moulitsas, and the true potential for progress lies in our ability to master these new communication tools and translate broadcast power into political power. Yes, we've heard it all before -- about how the Internet will usher in a new age of democracy, the ultimate forum of free expression, etc. etc. But one wonders: maybe Moulitsas's observations are quite timely? Maybe now is finally the moment where the ability for individuals to deliver their own "great content" (his words) finally does threaten the hegemony of corporate Big Media:

We need to focus on making sure progressives learn to use the tools of this new media landscape. That's where the new-century media wars will be fought and won.

It's an election year, folks... and an important one. Time to take it up a notch.

PR.

link: "Use the Tools" in The Nation

"increasingly undemocratic in both style and content"

MICHAEL SORKIN RETURNS to the pages of Architectural Record this month with a scathing critique of the New Urbanist coup of Gulf Coast reconstruction efforts. Sure, you can call Sorkin an ageing remnant of the 1960's lefty vanguard, but you must also admit that with regard to what's going on in Mississippi and Louisiana, he's absolutely right on the mark. In addition to pointing out the incredible shortcomings of the recent report issued by the Congress for the New Urbanism (CNU) -- a document that he accurately describes as aesthetically prescriptive while environmentally / socially / economically ignorant -- Sorkin describes with joyous irony how the CNU's authoritarianism has come to mirror that of the Modernism so loathed by New Urbanists. The article is not posted online yet, so bear with me as I quote at length:

I am not the first to observe that the CNU -- as an ideological and orgnizational construct -- is remarkably (and deliberately) similar to the Modernism it so acerbically criticizes for cruel formalist monomania and self-important manifestoes.... The issue with such prescriptions is not the superiority of one uniformity over another, it's the uniformity itself.... The New Urbanists' ideal subject may be a happy consumer committed to traditional family values but the fallacy is the same: the idea that architecture is not to be designed for people in all their messy, sqaulling, and delightful difference but as a means of assuring that they converge into behavioral sameness.

Yet despite his valiant and undying critical outlook, Sorkin nonetheless fails to offer a viable alternative -- or even any example of a concrete counter-solution -- to those being offered by the New Urbanists. Isn't there some kind of progressive reaction -- a redirection, a re-harnessing of the forces already at work -- that can somehow offer a better future for the Gulf Coast?

I could go on and on... but instead (since it isn't yet online), I recommend reading the article in the actual magazine itself. That way you could understand Sorkin's critique within the wider context of our profession, as represented by the editorial staff at Architectural Record, who somehow deemed it appropriate to sandwich within Sorkin's piece an advertisement for a cavity wall system that (and I quote) "[helps] prevent mold-induced asthma." Maybe I'm reading too much into the arbitrary nature of magazine advertising practices, but doesn't it seem more than a bit callous to insert a plug for mold-reducing products into the middle of an article about an entire region still suffering the effects of devastating floods? I think it's clear that we as architects need to do a lot more than circle "34" on our Architectural Record Reader Service Card in order to prevent the spread of mold, not to mention the other myriad miasmas that plague our Gulf Coast cities.

on progress

READING EMPIRE TONIGHT with Bush's State of the Union address in the background (I swear - not trying to be ironic, it just happens to be what I'm reading now!) got me thinking about the distinction between progress and reaction. At first, it seems simple: progress is going forward, proposing an affirmative agenda that moves on from the present, while a reaction is a step backwards, a negation. But isn't a belief in progress somehow rejecting the current state of affairs, and therefore a reaction to the present? And isn't there also embedded within the reactionary an equal (if perverse) belief that moving backwards will somehow make us all better off?

Not related to architecture, you say. Yet hear me out. In the ongoing disciplinary disputes over the validity of theory in contemporary architectural practice, we can oversimplify by saying there are two sides: those who value the role of criticality as a means of assessing the status quo with the hope of imagining a better future, and those who advocate more "pragmatic" or "projective" practices in which theory takes a back seat to the negotiation of real-world architectural projects. Here, at least in my assessment, the roles are reversed: the old adherents to critical theory remain committed to the greater cause of Progress (or at least maintain some sense of hope that architecture somehow can contribute to that cause), while the newer pragmatists are much more willing to sacrifice long-term vision for short-term success (monetary, fame, whatever). In other words, the post-critics are reacting to the long-term discilpinary hegemony held by the critical theorists, who, perhaps mistakenly, remain wedded to architecture's progressive imperative.

My point in all of this -- and to try to bring it back to tonight's presidential spectacle -- is that maybe the answer (or Answer?) is a hyrid of progress and reaction. Indeed, maybe the two are not mutually exclusive and are instead co-dependent -- or symbiotic, if you will. Maybe it is possible to posit a critical architecture that not only imagines, but projects and even realizes a better future. Maybe it is possible for an opposition party to do the same thing not with architecture, but with politics. Would that be a progressive reaction?

My apologies for talking in circles! It's just that kind of night. More to come, for sure - I'm working on an ongoing bibliography on the whole post-critical issue, so feel free to send links and references my way...

FAT's postmodernism

I'VE BECOME FASCINATED LATELY with the work of the London office FAT (Fashion, Architecture, Taste), which recently has been commented upon here, here, and here. While at first glance, the architecture seems (at best) a weak update of earlier, perhaps more genuine attempts at architectural postmodernism, I think there may be something deeper going on here. After spending a short time on FAT's website (which, I'm sure not coincidentally, recalls that of Venturi Scott Brown), my initial disgust slowly is replaced by a more intellectual -- dare I say political? -- curiosity. Sure, it's easy to write these guys off (like I normally would) as typical anything-goes postmodernists, completely devoid of taste, ethics, conscience, or any other such redeeming quality. But this time I hesitate. Why?

It's simple: although on aesthetic grounds much of their work renders me mildly nauseous, FAT is nonetheless exonerated in my eyes by their relentless and engaging polemic. A refusal to accept the status quo -- in their case, the persistent dominance of English modernism as the benchmark for acceptable taste -- imbues FAT's project with something greater than mere "attitude." I identify with and commend the eagerness to reinvent architecture, how it is represented, and what is expected of it.

I also am intrigued (and even at times amused) by FAT's written polemic. Their website is full of mini-manifestos, many of which again bring to mind the legacy of Venturi Scott Brown. "Maybe its time to decriminalise decoration and arrange an amnesty on ornament," FAT asks us in Everything Counts (In Large Amounts), a treatise on the evolution of architecture in the age of electronic communication.

FAT member Sam Jacob, in a piece on his own website Strange Harvest, caught my attention with a subtle yet definite elaboration on the central premise of Venturi + Scott Brown's 1972 masterpiece Learning from Las Vegas. Check it out:

The Pop Vernacular is a both a graveyard for the old and the superseded and the spawning ground of unexpected futures. A cornucopia of architectural salvage. The Pop Vernacular draws on all of time and space. And despite its familiarity, it glows with optimism and freshness. Far from the end of history, it is the well spring of the imminent future.

For those of you who don't remember your postmodernism, VSB begin their manifesto with the assertion that "Learning from the existing landscape is a way of being revolutionary for an architect." Yet I would argue that they never really followed through with proving Pop's revolutionary potential (at least in any political sense beyond the superficial and symbolic). Although VSB's embrace of the formal language of Pop was a valiant polemical move, especially at the time, their approach ultimately is misguided as it fails to offer a way out of the black hole of consumer capitalism. Call me crazy, but it seems like here, Mr. Jacob is suggesting a potentially progressive -- if still totally vague -- role for the Pop Vernacular. Is he hinting at an instrumentalization of Pop that maybe goes beyond that of Venturi and Scott Brown? Or will he end up at the same claustrophobic dead end of the windowless, decorated-shed interior of some casino on the Strip? Can't wait to see.

I'd be interested to see if anyone has any other links/commentary/criticism with regard to FAT and their work.

link: FAT
link: Sam Jacob's Strange Harvest
link: Hugh Pearman's FAT is a postmodernist issue: British pranksters get serious.

reconstruction rant

AS CONTEMPORARY ARCHITECTURE RETREATS to its postcritical refuge and, as a discipline, increasingly refuses to engage any progressive purpose whatsoever, it is ironic that the opportunities for such engagement are growing in number. From terrorist attacks to tsunamis to hurricanes to earthquakes, there are countless causes and debates to which architects could potentially contribute. Yet, as is most often the case, our profession (along with the rest of society) follows up an initial altruistic fervor with long-term ignorance.

Right now, the reconstruction efforts in the Gulf states happen to be on my mind, probably because as I read more and more about the situation (for example, this piece by Mike Davis), I keep getting the feeling (some would call it paranoia) that bad things are afoot down south. As mentioned in the previous post, the doctrine of New Urbanism has somehow become the default in any discussion of rebuilding. Some would ascribe this apparent coup by Andres Duany & Co. as a result of their seemingly innocuous taste for walkable cities, mixed-use development, white picket fences, and colored pencil renderings. I, however, see this movement more as a threat than a remedy: a highly coordinated campaign to refashion the coast of Mississippi and Louisiana into a suburban, Disneyfied, and (most importantly) Republican-voting region. (For precedents, see Seaside and Celebration.)

Much has already been said about the New Urbanist agenda, and I must say that many of its basic ideas certainly are sound, particularly seen in their context as a reaction against the devastating modernist escapades of postwar urban planning. It's hard to find somebody who will argue against the merits of being able to walk to work, have access to mass transportation, etc., etc. Nevertheless, an architect or planner (or anyone, for that matter) must be aware of the consequences of his or her ideology, however unpredicted or unintended. The early avant-garde iconoclasm of Mr. Duany and his friends does not excuse their having since morphed into developer-friendly producers of insta-suburbs. The entire movement is founded on a lie: they are in the business of promoting a culture of false nostalgia for a past that never existed in the first place. For me, the fact that the ideology of New Urbanism was chosen directly by Mississippi's governor Haley Barbour (a Republican fat cat and former head of the Republican National Committee, among other things) is no coincidence. The ideological symmetry of New Urbanism and contemporary conservative politics is undeniable. For now, it seems that Biloxi, Gulfport, and the rest of the Mississippi coastline has fallen under the New Urbanist spell, but the larger issue is the one that nobody is talking about: as the New Urbanists set their sights futher west to Louisiana, what are the implications for New Orleans? The city is the bluest oasis in a deep red state— but perhaps not for long, if some people have their way. After all, why redistrict when you can just "reconstruct"?

I realize I should contextualize my ire: This is all part of a larger dissatisfaction with the profession's current fixation with pragmatism and aversion to any broader progressive mission. Maybe the post-critics can take their own advice and pragmatically recognize that here and now, in what will be perhaps the largest reconstruction efforts in the history of this country, there are myriad opportunities for architects to do what they do best without playing into the hands of a reactionary regime.

Obviously I could go on and on. And indeed I will. But in the meantime, here are some of the latest responses/criticisms/thoughts on the topic of Katrina's New Urbanism:

• Why not start with a fan of New Urbanism, like this blogger, who claims (in a grammatical tour-de-force worthy of our prez-dint) that "What we need is suburbs, farms and living, thriving cities, not one or the other."

• Blogger Nancy Levinson has some interesting (and refreshingly optimistic) comments on the "disaster after the disaster." Includes her initial misgivings about New Urbanism as well as a follow-up piece on the need to broaden the reconstruction discussion beyond style to larger issues of urban and ecological infrastructure.

• By far the most direct, enjoyable, and all-around best piece I've read recently on post-Katrina: Mike Davis's piece "Gentrifying Disaster" from Mother Jones. If you read nothing else, read this. Good enough for me to cite twice in one post.
  

• Christopher Hawthorne's piece in the LA Times that clarifies what exactly is at stake. Hawthorne explicitly makes the parallel between the New Urbanists and their right-wing patrons:

"The Biloxi charrette, in other words, may go down as the architectural elite's Ohio: the place it watched rather helplessly as its ideological opponents outclassed it notthrough nimble thinking or grand theory or inspiring plans but simply by being more disciplined and better organized."