Ardeth A magazine on the power of the project

5 | 2019 Innovation as it happens

Electronic version URL: http://journals.openedition.org/ardeth/277 ISSN: 2611-934X

Publisher Rosenberg & Sellier

Printed version Date of publication: 1 November 2019 ISSN: 2532-6457

Electronic reference Ardeth, 5 | 2019, « Innovation as it happens » [Online], Online since 01 May 2020, connection on 23 December 2020. URL : http://journals.openedition.org/ardeth/277

CC BY-NC-ND 4.0

Cover image Hammock laboratory and fabrication workshop at the intentional community Twin Oaks in Louisa County, Virginia. Included in the project Sex and the So-Called City by Office for Political Innovation with Miguel de Guzmán. Ardeth #05 contents

5 The Innovation of the Other 145 La vita delle macchine. The Editorial Board of “Ardeth” Improvvisazione materiale creativa attraverso trasformazioni urbane a 15 Editorial. Political Innovation Barcellona-22@ Andrés Jaque Daniel Torrego Gómez, Miguel Mesa del Castillo Clavel

27 Principles of Construction. An Ontology of Design 165 Data (Centers) Controversies Enrico Terrone Ippolito Pestellini Laparelli

43 Innovazione: quale 185 Atmospheric Infrastructures miglioramento? Pratiche to Deal with the Toxic Air in a di costruzione sociale Common World Micol Rispoli Nerea Calvillo

57 The Production of Project. 199 On Interference. Designing A Subversive Guide to the Strange Life Forms that Don’t Subject of Innovation Always Listen Camilo Vladimir de Lima Amaral Lydia Kallipoliti

79 Parametrizzare la mente 213 Innovation as Loss? In Dialogue dell’architetto. Il caso di with Three Contemporary Tour Bois le Prêtre Practices Grazia Pota Andrea Alberto Dutto

97 Faxing Architecture. 221 Integrating AI and Deep Aldo Rossi’s Transnational Learning within Design Practice Practice, 1986-1997 Processes: XKool Technology Sebastiano Fabbrini Edoardo Bruno

228 Reviews 119 Ghost Islands Laurent Gutierrez, Valérie Portefaix 235 Ardeth #07 Jörg H. Gleiter 133 A Panoptic Cartography of Remote Sensing Marco Ferrari

The Innovation of the Other L’altra innovazione

The Editorial Board of “Ardeth”

To define a concrete possibility for innovation, in Contacts: whatever direction it is intended, it is first necessary redazione [at] ardeth [dot] eu to conceive a form of progress that develops over time. This means that every discourse that admits or DOI: 10.17454/ARDETH05.01 promises an innovative process implicates two condi- tions: the first is that in the future something “better” ARDETH#05 could or must happen than what is happening in the present; the second is that this improvement (growth, evolution, emancipation…) is in some way perma- nent. Innovation can take on a character of totality, as occurs in The Phenomenology of Spirit by Hegel (and in the philosophies of history that follow it), but also in Darwinian evolutionism; or it can refer to, in a more secular sense, contingent phenomena: like what occurs today with technological optimism that wants us to believe that IT, mechatronics or AI are intrin- sically optimised processes. In these cases, optimism gives us faith in the future optimality of performance in a specific context, without necessarily persuading us in the redemptive trajectory of history overall. It is perhaps the socio-technological dimension of the world we live in that demonstrates the most evident characteristics of innovation, which can even be in-

5 disputable in objective terms. Nevertheless, if on the one hand we easily accept that science and technology are vehicles for certain innovation, on the other hand we cannot confine these to a distinct realm that is separate from our daily experiences and lives. Bruno Latour skillfully demonstrated this macro phenomenon, pointing out how science and technology have extended and densified their bonds with that part of reality that we were used to considering “outside” of laboratories and their experiments: not only did “the laboratory expand its boundaries to the entire planet”, but also “experiments are conducted on a real scale and in real time”, creating a link between experience and experimenta- tion (Latour, 2006, translation by the authors). We can no longer consider innovation as a separate phenomenon from ordinary existence. Follow- ing the definition by Latour, this enormous movement brings us to a new global description of the reality we are living in, which necessarily implicates a historical philosophy; in the specific case, a sort of irrevers- ible law of expansion of socio-technological bonds. But all of this with an important difference in respect to previous versions: the expansion of the laboratory (or the “collective”) is not necessarily directed towards an optimum, because a certain prospective on which to judge the “good” and “better” aspect of the change does not exist. Innovation becomes a character of change, not always for the better, nor clearly attributable to an individual intention. A change that can take on the form of an expla- nation, an immersion of an apparition, depending on which the novum is considered as a latent, hidden phenomenon, or as something added to the previous reality. In global terms, innovation could therefore be a function based on becoming, a chain of events and experimentation that alter the common horizon of experience. More specifically, it would be traced back to the invention, as an individual or collective act, aimed at discovering (or creating) something new. And here there is a second turning point: is in- novation an unveiling or a production? As reiterated by Jacques Derrida (2007: 29-30), “[starting from the] seventeenth century, perhaps between Descartes and Leibniz, invention is almost never regarded as an unveil- ing discovery of what was already there (an existence or truth), but is more and more, if not solely the productive discovery of an apparatus that we can call technical in the broad sense, technoscientific or techno- poetic”. In other words, inventing meant more or less producing something new. This “productive discovery” had to do with the widespread and perma- nent need for accumulation and growth: “Everywhere the enterprise of knowledge and research is first of all a programmatics of inventions” (p. 27). The invention (as the constitutive act of an innovation process) would be inserted into a system that requires productivity, efficiency and reliability. In other words, Derrida (2007: 27) reminds us of the unavoid- able economic-political imperative that dictates the passage to “all the institutions, private or public, capitalist or not, that declare themselves

6 The Innovation of the Other to be organs for producing and orienting invention”. And this presents us with a radical question: “is a programmed invention still an inven- tion?”. Because in the end, if we programmed an invention it means that we have already foreseen it (and therefore, what kind of invention is it anyway?). The series of ambiguities that we have touched upon (optimization, intentionality, productivity, programmability) to outline the definitions of innovation can be entirely transferred to the epistemology of the archi- tectural project. Also in architecture there exists the problem of defining the consistency of one’s own innovations (are they objects, systems or processes?), and of making programs for innovation and research (how to foresee a collateral effect or exception?). To make the spectrum of possibility of innovation that crosses through the field of the project clearer, we could start with the considerations of Latour and Derrida. The first helps to measure the separateness that dis- tinguished experimentation in closed laboratories, where “white jackets” are at work, from the outside world, where certain science is debated in an uncertain manner: a condition, in the contemporary world, that is no longer guaranteed – neither for scientists nor architects. The second helps to see the programmability of innovation, or the dif- ference that is evident between an invention that confirms a planned pathway, or at least directed towards a preset objective, and an invention that emerges unexpectedly, like the collateral effect or exaptation of a contingent situation. We therefore have two axes, along which it is possible to try and order the many meanings used to delineate innovation processes. The vertical axis distributes the level of separateness among spaces of innovation and experience: following Latour, every innovation should impact the collective, and vice-versa. Therefore, innovation would be for the most part a distributed phenomenon correlated (entangled) with the rest of reality, difficult to isolate into a single object. On the one hand, there are forms of innovation that are concentrated on the production of specific entities, in particular technical objects, tested and developed in laboratories that are carefully separated from the outside world. In these cases, the measure of innovation can be effectively attributed to the object. But up to what point can we assimilate architecture into a techni- cal object developed in vitro and its innovation paradigms? For example, is innovation in construction components is a form of innovation in the architectural project? The horizontal axis, on the other hand, distinguishes the level of inten- tionality attributed to an innovative process. Derrida (2007: 39) says that programmed innovation is innovation promoted by “the governmental policies on modern science and culture”, inevitably: “An order where there is no absolute surprise, the order of what I will call the invention of the same”. The same is what is possible, which therefore was already there from the start. While free invention would be, at its limit, the inven-

The Editorial Board of “Ardeth” 7 tion of the impossible, what could not be predicted, invention of the other: “To invent would then be to ‘know’ how to say ‘come’ and to answer the ‘come’ of the other. Does that ever come about? Of this event one is never sure”. So, innovation can oscillate between the prospective determining a programmed intention (invention of the same), and the opening to an unpredictable, collateral, even impossible event (invention of the other). A Cartesian plane emerges, where four polarities are combined along two axes of separateness and intentionality. Separateness (vertical axis) is drawn between two poles: innovation intended as a distributed phenomenon (entanglement), or as a process that can invest an isolated entity within a closed laboratory (object). Intentionality (horizontal axis) opposes the programmed innovation pole, which must be instituted and expected, against the collateral innovation pole, which emerges from unexpected conditions. These four planes generate a possible spectrum of the forms of innova- tion of the project. In the first quadrant, we considered the proposals that define innovation as a programmable phenomenon, but also distributed (entangled), and that presume the possibility of instituting applicable research programs to the multi-dimension nature of a socio-technological system. According to these terms, Micol Rispoli supports the ability to describe processes of innovation from a socio-technological prospective, like a collective experiment at a real scale. Starting from similar prem- ises, Marco Ferrari offers an example of application through a series of maps, satellite images and models, which reveal the temporal and geo- graphical variations of an apparently pervasive apparatus, but in reality, limited by specific social, commercial and political contingencies. The second quadrant includes the contributions where innovation refers mainly to objects that can be patented – and therefore also those that cannot be attributed to a program. The authors contemplate the project innovations mainly as technological objects, similar to what occurs in the prospective of industrial innovation – or as inventions and transfor- mations that happen in a controlled environment that is separate from contingencies. Enrico Terrone introduces the ontology of the project, outlining a relation of direct intentionality between the project action and the designed object: in this quadrant, the measure of the distance between the two defines the threshold between the architectural proj- ect – responding to the unique and contingent conditions – and the engineering project – by definition created to ensure that the object can be reproduced. In the subsequent texts, three definitions of the technical object help to explore the relationship between the architectural project and the designed object: the interview by Edoardo Bruno with the start- up XKool Technology describes an artificial intelligence platform capable of learning and rendering certain project phases automatic, and Grazia Pota explores the possibility of retrospectively defining the possibility of creating algorithms for replicable parametric design, based on the well- known project by Lacaton and Vassal for the Tour Bois le Prêtre. Finally,

8 The Innovation of the Other Valérie Portefaix and Laurent Gutierrez present a floating installation that helps to clean a section of ocean of unused fishing nets, and also functions as a vehicle for collecting local stories and traditions. The third quadrant contains the texts where innovation is mainly referred to as an object, not necessarily the result of a program, but a collateral effect (exaptation), reuse or reformulation. Here, Lydia Kal- lipoliti uses a measuring stick based on interference and deviation to describe the apparent necessary determinism of design knowledge, while Sebastiano Fabbrini contemplates appropriation of the new fax tech- nology in two offices of the Aldo Rossi studio as the simultaneous cause and effect of specific decisions in the design process. In a parallel inter- view with three emergent architectural studios, Andrea Alberto Dutto defines innovation as becoming lost in a context of non-narration, where disciplinary knowledge must constantly reinvent itself and redefine its limits in the quest for social, political and technical relevance. Finally, the fourth quadrant contains those texts that perceive innovation as a dislocated and systemic effect, which emerges in conditions that are difficult to predict or control. At its limit, this notion of innovation can also dissolve into a form of slow change, on which the project will only have an indirect and distant influence. Daniel Torrego Gómez and Miguel Mesa del Castillo Clavel recount a distributed electronic waste collection system built from the ground up, through subsequent adjust- ments and contingents, at an incremental scale. Starting from a similar conception of the project as an experiment at a real scale, Nerea Calvillo reflects on the performing potential of the architectural project that cre- ates atmosphere, and at the same time, on the production conditions – so- cial, political and technical – of a dematerialized installation. Ippolito Pestellini defines the advent of a new architectural-urban typology, where pervasiveness and discretion work together to create a necessary point of departure for analyzing the convergence and divergence trajec- tories among the project disciplines and the social and political tensions in the digital world. In conclusion, Camilo Vladimir de Lima Amaral is positioned on the vertical axis, between positive and negative intention- ality, reinterpreting the myth of individual architecture and the role of narration, which ex-post and collectively define the boundaries within which innovation and the political role of the discipline can act.

The Editorial Board of “Ardeth” 9 Per definire una possibilità concreta di innovazione, in qualsiasi direzio- ne la si intenda, è necessario poter concepire una forma di progresso che procede nel tempo. Vale a dire che ogni discorso che ammette o promette un processo di innovazione implica due condizioni: la prima è che nel futuro possa o debba accadere qualcosa di “meglio” di ciò che c’è nel presente; la seconda è che questo miglioramento (crescita, evoluzione, emancipazione…) sia in qualche misura permanente. L’innovazione può essere un carattere totalizzante, come avveniva nella fenomenologia dello Spirito di Hegel (e nelle filosofie della storia che ne sono seguite) ma anche nell’evoluzionismo darwiniano originario; oppure può riferirsi, più laicamente, a fenomeni contingenti: come avviene ancora oggi con l’ottimismo tecnologico che ci fa credere che l’IT, la meccatronica o l’intel- ligenza artificiale siano processi intrinsecamente ottimizzanti. In questi casi l’ottimismo ci fa aver fiducia nell’ottimalità futura della performance in un ambito particolare, senza necessariamente persuaderci della traiet- toria redentiva della storia nel suo complesso. Forse è proprio la dimensione sociotecnica del mondo in cui viviamo che presenta le caratteristiche di innovazione più evidenti, se non persino in- negabili in termini oggettivi. E tuttavia, se per un verso accettiamo facil- mente che scienza e tecnica siano portatrici di innovazioni certe, d’altra parte non riusciamo a confinarle in un ambito distinto dalla nostra vita ed esperienza quotidiana. Bruno Latour ha illustrato bene questo macro- fenomeno, facendo notare come la scienza e la tecnologia abbiano esteso e densificato i loro legami con quella parte di realtà che eravamo abituati a considerare come “esterna” ai laboratori e alle loro sperimentazioni: non solo “il laboratorio ha allargato i suoi confini a tutto il pianeta”, ma per di più “gli esperimenti sono condotti a scala reale e in tempo reale”, creando una saldatura tra esperienza e sperimentazione (Latour, 2006). Non possiamo più considerare l’innovazione come un fenomeno separa- to dall’esistenza ordinaria. Se seguiamo la definizione di Latour, questo enorme movimento ci porta di nuovo a una descrizione globale della realtà in cui viviamo, che implica necessariamente una filosofia della storia; nel caso specifico, una sorta di legge di espansione irreversibile dei legami sociotecnici. Ma con una differenza importante rispetto alle versioni precedenti: l’allargamento del laboratorio (o del “collettivo”) non è necessariamente diretto verso un optimum, perché non esiste una prospettiva certa da cui giudicare il “bene” e il “meglio” del cambiamen- to. L’innovazione diviene allora un carattere di mutamento, non sempre migliorativo, né chiaramente riconducibile a una intenzione individua- le. Un mutamento che può assumere i contorni di un’esplicitazione, di un’emersione o di un’apparizione, a seconda che si consideri il novum come un fenomeno latente, nascosto, o come qualcosa che si aggiunge alla realtà precedente. In termini globali, l’innovazione potrebbe dunque essere una funzione del divenire, una catena di eventi e di sperimentazioni che modificano l’orizzonte comune dell’esperienza. In termini particolari, essa invece

10 The Innovation of the Other andrebbe ricondotta all’invenzione, come atto individuale o collettivo, volto a scoprire (o creare) qualcosa di nuovo. E qui giungiamo a un secondo nodo: l’innovazione è un disvelamento o una produzione? Come ci ricorda Jacques Derrida (2008: 45), “[a partire dal] XVII secolo, forse tra Descartes e Leibniz, non si parlerà pressoché più di invenzione come scoperta svelante di ciò che si trova già lì (esistenza o verità), ma sempre di più come scoperta produttiva di un dispositivo che si può chiamare tecnico in senso lato, tecno-scientifico o tecno-poetico” Ovvero inventare significa ormai, per lo più, produrre qualcosa di nuovo. Tale “scoperta produttiva” avrebbe a che fare con l’esigenza diffusa e permanente di ac- cumulazione e di crescita: “ovunque il progetto di conoscenza e di ricerca è anzitutto una programmatica delle invenzioni” (p. 42). L’invenzione (come atto costitutivo di un processo di innovazione) sarebbe inserita in un sistema che richiede produttività, efficienza, affidabilità. In altre parole, Derrida ci ricorda l’ineludibile imperativo economico-politico che detta il passo a “tutte le istituzioni, private o pubbliche, capitaliste o non capitaliste, che si proclamano macchine per produrre e orientare l’inven- zione”. E ci pone una domanda radicale: “un’invenzione programmata è ancora un’invenzione?”. Perché in fondo, se abbiamo programmato un’invenzione significa che l’abbiamo già prevista (e di conseguenza che invenzione sarebbe?). La serie di ambiguità che abbiamo toccato (ottimizzazione, intenzionali- tà, produttività, programmabilità) per delimitare le definizioni dell’inno- vazione può essere integralmente trasferita all’epistemologia del proget- to architettonico. Anche per gli architetti esiste il problema di definire la consistenza delle proprie innovazioni (sono oggetti, sistemi o processi?), e di fare programmi per l’innovazione e la ricerca (come prevedere un effetto collaterale o un’eccezione?) Per rendere più chiaro lo spettro di possibilità di innovazione che attra- versano il campo del progetto possiamo farci aiutare dalle considerazioni di Latour e di Derrida. Il primo ci aiuta a misurare la separatezza che distingue la sperimentazione dei laboratori chiusi, dove lavorano i “cami- ci bianchi”, dal mondo esterno, in cui la scienza certa viene dibattuta in modo incerto: una condizione che, nel mondo contemporaneo, non è più affatto garantita – né per gli scienziati né tantomeno per gli architetti. Il secondo ci aiuta a vedere la programmabilità dell’innovazione, ovvero la differenza che possiamo cogliere tra un’invenzione che conferma un percorso pianificato, o almeno orientato verso un obiettivo posto a priori, e un’invenzione che emerge imprevedibilmente, come effetto collaterale o ex-aptation di una situazione contingente. Abbiamo così due assi, lungo i quali è possibile tentare di ordinare le molte accezioni attraverso cui delineiamo i processi di innovazione. L’asse verticale distribuisce il livello di separatezza tra luoghi dell’in- novazione e spazio dell’esperienza: seguendo Latour, ogni innovazione dovrebbe ripercuotersi sul collettivo, e viceversa. Dunque l’innovazione sarebbe per lo più un fenomeno distribuito e correlato (entangled) con

The Editorial Board of “Ardeth” 11 il resto della realtà, difficilmente isolabile in un singolo oggetto. D’altro canto, esistono forme di innovazione che si concentrano sulla produzione di entità puntuali, specialmente oggetti tecnici, che vengono testati e svi- luppati in laboratori accuratamente separati dal mondo. In questi casi la misura dell’innovazione può essere efficacemente ricondotta all’oggetto. Fino a che punto possiamo però assimilare un’architettura a un oggetto tecnico sviluppato in vitro e ai suoi paradigmi di innovazione? Per esem- pio: l’innovazione dei componenti edilizi è una forma di innovazione del progetto architettonico? L’asse orizzontale ci consente invece di distinguere il grado di intenziona- lità che attribuiamo a un processo innovativo. Derrida (2008: 58) ci dice che l’invenzione programmata è quella promossa dalle “politiche della scienza e della cultura”, inevitabilmente: “Nessuna sorpresa assoluta. Invenzione del medesimo, la chiamerei”. Il medesimo è ciò che è pos- sibile, che dunque era già lì fin dall’inizio. Mentre l’invenzione libera sarebbe, al limite, l’invenzione dell’impossibile, ciò che non poteva essere previsto, invenzione dell’altro: “Inventare sarebbe perciò “saper” dire “vieni” e rispondere al “vieni” dell’altro. Avviene mai? Di tale evento non si è mai sicuri”. L’innovazione potrà dunque oscillare tra la prospettiva determinante di un’intenzione programmatica (invenzione del medesi- mo), e l’apertura all’evento incalcolabile, collaterale, persino impossibile (invenzione dell’altro). Ne emerge un piano cartesiano, dove si combinano quattro polarità, sui due assi della separatezza e dell’intenzionalità. La separatezza (asse verticale) si dispiega tra due poli: l’innovazione intesa come fenome- no distribuito (entanglement), oppure come processo che può investire un’entità isolata dentro un laboratorio chiuso (object). L’intenzionalità (asse orizzontale) oppone il polo dell’innovazione programmatica, che deve essere istituita e anticipata, al polo dell’innovazione collaterale, che emerge da condizioni inattese. I quattro piani così individuati ci restituiscono uno spettro possibile delle declinazioni dell’innovazione di progetto. Nel primo quadrante abbiamo considerato quelle proposte che intendono l’innovazione come un feno- meno programmabile, ma anche distribuito (entangled), e che dunque presuppongono la possibilità di istituire programmi di ricerca applicabili alla multidimensionalità di un sistema sociotecnico. In questi termini, Micol Rispoli sostiene la descrivibilità dei processi di innovazione da una prospettiva sociotecnica, come esperimenti collettivi a scala reale. Mentre, a partire da premesse simili, Marco Ferrari offre un esempio di applicazione attraverso una serie di mappe, immagini satellitari e modelli, che rivelano le varianze temporali e geografiche di un apparato all’apparenza pervasivo, ma in realtà delimitato da specifiche contingen- ze sociali, commerciali, e politiche. Il secondo quadrante include i contributi in cui l’innovazione si riferisce prevalentemente a oggetti brevettabili – e dunque anche inscrivibili in un programma. Gli autori trattano le innovazioni di progetto prevalen-

12 The Innovation of the Other temente come oggetti tecnologici, in modo analogo a quanto avviene nella prospettiva dell’innovazione industriale – ovvero come invenzioni e trasformazioni che accadono in un ambiente controllato e separato dalle contingenze. Enrico Terrone ci introduce all’ontologia del progetto, tracciando una relazione di intenzionalità diretta fra l’azione del pro- gettare e l’oggetto progettato: in questo quadro, la misura della distanza fra i due definisce la soglia fra progetto di architettura – rispondente a condizioni uniche e contingenti – e progetto di ingegneria – per sua de- finizione finalizzato alla riproducibilità dell’oggetto. Nei testi successivi, tre declinazioni di oggetto tecnico aiutano a sondare il rapporto fra pro- getto di architettura e oggetto progettato: l’intervista di Edoardo Bruno alla start-up XKool Technology descrive una piattaforma di intelligenza artificiale in grado di apprendere e rendere automatiche determinate fasi di progettazione, e Grazia Pota esplora le possibilità offerte dagli algoritmi di progettazione parametrica per definire retrospettivamente dei parametri replicabili, sulla base del noto progetto di Lacaton e Vassal per la Tour Bois le Prêtre. Infine, Valérie Portefaix e Laurent Gutierrez propongono un’installazione galleggiante che contribuisca a ripulire un angolo di oceano da reti da pesca inutilizzate, e che funzioni da collettore di narrative e tradizioni locali. Il terzo quadrante delimita quei testi in cui l’innovazione è riferita an- cora prevalentemente a un’entità oggettuale, seppure non come esito di un programma, bensì di un effetto collaterale (ex-aptation), di un riuso o rifunzionalizzazione. Qui, Lydia Kallipoliti utilizza il metro dell’inter- ferenza e della deviazione per scardinare l’apparentemente necessario determinismo del sapere progettuale, mentre Sebastiano Fabbrini guar- da all’appropriazione della nuova tecnologia del fax nelle due sedi dello studio di Aldo Rossi come, al contempo, causa ed effetto di determinate scelte progettuali. In un’intervista parallela a tre studi di architettura emergenti, infine, Andrea Alberto Dutto definisce l’innovazione come perdita in un contesto di non-narrazione, nel quale il sapere disciplinare deve costantemente rinnovarsi e ridefinire i propri confini alla ricerca di una qualche rilevanza sociale, politica, tecnica. Nel quarto quadrante abbiamo infine collocato quei testi in cui l’innova- zione veniva trattata come un effetto dislocato e sistemico, che emerge in condizioni difficilmente prevedibili o controllabili. Al limite, questa nozione di innovazione può arrivare anche a dissolversi in una forma di cambiamento latente, su cui il progetto può avere solo un’influenza indiretta e distante. Daniel Torrego Gómez e Miguel Mesa del Castillo Clavel raccontano un sistema distribuito di raccolta di rifiuti elettronici che si costituisce dal basso, per aggiustamenti successivi e contingenti e su scala incrementale. A partire da una simile concezione del progetto come esperimento su scala reale, Nerea Calvillo riflette sul potenziale performativo del progetto di architettura che si fa atmosfera e, al con- tempo, sulle condizioni di produzione – sociali, politiche e tecniche – di un’installazione dematerializzata. Ippolito Pestellini definisce l’avvento

The Editorial Board of “Ardeth” 13 di una nuova tipologia architettonica-urbana, la cui pervasività e discre- zione insieme la rendono un necessario punto di partenza per analizzare le traiettorie di convergenza e divergenza fra le discipline del progetto e le tensioni sociali e politiche del mondo digitale. Infine, Camilo Vladimir de Lima Amaral si posizione a cavallo dell’asse verticale, fra intenziona- lità positiva e negativa, rileggendo il mito dell’architetto individuale e il ruolo delle narrazioni che, ex post e collettivamente, definiscono i confini all’interno dei quali l’innovazione e il ruolo politico della disciplina pos- sono agire.

References Derrida, J. (2008), Psyché. Invenzioni dell’altro, vol. 1, Milano, Jaca Book. Derrida, J. (2007) Psyche. Inventions of the Other, vol. 1, Stanford (CA), Stanford University Press. Latour, B. (2006) Nessuna innovazione senza rappresentanza! Un parlamento delle cose per i nuovi esperimenti socioscientifici, in M. Bucchi (a cura di), Sapere, fare, potere. Verso un’innovazione responsabile, Fondazione Giannino Bassetti - Rubbet- tino, pp. 67-97.

14 The Innovation of the Other Editorial. Political Innovation Innovazione politica

Andrés Jaque

With 1.2 billion Google results, innovation is now Affiliation the omnipresent buzzword used in the domain of Office for Political Innovation - founder advanced capitalism to encapsulate the processes by Columbia which environments and societies recombine, evolve, University - director of the Advanced dispute with, and reproduce themselves. Innovation Architectural creates a fiction in which problems are resolved, Design Program material inflation makes things better, and linear Contacts: progress is possible. But this doesn’t work. Corporate office [at] offpolinn rhetoric and Silicon Valley-like narratives about the [dot] com

heroism of product development have rendered ac- DOI: counts of how society “innovates” delusional. Schum- 10.17454/ARDETH05.02

peter’s notion of the entrepreneur (1939) as a solo ARDETH#05 agent who brings invention to the markets through linear innovation is just a distraction. Secluded in a limbo of PR-made identarian-capitalism, innovation has been reduced and weaponized to become the tool to render smooth the promotion of consumerism. As often happens with wrong ideas, this rhetoric has deeply influenced architecture, its education, and its myths. As Lydia Kallipoliti explains in On Interferenc- es: designing strange life forms that don’t always listen, Buckminster Fuller’s epiphany, which involved his overcoming a personal crisis by reinventing architec-

15 ture, is nothing but the combination of two of the most successful neolib- eral mantras: to just do it and to think differently. Kallipoliti describes its pernicious pull: “To innovate one must overcome all barriers and initial obstacles against all odds; a vision must be maintained unbroken and it is one’s commitment to a cause unaltered that grants valor and eventually yields results. Propaganda of the Silicon Valley modus operandi, to reach lucrative self-fulfillment”. Confronting the effects of advanced capitalism, techno-segregation, and human-and-more-than-human exploitation requires us to rethink the way we think about innovation. This fifth issue of Ardeth gathers archi- tectural thinkers to examine specific cases of architectural innovation in detail, with the mission of situating the term innovation in the terrain of realism and to help rethink how architectural innovation is discussed, imagined, and practiced. The work included here is linked by its inten- tion of conceiving a new collective notion of innovation that exceeds the domain of the human, and that is enacted by/through settings compos- ited by numerous heterogenous entities. Here the idea that innovation is the unfolding of new ideas or the development of eureka moments or individual genius is confronted by accounts of conflicted processes affected by the contingent, the accidental, the environmental, and the non-intentional. As Micol Rispoli recounts in her Innovazione: quale miglioramento? Pratiche di costruzione sociale, innovation was entangled with notions of progress that grew out of nineteenth-century Saint-Simonianism. While acknowledged innovation as a form of togetherness by identifying its role in the production of social convergency; Saint-Simonianism did it by introducing an excluding mode of modern normativity that segmented technology from the larger social entanglements in which it participates. In 2002 Madeleine Akrich, Michel Callon, and Bruno Latour of the Cen- tre de Sociologie de l’Innovation sent out a call to complicate received notions on the role designers and entrepreneurs play by approaching in- novation as a collective enactment: “The bringing together of market and technology, through which both inventions and the outlets which trans- form them into innovations are patiently constructed, is more and more a result of a collective activity and no longer the monopoly of an inspired and dedicated individual. The individual qualities of insight, intuition, sense of anticipation, quick reactions, skillfulness, must all be reinvented and reformulated in the language of the organization. They are no longer the property of an individual, but become collective virtues, during the mergence of which the art of governing and managing play a key role” (Akrich et al., 2002). This publication is not an attempt to reinvent notions of innovation, but is rather a project to bring such notions back to the larger prerogatives that are detected when innovation in action is observed, something that in different ways the field of architecture is forced to do. If Zaha Hadid’s office and the Fundação Oscar Niemeyer, Camilo Vladimir de Lima

16 Political Innovation Amaral announced the arrival of a post-starchitect, phantasmagorical era in architecture, they did so only after their stars passed away. While Hadid and Neimeyer were living, their agencies supported the fantasy of individual genius and not the ingenuity of the teams, methodologies, and tools in the background of their star’s fame. Aldo Rossi’s transatlantic office, which Sebastiano Fabbrini reconstructs in Faxing Architecture, provides evidence of how architecture’s capacity to intervene reality results from specific techno-social settings that gain agency on the definition of architectural action. With the opening of an office space in Manhattan in 1986, Aldo Rossi operated as a bilocated assemblage of objects, humans, and technological devices connected by the constant flow of scrolling thermal paper facsimiles coming out of the noisy mouth of fax machines. Faxes regulated the very status of archi- tecture as multiple, scalable, and composed. Rossi’s key contributions to the field of architecture, such as the notion of “analogy” or the focus of façade design versus floorplan, were coproduced by a more-than-human transatlantic material assemblage. This discussion is intended to reformulate the role of agencies in archi- tectural action. It is obvious in many cases that architectural design, being a socially and environmentally integrated activity, is participated by agents external to its offices. Architectural action is not the result of individual architects’ minds and organizations. As Marco Ferrari argues in A Panoptic Cartography of Remote Sensing, the daily practice of pinch- ing-and-zooming in Google Earth, Bing, and Apple Maps, momentous is the development of a big part of human actions now, depends on the performance of planetary-scale infrastructure, resulting in the coopera- tion of “spacecrafts, sensors, antennas, and fiber-optic cables, owned by nation states and private corporations, and managed through an intri- cate network of data processing facilities. The different agendas of these institutions are concealed under the smooth, color-corrected surface of commercial imagery, embedded in the metadata of the global digital mosaic like a footnote to the wonders of the contemporary geographic omniscience-while delivering a profitable picture of a borderless world”. In the work of Ferrari, innovation comes as an inquiry into the relational dimension of the making of such a ubiquitous and non-scrutinized infra- structure. As a form of intervention on a shared layer of reality intended to render the participation of users critical and capable of trespassing the sense of smoothness and automatism that geographical visualization pro- viders promote. The assemblage of science, technology, product design, and aesthetics composing mapping infrastructures performs politically to favor specific non-universally shared agendas. The endeavor of design- ing the evolution of such infrastructures therefore inevitably falls into the domain of political action. In order for design to gain access to the ac- tual performance of these geopolitical apparatuses, Ferrari’s work needs to symmetrically operate at the intersection of design and activism. Design comes here as an agency that responds to user experience, in the

Andrés Jaque 17 way it is now designed, blackbox the technological, contractual, aesthetic and political assemblage of geographical visualization platforms, and by providing access to the contentiousness of their users. A focus on visual and spatial literacy by which humans engage in pinch-and-zooming are equipped to exceed a relational model that construct them as consumers, to gain new forms of critical participation. As Ippolito Pestellini Laparelli explains in Data (Centers) Controversies, the current development of data centers associated with the growing dig- italization of daily interaction shows innovation as a contentious process meant to segregate societies. He highlights the case of AT&T’s buildings, in use since 1985 across the US, that conceal the way communication sys- tems are organized, evidenced by the fact that evolution is often meant to unevenly distribute resources; and that their non-universality inscribes them in arenas where different interests confront each other, rather than in linear processes of shared equal improvement. When examined in detail, digital technology does not bring people together as was first dreamed, but rather heightens the effects of surveillance capitalism and creates an ecosystem of asymmetrical and abusive power dynamics between tech corporations and end-users, as Pestellini puts it. This case shows how innovation is not the result of techno-scientific consensus, were such a thing possible, but a political process where difference is managed and negotiation among agents with different participations and affections is required. In Atmospheric Infrastructures to deal with the transition, Nerea Calvillo questions our ideas of air as being something needing to be cleaned. The atmosphere is “the dump of capitalist practices,” and Calvillo asks how we can clean “a global circulating entity, when the economic system that has set up this situation does not seem to be changing soon?” Most inno- vations developed to address air pollution, in the way they are promoted, end up empowering the power structures responsible for emissions in the first place. At a time when environmental remediation has gained a scale that has made it a priority for large-scale infrastructural service providers, the implementation of solution-oriented atmospheric services allows the selling of remediation products that are ineffective in address- ing the transectionality of the air, but that prove to be commercially suc- cessful by not questioning the larger order in which emissions happen. Innovation here requires a deliberated process, where the relational ex- tension that the air is constituted by redefines the terms of its interaction. To the common question of What to do?, Calvillo proposes that instead we should think How to do? This immediately shifts thinking about inno- vation as a solution-finding process into an inquiry for forms to deal with transition. Rather than finding delusional solutions in making so-stated problems disappear, Calvillo explores how the infrastructures that allow us to manage how the terms of transition that alter the complex tech- no-social assemblages of air can be collectively enunciated. In a similar way, facing the growing presence of Abandoned, Lost or

18 Political Innovation otherwise Discarded Fishing Gear (ALDFG) in the ocean, MAP Office in 2017 developed the Ghost Island in Krabi, with 300 kilograms of fishnets rescued by activist diver groups, that is now followed by the construc- tion of a second Ghost Island in Hong Kong, as the places for diverse human players (politicians, environmentalist, scientist, designers) to be convened. Reflecting through the experience of her realized project ‘Yellow Dust,’ a mist canopy device that measured, visualized, and partially remediat- ed the quality of Seoul’s air when tested in 2017, Nerea Calvillo calls us to consider the potential of moving from unified forms of association, focused on representation and action (like the Greenpeace campaigns exposing those responsible for environmental damage) to paying “closer attention to what surrounds us and understand what the surrounding requires us to do”. Her device helped assemble a community by promot- ing a shared engagement in visualizing environmental inequality; it was therefore not merely a performance device, but one that found in the setting of its physical constitution a means for human and more-than-hu- man association. In order to produce a yellow dust out of water, the de- signers had to train their eyes to differentiate densities of mist, and their skin to sense the difference between “fresh” and “wet.” The possibility for architecture to operate in/with the air, when considered in detail and in the extension of the agents that affect and are affected by it, imposes forms of symmetry between humans and more-than-humans. If innova- tion has often posed humans as being the subject modifying an external, objectual other, this case shows how from the perspective that Calvillo offers, humans and more-than-humans share a symmetrical status, as actors of an interaction that not only changes the way they relate to each other, but their material constitutions as well. Along these lines, Lydia Kallipoliti proposes thinking about architecture through Donna Haraway’s notion of the cyborg that “resists utopia and wholeness as a generic idea” and proposes “biotic components – frag- ments – that can be interfaced and interconnected in endless ways”. Kallipoliti brings back Robin Evans’s ideas of interference, a “critical de- sign parameter to creatively disrupt the expected turn of events… Inter- ference is not blocking the course of actions, but revealing a path which would have been invisible in the design process otherwise”. According to Kallipoliti, Evan’s work helped derail a system from its normative end goal by unveiling “surrogate goals” through deviation. Avoiding linearity, he designed a number of piezoelectric structures that responded to ran- dom events. Rather than showing cause and effect-based reactions, these were meant to “energize the artifactual world” by showing architectural entities not as structures in an environment, but rather as environments themselves, and predetermination as obsolete: “Rather that the realiza- tion of a single vision, the object of creation could be the crossroad of several different paths”. Architecture for Evans was not an instrument but a form of being itself. “As analogous to an animal, both as an embod-

Andrés Jaque 19 iment of organizational principles, as well as architecture’s relationships to climatic and site-related givens” as Caroline O’Donnell argues. This is the case of the Big Dog, the Boston Dynamic’s tumbling robot that US marines rejected in 2015 due to concerns that its noisiness would give away troops’ positions. Architecture as a hysterical unbalanced being, where the linearity of progress is replaced by forms of kinship that challenge the tradition-technology, history-science divide that has shape the way architectural innovation has been founded since Reiner Banham announced in 1960.

Con 1,2 miliardi di risultati su Google, innovazione è oggi l’onnipresen- te parola d’ordine utilizzata nel campo del capitalismo avanzato per inglobare i processi attraverso i quali gli ambienti e le società si ricom- binano, evolvono, si fronteggiano e si riproducono. L’innovazione crea una finzione nella quale i problemi vengono risolti, l’inflazione materiale rende le cose migliori e il progresso lineare è possibile. Ma non funziona così. La retorica aziendale e le narrazioni in stile Silicon Valley a pro- posito dell’eroismo dello sviluppo dei prodotti hanno reso deliranti le spiegazioni sulla maniera in cui la società “fa innovazione”. Il concetto di imprenditore di Schumpeter (1939), visto come l’agente solitario che introduce l’invenzione sui mercati attraverso l’innovazione, è semplice follia. Isolata in un limbo di capitalismo identitario fabbricato dalle PR, l’innovazione è stata ridotta e strumentalizzata per ammorbidire la pro- mozione del consumismo. Come spesso accade con le idee sbagliate, questa retorica ha profonda- mente influenzato l’architettura, il suo insegnamento e i suoi miti. Come spiega Lydia Kallipoliti in On Interferences: designing strange life forms that don’t always listen, l’epifania di Buckminster Fuller, che ha implicato il superamento di una crisi personale attraverso la reinvenzione dell’ar- chitettura, non è altro che la combinazione di due dei mantra neoliberali di maggior successo: just do it e think differently. Kallipoliti ne descrive il richiamo pernicioso: “Per innovare, occorre superare tutte le barriere e gli ostacoli iniziali contro ogni previsione. Una visione deve essere man- tenuta integra ed è l’impegno di un individuo nei confronti di una causa intatta a conferire valore e, a termine, a produrre risultati. La propagan- da del modus operandi della Silicon Valley, per ottenere un’auto-realizza- zione lucrativa” (N.d.T.: Libera traduzione). Il raffronto degli effetti del capitalismo avanzato, della tecno-segregazio- ne e dello sfruttamento “umano e più che umano” ci impone di rivedere il modo di pensare legato all’innovazione. Questo quinto numero di Ardeth riunisce pensatori per esaminare in dettaglio casi specifici di innovazione architettonica, nell’intento di collocare il termine innovazio- ne sul terreno del realismo e di contribuire alla revisione del modo in cui l’innovazione architettonica viene discussa, immaginata e praticata. I la- vori qui documentati sono collegati dalla volontà di elaborare un nuovo

20 Political Innovation concetto collettivo di innovazione, che vada al di là della sfera dell’umano e che sia applicato da/attraverso parametri composti da numerose entità eterogenee. L’idea che l’innovazione rappresenti il dispiegamento di nuove idee o lo sviluppo di momenti “eureka” o di singoli geni viene qui raffrontata con testimonianze di processi combattuti e influenzati dalla contingenza, dall’accidentalità, dall’ambiente e dalla non-intenzionalità. Come racconta Micol Rispoli in Innovazione: quale miglioramento? Pratiche di costruzione sociale, l’innovazione si è intrecciata con nozioni di progresso nate dal saint-simonismo del XIX secolo. Pur riconoscendo l’innovazione come una forma di unione e indentificandone il ruolo nella produzione della convergenza sociale, il saint-simonismo ha introdotto una modalità escludente di moderna normatività, che segmentava la tecnologia rispetto ai più vasti intrecci sociali di cui era parte. Nel 2002, Madeleine Akrich, Michel Callon e Bruno Latour (Centre de Sociologie de l’Innovation) lanciarono un appello per complicare le nozioni ricevute sul ruolo svolto da designer e imprenditori, affrontando l’innovazione come un’emanazione collettiva: “L’unione tra mercato e tecnologia, attraverso la quale le invenzioni e gli sbocchi commerciali che le tra- sformano in innovazioni vengono pazientemente costruiti, è sempre più il risultato di un’attività collettiva e non più il monopolio di un singolo individuo ispirato e impegnato. Le qualità personali di discernimento, in- tuito, senso di anticipazione, rapidità di reazione e abilità devono essere reinventate e riformulate nel linguaggio dell’organizzazione. Non sono più proprietà di un individuo, ma diventano virtù collettive, durante la cui comparsa l’arte di governare e gestire svolge un ruolo chiave (N.d.T.: Libera traduzione)” (Akrich et al., 2002). Questa pubblicazione non vuol essere un tentativo di reinventare i con- cetti di innovazione. Si tratta piuttosto di un progetto che mira a riporta- re tali concetti verso le prerogative più ampie che possono essere rilevate quando si osserva l’innovazione in azione, cosa che il settore dell’architet- tura è costretto a fare in diverse maniere. Se lo studio di Zaha Hadid, la Fundação Oscar Niemeyer e Camilo Vladimir de Lima Amaral annun- ciarono l’avvento di un’era post-archistar fantasmagorica, lo fecero solo dopo la scomparsa delle loro stelle. Quando Hadid e Neimeyer erano in vita, le loro agenzie supportavano la fantasia dei singoli geni e non l’in- gegnosità dei team, delle metodologie e degli strumenti celati dietro alla celebrità delle loro star. Lo studio transatlantico di Aldo Rossi, che Sebastiano Fabbrini ricostru- isce in Faxing Architecture, dimostra come la capacità dell’architettura di intervenire sulla realtà derivi da specifiche impostazioni tecno-sociali che agiscono sulla definizione di azione architettonica. Con l’apertura di uno spazio uffici a Manhattan nel 1986, Aldo Rossi funzionò come un assemblaggio a doppia ubicazione di oggetti, persone e dispositivi tecnologici collegati da un flusso ininterrotto di strisce di carta termica che uscivano dalla rumorosa bocca dei telefax. I fax regolavano lo status stesso dell’architettura: multipla, evolutiva e composita. I contributi

Andrés Jaque 21 chiave apportati da Rossi nel campo dell’architettura, come il concetto di “analogia” o l’accento posto sulla progettazione della facciata rispetto alla planimetria, furono coprodotti da un assemblaggio di materiale transat- lantico “più che umano”. Questa discussione mira a riformulare le regole delle agenzie nell’azione architettonica. In molti casi, è ovvio che il design architettonico, essen- do un’attività integrata dal punto di vista sociale e ambientale, vede la partecipazione di soggetti esterni agli uffici dell’agenzia. L’azione archi- tettonica non è il risultato di singole menti e organizzazioni di architetti. Come sostenuto da Marco Ferrari in A Panoptic Cartography of Remote Sensing, la pratica quotidiana di “pinching-and-zooming” su Google Earth, Bing e Apple Maps, oggi fondamentale in gran parte delle azioni umane, dipende dalla performance di un’infrastruttura su scala planeta- ria, che ha dato luogo alla collaborazione di “navicelle spaziali, sensori, antenne e cavi a fibra ottica, posseduti da nazioni e società private e ge- stiti attraverso un’intricata rete di strutture di data processing. I diversi programmi di queste entità sono celati sotto la superficie liscia e ritoccata del trattamento delle immagini commerciali, integrata nei metadati del mosaico digitale globale come una nota a piè pagina delle meraviglie dell’onniscienza geografica contemporanea, offrendo nel contempo il quadro redditizio di un mondo senza più”. (N.d.T.: Libera traduzione) Nell’opera di Ferrari, l’innovazione si presenta come un’esplorazione della dimensione relazionale della costruzione di un’infrastruttura così onnipresente e non analizzata. Come una forma di intervento su uno strato condiviso della realtà, destinato a rendere la partecipazione degli utenti critica e in grado di trascendere il senso di fluidità e automati- smo promosso dai provider di servizi di visualizzazione geografica. L’assemblaggio di scienza, tecnologia, design di prodotto ed estetica che compone le infrastrutture di mappatura, opera politicamente a favore di programmi specifici non universalmente condivisi. Il tentativo di proget- tare l’evoluzione di tali infrastrutture ricade perciò inevitabilmente nel campo dell’azione politica. Affinché il design possa accedere all’effettiva performance di questi apparati geopolitici, il lavoro di Ferrari deve ope- rare simmetricamente al crocevia tra design e attivismo. Il design appare qui come un’agenzia che reagisce all’esperienza dell’utente, così come oggi concepita. Una sorta di “scatola nera” dell’assemblaggio tecnologi- co, contrattuale, estetico e politico delle piattaforme di visualizzazione geografica, che dà accesso alla litigiosità dei loro utenti. Un focus sulle competenze visive e spaziali di cui sono dotati gli individui che si dedica- no al “pinch-and-zooming”, per andare oltre un modello relazionale che li struttura come consumatori e acquisire nuove forme di partecipazione critica. Come spiega Ippolito Pestellini Laparelli in Data (Centers) Controver- sies, l’attuale sviluppo dei data center, associato alla crescente digita- lizzazione delle interazioni quotidiane, mostra l’innovazione come un processo controverso, destinato a segregare le società. L’autore evidenzia

22 Political Innovation il caso degli edifici AT&T, in uso fin dal 1985 negli Stati Uniti, che celano la maniera in cui i sistemi di telecomunicazioni sono organizzati, come evidenziato dal fatto che l’evoluzione è spesso destinata a distribuire le risorse in maniera disomogenea. La loro non-universalità li colloca in ambiti nei quali si confrontano interessi diversi, anziché in processi lineari di pari miglioramento condiviso. Se la si esamina in dettaglio, la tecnologia digitale non riunisce le persone, come sognato all’inizio, ma acuisce piuttosto gli effetti del capitalismo della sorveglianza e crea un ecosistema fatto di dinamiche di potere asimmetriche e abusive tra grandi gruppi tecnologici e utenti finali, come sottolineato da Pestellini. Questo caso mostra come l’innovazione non sia il risultato del consenso tecno-scientifico, ancorché possibile, bensì un processo politico nel quale viene gestita la differenza ed è necessaria la negoziazione tra gli agenti con diversi coinvolgimenti e attaccamenti. In Atmospheric Infrastructures to deal with the transition, Nerea Calvillo rimette in discussione le nostre idee secondo cui l’aria sarebbe qualcosa da ripulire. L’atmosfera è “la discarica delle pratiche capitalistiche”, e Calvillo si chiede come sia possibile ripulire “un’entità circolante globale, quando il sistema economico che ha creato questa situazione non sembra pronto a cambiare??” (N.d.T.: Libera traduzione) La maggior parte delle innovazioni messe a punto per risolvere il problema dell’inquinamento atmosferico, così come sono promosse, finiscono per rafforzare le strut- ture di potere responsabili in primo luogo delle emissioni. In un’epoca in cui il risanamento dell’ambiente è diventato una priorità per i provider di servizi infrastrutturali su larga scala, l’implementazione di servizi atmosferici solution-oriented consente di vendere prodotti di bonifica incapaci di far fronte alla trasversalità dell’aria, ma che si rivelano com- mercialmente vincenti proprio perché non -mettono in discussione il più vasto sistema nel quale vengono prodotte le emissioni. In questo caso, l’innovazione richiede un processo deliberato, nel quale l’estensione rela- zionale di cui è costituita l’aria ridefinisce i termini della sua interazione. Anziché porsi la banale domanda Cosa fare?, Calvillo propone invece di chiedersi Come fare? Questo sposta immediatamente la riflessione sull’innovazione, vista come un processo di elaborazione di soluzioni, in una ricerca di forme per gestire la transizione. Anziché trovare soluzioni deliranti per fare scomparire i problemi così definiti, Calvillo esplora la maniera in cui possano essere collettivamente enunciate le infrastrutture che ci consentirebbero di gestire il modo un cui i termini della transazio- ne alterano i complessi assemblaggi tecno-sociali dell’aria. In maniera analoga, di fronte alla crescente presenza di ALDFG (Abando- ned, Lost or otherwise Discarded Fishing Gear) negli oceani, MAP Office ha sviluppato nel 2017 la Ghost Island a Krabi, utilizzando 300 kg di reti da pesca recuperate da gruppi di attivisti subacquei, cui è seguita la costruzione di una seconda Ghost Island a Hong Kong, intesi come luoghi in cui riunire vari attori della società (politici, ambientalisti, scienziati, designer).

Andrés Jaque 23 Riflettendo attraverso l’esperienza del suo progetto “Yellow Dust”, una canopea nebulizzante che misurava, visualizzava e in parte migliorava la qualità dell’aria a Seul nel 2017, Nerea Calvillo ci invita a considerare la possibilità di passare da forme unificate di associazione, incentrate sulla rappresentanza e sull’azione (come le campagne in cui Greenpeace mette in scena i responsabili dei danni ambientali), ad un “esame più attento di ciò che ci circonda e a comprendere ciò che l’ambiente circostante ci chiede di fare” (N.d.T.: Libera traduzione). Il suo dispositivo ha contribu- ito a riunire una comunità attraverso la promozione di un impegno con- diviso per visualizzare la diseguaglianza ambientale. Non si tratta quindi di una semplice performance, ma di un dispositivo che trova nell’ambito della propria costituzione fisica un mezzo di associazione umana e “più che umana”. Per produrre una “polvere gialla” partendo dall’acqua, i designer hanno dovuto allenare lo sguardo per distinguere le diverse densità di foschia e la loro pelle per cogliere la differenza tra “fresco” e “bagnato”. La possibilità per l’architettura di operare con/nell’aria – con- siderata in dettaglio e tenendo conto degli agenti che la influenzano e ne sono influenzati – impone forme si simmetria tra gli umani e i “più che umani”. Se l’innovazione ha spesso considerato gli individui come sogget- ti in grado di modificare un altro da sé esterno e oggettuale, questo caso mostra come, dalla prospettiva offerta da Calvillo, gli umani e “i più che umani” condividano uno status simmetrico, in quanto attori di un’intera- zione che modifica non solo la maniera in cui si relazionano, ma anche le loro costituzioni materiali. Insieme a questi spunti, Lydia Kallipoliti propone una riflessione sull’architettura attraverso il concetto del cyborg che “resiste all’utopia e all’interezza come un’idea generica”, caro a Donna Haraway, e pro- pone “componenti biotici – frammenti – che si possono interfacciare e interconnettere in infinite maniere”. Kallipoliti riprende le idee di Robin Evans sull’interferenza, un “parametro di progettazione critico per alterare in modo creativo l’attesa svolta degli eventi”. L’interferenza non significa bloccare il corso delle azioni, ma svelare un percorso che sarebbe stato altrimenti invisibile nel processo di progettazione” (N.d.T.: Libera traduzione). Secondo Kallipoliti, lo studio di Evan ha contribuito a far deragliare un sistema dal suo scopo finale normativo, rivelando “obiettivi surrogati” tramite la deviazione. Evitando la linearità, egli ha progettato una serie di strutture piezoelettriche che reagivano ad eventi aleatori. Anziché rappresentare reazioni basate sul rapporto di causa-effetto, tali struttu- re miravano a “energizzare il mondo artifattuale”, mostrando le entità architettoniche non come strutture in un ambiente, bensì come ambienti stessi, e considerando la predeterminazione obsoleta: “Anziché la rea- lizzazione di una singola visione, l’oggetto di creazione potrebbe essere il crocevia di numerosi percorsi diversi” (N.d.T.: Libera traduzione). Per Evans, l’architettura non era uno strumento, ma piuttosto una forma per essere sé stessi. “Analogo ad una animale, inteso come l’incarnazione di

24 Political Innovation principi organizzativi e dei rapporti dell’architettura con i presupposti climatici e locali” (N.d.T.: Libera traduzione), come sostenuto da Caroli- ne O’Donnell. Questo è il caso del Big Dog, l’acrobatico robot di Boston Dynamic che i Marine americani respinsero nel 2015 a causa del rischio che la sua rumorosità potesse rivelare la posizione delle truppe. L’ar- chitettura vista come un essere isterico e squilibrato, in cui la linearità del progresso è sostituita da forme di parentela che sfidano il divario tradizione-tecnologia e storia-scienza che ha modellato la maniera in cui l’innovazione architettonica è stata percepita fin dal suo annuncio da parte di Reiner Banham nel 1960.

References Akrich, M., Callon, M., Latour, B. (2002), The key to success in innovation Part I: The art of interessement, “International Journal of Innovation Management”, vol. 6, n. 2, pp. 187-206. Schumpeter, J. (1939), Business Cycles: A Theoretical, Historical, and Statistical Analysis of the Capitalist Process, New York, McGraw-Hill.

Andrés Jaque 25 ontolo- gy • me- taphysics • design • normati- vity • cre- ativity Principles of Construction. An Ontology of Design

Enrico Terrone

Abstract Affiliation If ontology is the study of being, the ontology of Universitat de Barcelona, design studies the specific being of design. I propose Departament de an ontology of design that rests on the distinction Filosofia between design as an activity and the design as the Contacts: outcomes of this activity. I begin with arguing that a enrico [dot] terrone design is a principle of construction of artifacts that [at] ub [dot] edu belongs to the ontological category of norms. Then, I Received: exploit this account of the designs as norms to build 06 August 2019 up an account of design as normative practice. Just as politics governs the life of people, design governs Accepted: 28 October 2019 the life of artifacts. Lastly, I show that the ontologi- cal conception that I have proposed can shed some DOI: light on three important aspects of design, namely, its 10.17454/ARDETH05.03

forms (architecture versus engineering), its processes ARDETH#05 (individual versus collective), and its values (innova- tive versus traditional).

27 This paper proposes an account of design as broad as possible, which aims to remain neutral on three distinction. First, the distinction between engineering design and architecture design. Second, that between design as an individual act of creation and design as a collective process. Third, that between innovative and traditional design. The fact the my account aims to remain neutral on these issues does not mean that I do not care about them. Quite the opposite. The point is that, in order to properly address these issues, we need an account of design that is independent of them. An account that is ontological in the sense that it concerns the being of design independently of our preferences as regards its forms (architecture versus engineering), its processes (individual versus collec- tive) or its values (innovative versus traditional). As Achille Varzi (2011: 407) aptly points out, “According to a certain, familiar way of dividing up the business of philosophy, made popular by Quine, ontology is concerned with the question of what entities exist (a task that is often identified with that of drafting a “complete inventory” of the universe) whereas metaphysics seeks to explain, of those entities, what they are (i.e., to specify the “ultimate nature” of the The English term items included in the inventor)”. In this paper I shall “design” can be develop an ontology of design in the sense that I shall used both as an try to find the place of design in the “inventory” of the universe. Moreover, I will sketch a metaphysics of de- uncountable noun sign in the sense that I will also try to figure out what and as a countable design is (though without any claim to reach what Varzi calls the “ultimate nature”). one. That being the case, it is worth noting that the English term “design” can be used both as an uncountable noun and as a countable one. As uncountable, “de- sign” designates the human activity of creating artifacts whereas, as countable, it concerns the production of a certain artifact. These two meanings are deeply intertwined and yet distinct. The strategy of this paper consists in focusing on the countable meaning with the aim of shedding some light on the uncountable one. Thus, I shall propose a unified onto- logical account of what a design is, thereby exploiting it in order to figure out what design is as a human ac- tivity, and how this is related to its forms, its processes and its values.

28 Principles of Construction The Concrete and the Abstract At a basic ontological level, we can distinguish be- tween concrete entities, which have a place in space, and abstract entities, which lack a place in space (cf. Lowe, 1998). I conceive of a design as an abstract en- tity that governs the construction of concrete entities, which I call its instances. A design is a principle of construction of its instances, that is, a norm that speci- fies how to construct its instances. Norms do not have a place in space. Although there Norms do not have can be places in space for some inscriptions that a place in space. record a norm, the existence of the norm does not depend on the existence on a particular inscription of it; the inscription can disappear while the norm keeps existing. A norm can exist even in the absence of any inscription, provided that the norm is supported by the appropriate mental states (e.g. beliefs, intentions, expectations) of the members of a social group (cf. Lewis, 1969; Gilbert, 1989; Searle, 1995; Bicchieri, 2006). Thus, a design, as a norm, lacks a place in space even though it can be recorded by inscriptions that have a place in space, and instantiated by concrete entities that also have a place in space. In everyday life, we are mainly interested in the concrete instance of a design rather than in the de- sign itself as an an abstract entity. If I have to do the laundry, I need a particular washing machine. I do not care about the abstract design of a washing machine, that is, a principle of construction of washing ma- chines. I need that this principle has been applied; I need an instance of it, a particular washing machine. However, if we take a broader perspective, we can un- derstand why designs as abstract entities also matter. When, for example, engineers design a new washing machine, their main focus of attention is the abstract entity, not the concrete one. Engineering design cre- ates an abstract entity that can then be instantiated by a multiplicity of concrete entities. In the case of architecture, it is debatable whether a design can be instantiated by a multiplicity of concrete buildings or is rather essentially associated to one building (cf. Lopes, 2007; Armando, Durbiano, 2017; Terrone, 2018a). Nevertheless, the design remains distinct from the building whose construction it governs. The latter has a place in space that the former, as a norm, lacks. From this perspective, designs can be compared to

Enrico Terrone 29 biological species, inasmuch as both are abstract en- tities that have concrete individuals as their instanc- es, namely, artifacts for designs and organisms for species. However, in the philosophy of biology, there is an alternative ontological approach according to which species are concrete individuals scattered in space, as it were, of which organisms are components (see Ghiselin, 1974; Hull, 1976). One might apply this approach to artificial individuals, thereby conceiving of a design as the particular individual who has the various concrete designed artifacts as its components. Nevertheless, the conception of a design as an abstract entity is closer to the way people usually think about designed artifacts, and therefore more suited to an ontological account of such entities, whose existence, unlike that of organisms, depends on the thoughts of An organic species the people who create and use them. For an engineer who designs it or for a driver who drives it, a particu- surely ceases to lar helicopter is not a component of a concrete entity exist when its “scattered” in space; it is an entity in its own right, last specimen that instantiates a principle of construction, namely the design of that helicopter. Moreover, an organic disappears, while species surely ceases to exist when its last specimen a design can exist disappears, while a design can exist even if there are no concrete instances of it, and thus it is better con- even if there are no ceived of as something essentially different from the concrete instances totality of its particular instances. of it. Prototypes and archetypes A design can be created either implicitly, through the construction of a concrete particular (the “prototype” or “model”), or explicitly, through the creation of a principle of construction of particulars (the “arche- type” or “project”). In the latter case the design corre- sponds to the archetype, while in the former case it is identified by the features of the prototype that can be imitated and therefore used as a principle of construc- tion of other particulars. Crawford Elder (2004) speaks of a “copying process” according to which artifacts would replicate in a similar way to genes and organ- isms. The passage from handcraft to industrial production involves a regimentation of design as principle of con- struction of instances. In handicraft production the instances of a design are constructed by a craftsman who imitated a prototype, so that the instances could

30 Principles of Construction vary significantly depending on the contingencies in which imitation occurred. In industrial production, instead, the instances are constructed by a machine that conforms to an archetype by relentlessly repeat- ing the same series of operations. In this way, the influence of contingencies is reduced to the minimum so that the instances of the same design tend to be indistinguishable one from the other. As a norm that specifies how concrete instances should be, a design allows people to avoid wasting time and energies. One does not need to reinvent the helicopter from scratch any time one wants to make a particular helicopter. One just has to consider its design, which provides one with the fundamental indications for making a particular helicopter. In this sense, designs incorporate the intentions by which designers has established the functions of artifacts and specified them through structures (by ‘struc- ture’, here, I just mean a purposeful connection of elements). As a principle of construction, a design makes it possible to construct a potentially unlimited number of instances. This is how technical reproduc- ibility becomes possible: since the helicopter has been designed, we have a principle of construction at our disposal that allows us to produce as many helicopters As a norm that as we want (provided, of course, that we have the specifies how skills and the means to build them). Although the notion of technical reproducibility is concrete instances inherent in the notion of a design (understood as the should be, a design principle of construction of a multiplicity of instanc- allows people to es), it is only with the rise of machines that an almost perfect reproduction becomes possible. This progress avoid wasting time can be positively evaluated as it allows many people and energies. to enjoy the same artifact, but also negatively assessed because it deprives an artifact of its qualitative indi- viduality that makes it somehow similar to a person. Such clash of evaluations underlies Walter Benjamin’s famous essay The work of art in the age of its techno- logical reproducibility (1936). Benjamin’s notion of technical reproducibility can be clarified by relying on two distinctions introduced by Nelson Goodman (1968): that between one-stage and two-stage works, and that between autographic and allographic works. While one-stage work are direct- ly accomplished by their makers, two-stage works involve a phase of design which is distinct from the

Enrico Terrone 31 phase of production thereby making room for the production of a plurality of instances. If the design is nothing but the production of a material blueprint (as for instance in cast sculpture), then two-stage works remain autographic just as one-stage works are. Yet, if the design can be formally represented through a notation, then the two-stage work become allographic: it is individuated by an abstract design which allows it to generate a plurality of perfectly identical instanc- es. While the transition from one-stage to two-stages works establishes technical reproducibility, the tran- sition from autography to allography brings technical reproducibility to its full deployment (cf. Terrone, 2018b). According to Beth Preston (1998), the function of a particular artifact comes from its being technically reproducible. Peter Kroes (2012) criticizes Preston’s claim arguing that technical reproducibility is only a very frequent feature in the domain of artifacts, but in principle there may be purely singular artifacts, for example “one-of-a-kind technical artefacts or systems like the Oosterschelde-dam, a major accomplishment of civil engineering protecting part of the Netherlands from flooding by the sea, or the Hubble telescope and The function of a similar unique scientific instruments” (Kroes, 2012: particular artifact 73). Even in these cases, however, artifacts remain, in principle, reproducible. It is only because of a geo- comes from its graphic contingency (in the case of the dam) or eco- being technically nomic (in the case of the telescope) that we have just reproducible. one instance, those designs do not exclude the possi- bility of other instances if the appropriate conditions become available.

The particular and the universal So far I have characterized design by relying on the distinction between the abstract and the concrete. Specifically, I have conceived of a design as an ab- stract entity that counts as a principle of construc- tion of its concrete instances. Still, there is another ontological distinction that is relevant to design, that between the universal and the particular. As Jonathan Lowe (1998) points out, the latter distinction apparent- ly matches that between the concrete and the abstract, but they are based on different criteria. A universal entity differs from a particular one in virtue of having instances, while an abstract entity differs from a con-

32 Principles of Construction crete one in virtue of lacking a precise location. The universal/particular divide and the abstract/con- crete divide are logically connected in the sense that a concrete individual can only be a particular. In virtue of having one localization, a concrete individual can only be in that place, and therefore cannot have in- stances (through which, at a certain moment, it would also be in other places). For example, in virtue of being at a specific place, the Colosseum cannot simul- taneously be in another place. So its being concrete A language is not entails its being particular. something that can On the other hand, in virtue of lacking a precise have instances. location, an abstract individual could in principle have several instances in various places. If it actually has them, it is universal. For example, the abstract individual circumference is also a universal whose instances are the particular circumferences that can be drawn in different places. However, there may be an abstract individual whose nature prevents the existence of its instances, and this would count as an abstract particular. According to Lowe (1998), mathe- matical sets are individuals of this kind. For example, the set {1, 4, 9} is an abstract individual because it lacks a location; yet it is not a universal, because it cannot have instances. In most cases relevant to design, the universal/partic- ular divide and the abstract/concrete divide go hand in hand. But there is at least one interesting sort of designed abstract particulars: programming languag- es. The C language, for example, is abstract because it lacks a location, but it is also particular because it cannot have instances. At most there are variants of the language, or its compilers and development envi- ronments, or manuals that explain how to use it. Yet, there is no particular instance of the language that en- tirely realize it at a certain place. Indeed, a language is not something that can have instances, and this seems to hold true also regarding natural languages such as Italian, English or French. The difference between natural languages and artificial language is not at the ontological level but rather at the empirical one. Italian, English or French are not created from scratch but rather emerge from a network of social interac- tions. While Dennis Ritchie created the C program- ming language in 1972, a natural language like Italian surely lacks parents and date of birth. Nevertheless,

Enrico Terrone 33 both C and Italian can be conceived of as abstract designs that are also particular artifacts. Specifically, C language is a principle of construction of computer programs while Italian language is a principle of con- struction of speech acts.

The quasi-abstract In the domain of abstract entities, we can introduce a further distinction depending on how the notion of lo- One might cation is interpreted. A totally abstract individual – or wonder whether abstract tout-court – has neither spatial nor temporal designs are to be location; it is completely outside of space and time whereas a partially abstract – or quasi-abstract – in- considered abstract dividual has no location in space but it has at least a or rather quasi- location in time. That is to say that there is not a place where this individual is, but there is a moment at abstract. which it begins to exist, as well as a “line of descent” along which its existence unfolds, and possibly a mo- ment at which it stops to exist. The circumference is a case of a totally abstract indi- vidual (unless one endorses a “constructionist” con- ception according to which geometric objects are the creations of mathematicians who first study them). In- stead, Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony is a quasi-abstract individual: it lacks a spatial location (there is not a single place to go to visit him), but it has a temporal location, starting with his creation, by Beethoven, in 1808, and continues its existence in time until today (provided that one endorses a “creationist” accounts of works of music, as not only the supporters of an- ti-Platonism but also those of “Complex Platonism” do, cf. Kania, 2017). One might wonder whether designs are to be consid- ered abstract or rather quasi-abstract. It is tempting to treat them as quasi-abstract individuals since they are the outcome of human creativity, and thus begin to exist only when some human activity occurs. In this perspective, the design of a knife begins to exist when, for the first time in history, a human being builds a knife. However, it is not clear whether this original moment constitutes an invention, that is, bringing something into existence, or rather a discovery, that is, selecting something that already had its own reality but was not accessible. Surely the particular concrete knife is invented by our “proto-cutler”, not discov- ered. But the corresponding design, as a principle of

34 Principles of Construction construction, could be regarded as something that the proto-cutler has, so to speak, selected in an abstract space of possibilities, just as the protogeometer would select the triangle or the circumference. The decisive test to establish whether an individual is abstract or quasi-abstract consists in imagining of a concrete particular that it would be tempting to treat as one of its instances, but which is not on its line of de- scent. For example, let us imagine to travel to another galaxy and meet aliens that make things that are sim- While the discovery ilar to our knives, and use them just as we use them. does not affect the Would we be willing to consider these objects and our nature of what knives as instances of the same design? If the answer is affirmative, it means that the design is abstract, not is discovered, quasi-abstract, because it may have instances that lie the invention outside its alleged line of descent. The alien proto-cut- ler discovered the design of the artificial knife just as, determines the in a completely different context, the human proto-cut- nature of what is ler did so, but these discoveries do not bear upon the invented. ontological nature of what has been discovered. On the other hand, if we conceive of the design as a quasi-abstract individual, we should conclude that the alleged knives in the other galaxy are not instances of the same design as ours, but instances of another design, which has its own lineage that begins with its invention by the alien proto-cutler and is therefore quite distinct from ours. While the discovery does not affect the nature of what is discovered, the invention determines the nature of what is invented. Since there are two inventions, the human and the alien, there are also two designs. From this perspective, one might go up to argue that all designs are what they are in virtue of belonging to one line of descent, a “tree of technology” that would be the artificial equivalent of “the tree of life” in biology. As life evolves from bacte- ria and protists to plants and animals, so technology evolves from primordial inventions such as fire and the wheel to computers and drones.

Creation, structure, function A design is created by configuring a structure in order to carry out a function. Thus, in order to establish whether a certain design is better cast as abstract or as quasi-abstract, we should consider its three funda- mental dimensions, namely, creation, structure, and function.

Enrico Terrone 35 I call f-design a design identified exclusively by its function: what makes something an instance of that design is simply the ability to perform a certain function. I call s-design a design identified not only by its function but also by its structure: what makes something an instance of that design is the ability to perform a certain function in virtue of the possession of a certain structure. Finally I call c-design a design identified not only by its function and its structure The line of descent but also by its creation: what makes something an does not affect instance of a c-design is not only the ability to perform the identification a certain function in virtue of possession of a certain structure, but also having a place in a line of descent of an instance of originated by the invention of that design. the design, which For example, the camera, as f-design, is individuated by the function of recording the distribution of light thus is an abstract that can be found in a certain environment from a individual, not a certain point of view. This f-design is instantiated by both the digital machines that are used nowadays and quasi-abstract one. the analog machines that were used in the previous century. From this perspective, the design is an ab- stract individual. If we discovered that the aliens have a device of their own to record the light, we should treat that as a instance of the design since it performs the same function as our cameras. That is to say that the line of descent does not affect the identification of an instance of the design, which thus is an abstract individual, not a quasi-abstract one. However, a more fine-grained identification can be made by taking into account the structure, i.e. by considering the s-design. This allows us, for example, to distinguish between the analog camera, which per- forms its function in virtue of a structure that includes the film, and the digital camera, which performs the same function in virtue of a structure that includes a matrix of photoelectric sensors. Thus, we have at least two s-designs (analog camera, digital camera) that correspond to one f-design (camera). I say “at least” because in principle each type of camera (both analog and digital) could individuate a s-design, in virtue of having a peculiar structure that fulfills its function. When the structure is considered in a way that in- cludes even the smallest details, one may be inclined to consider a further feature of the design: its relation to the particular creative process that made it. This leads us to the c-design, which is identified not only

36 Principles of Construction by function and structure, but also by creation. In Brian Epstein’s (2015) terms, a c-design is not only “anchored” to the circumstances of its creation, but also “grounded” in such circumstances, which do not limit themselves to putting in place the conditions for its existence (this is what “anchoring” means), but also make it the entity it is (that is what “grounding” means). For example, the Leicaflex identifies a 35mm sin- gle-lens reflex analog camera designed in 1964 by the engineers of the Leitz factory. In order to count as an instance of the Leicaflex, it is not sufficient that a particular possesses a certain structure and performs a certain function. It is also necessary that the pro- duction of this particular is correctly situated on the lineage originated from the creation of that type. If we found out that aliens who have never come into contact with our civilization have a camera that is indistinguishable from a Leicaflex (not only in terms of function but also in terms of structure), we would certainly be much surprised, but we could not to consider such an object an instance of the Leicaflex c-design, because its lineage is completely detached from that of the Leicaflex. As a c-design, Leicaflex is thus a quasi-abstract universal individual: before 1964, the year in which it was designed, not only there were no instances of it but they could not have been there either, because to be an instance of a c-design it is necessary to have a place on the line of descent that originates with its creation. A c-design has not only a function and a structure, A c-design can but also a history, which involves a date of birth, in which it is established as a principle of construction be considered of its instances, and possibly a date of death – or, if a “historical you prefer, of extinction – when for some reason individual” whose the construction of instances is no longer possible (for example because the information necessary to existence unfolds produce them is lost). In this sense, a c-design can be over time. considered a “historical individual” whose existence unfolds over time (cf. Rohrbaugh, 2003). This makes a c-design similar to particular individuals like us, even though it differs from us in virtue of being abstract and possibly having instances. A linguistic symptom of this peculiar individuality of c-designs is the use of proper names to designate them. For example, in ordinary language ‘camera’ is a common name, but

Enrico Terrone 37 Leicaflex is a proper name, as the use of uppercase at the beginning of the word indicates. The individuality of c-designs finds its juridical corre- spondence in the institution of patents, which plays for designs a role similar to that which the registry plays for people (cf. Koepsell, 2003). By patenting an invention, the inventor establishes, as it were, the birth certificate of a certain design, binding it inextri- cably to the historical context in which it was created. By patenting From then on, only those particular artifacts that their an invention, makers will appropriately place on the lineage orig- the inventor inated by the patent (by paying the due to the inven- tor) could be considered instances of that design. establishes, as it were, the birth Design: Its forms, its processes, its values The nature of a design in our technical culture is ulti- certificate of a mately captured by the notion of c-design, which casts certain design, the principle of construction as a quasi-abstract entity individuated not only by its function and its structure binding it but also by its historical origin. That being the case, inextricably to the if a design is a historically established principle of historical context construction of particular artifacts, what is design as a human activity? A straightforward answer casts in which it was design as the activity aimed at producing principles of created. construction. In this sense, design is a normative ac- tivity just like politics. While rulers produce laws that govern the life of people, designers produce norms that govern the life of artifacts. The nature of design, which I have argued to be both normative and histor- ical, affects its forms, its processes and its values, as I am going to show. As regards forms of design, a basic distinction is that between architecture and engineering. Architects typically design buildings that have an essential relation to the particular place in which are located whereas engineers typically design machines that can function regardless of the particular place in which are located. This seems to suggest that architecture de- sign is somehow less abstract than engineering design since being abstract means lacking a particular place in space. Yet, the fact that a building has a distinc- tive place in space does not mean that the design of that building in turn has a particular place in space. A design, as argued in this paper, is a principle of construction, a norm, and norms lack a particular place in space even when they specify how to con-

38 Principles of Construction struct something that has a distinctive place in space. In this sense, architecture design and engineering design share a basic ontological structure in spite of the ontological differences between the buildings that are produced by the former and the machines that are produced by the latter. As regards processes of designing, individual creation and collective creation can both originate principles of construction. Although one surely can conceive a design on one’s own, a design can also be the outcome of a complex social interactions. Arguably the latter option is much more common in our age in which technology is so complex that it is hard for one person to carry out a design on one’s own, and yet the notion of design, as such, does not rule out this possibility. However, there is a sense in which design is collective even when the principle of construction is entirely conceived by one person. As Wittgenstein argued with tremendous force in his Philosophical Investiga- tions, there cannot be a private norm. Norms, as such, depend on the collective dimension of a community. Although one can conceive a norm on one’s own, for the norm to be enforced a community is required, otherwise the norm would lack its essential capaci- ty to constrain behavior. Since a design is a kind of norm, there cannot be private design. The difference between individual design and collective design is not that the former does not require a community. Rather, Originality the difference is that the former requires a communi- warrants that ty only for the enforcement of the norm whereas the latter requires a community also for the conception of something new is the norm. created, but this As regards values, one might wonder what distin- guishes innovative design from traditional one. The is not enough for notion of creativity can be helpful for this purpose. creativity since According to a conception that is quite widespread there can be new in contemporary philosophy of mind and cognitive science, creativity is a combination of originality and things whose relevance (cf. Boden 1994). Originality warrants that production is not something new is created, but this is not enough for creativity since there can be new things whose pro- creative at all. duction is not creative at all. For instance, I can create this word “weehdzoddvxdovdvfvbò” which surely is new and yet I’ve not been especially creative in doing so. What warrants the upgrade from mere originality to creativity is relevance, that is, the capacity of pro-

Enrico Terrone 39 ducing something that contributes to some purpose. This finally provide us with another important sense in which design is an essentially collective practice even when the designer designs on its own. What bestows creativity on a designed artifact, thereby enabling us to speak of innovative design, is not only the originality of the designer’s ideas and intentions but also the relevance of the designed artifact to the purposes of the life of a community.

References Armando, A., Durbiano, G. (2017), Teoria del progetto ar- chitettonico, Roma, Carocci. Benjamin, W. (1936), The Work of Art in the Age of its Tech- nological Reproducibility, English translation in The Work of Art in the Age of its Technological Reproducibility and Other Writings on Media, Cambridge (MA), Harvard University Press, 2008. Bicchieri, C. (2006), The Grammar of Society: The Nature and Dynamics of Social Norms, New York, Cambridge University Press. Boden, M. (ed.) (1994), Dimensions of Creativity, Cambridge (MA), The MIT Press Elder, C. (2004), Real Natures and Familiar Objects, Cambridge (MA), The MIT Press. Epstein, B. (2015), The Ant Trap: Rebuilding the Foundations of the Social Sciences, Oxford, Oxford University Press. Ghiselin, M. T. (1974), A radical solution to the species problem, “Systematic Zoology”, n. 23, pp. 536-554. Gilbert, M. (1989), On Social Facts, London, Routledge. Hull, D. L. (1976), Are species really individuals?, “Systematic Zoology”, n. 25, pp. 174-191. Kania, A. (2017), The Philosophy of Music, The Stanford En- cyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2017 Edition), E. N. Zalta (ed.) [Available at: https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2017/ entries/music/]. Koepsell, D. R. (2003), The Ontology of Cyberspace: Philosophy, Law, and the Future of Intellectual Property, Chicago, Open Court Publishing. Kroes, P. (2012), Technical Artefacts: Creations of Mind and Matter: A Philosophy of Engineering Design, Berlin, Springer. Lewis, D. (1969), Convention: A Philosophical Study, Cambridge (MA), Harvard University Press. Lopes, D. M. (2007), Shikinen Sengu and the ontology of ar- chitecture in Japan, “Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism”, vol. 65, n. 1, pp. 77-84. Lowe, E. J. (1998), The Possibility of Metaphysics, Oxford, Clarendon Press.

40 Principles of Construction Preston, B. (1998), Why is a wing like a spoon? A pluralist theory of function, “Journal of Philosophy”, vol. 95, n. 5, pp. 215-254. Rohrbaugh, G. (2003), Artworks as historical individuals, “The European Journal of Philosophy”, vol. 11, n. 2, pp. 177-205. Searle, J. R. (1995), The Construction of Social Reality, New York, Free Press. Terrone, E. (2018a), Recensione di Teoria del progetto architet- tonico. Dai disegni agli effetti, “Rivista di estetica”, n. s., 67, pp. 229-234. Terrone, E. (2018b), (2018) Appearance and history: The au- tographic/allographic distinction revisited, “British Journal of Aesthetics”, 58, 1, pp. 71–87. Varzi, A. C. (2011), On doing ontology without metaphysics, “Philosophical Perspectives”, vol. 25, pp. 407-423. Wittgenstein, L. (1953), Philosophical Investigations, Oxford, Blackwell.

Enrico Terrone 41 innovation / progress • hybrid forums • sharing • social con- struction Innovazione: quale miglioramento? Pratiche di costruzione sociale

Micol Rispoli

Abstract / Innovation: What Kind of Improvement? Affiliation Social Construction Practices. Università degli Studi di Napoli The term innovation is commonly considered synony- Federico II, mous with improvement. This particularly happens Dipartimento di in liberal societies, whose economic dynamics are Studi Umanistici - Sezione di Filosofiaa expressed both in the production of objects and in the design of new services. This meaning in fact has Contacts: emerged in a productive and social context in which micol [dot] rispoli [at] unina [dot] it high technology is able to produce increasingly so- phisticated instruments and devices that, although re- Received: quiring a very high level of scientific knowledge, are 27 February 2019

offered for mass consumption. Moreover, most of the Accepted: users can only partially understand their functioning. 04 September 2019 Today innovation seems to be a permanent impera- DOI: tive both at the level of companies and industries, and 10.17454/ARDETH05.04 at the level of institutions, that widely use this term when reforming their services. However, even though ARDETH#05 the term is mostly used to feed the vicious circle of consumerism, it could also refer to shared design processes and practices capable of promoting unprec- edented methods of social construction.

43 L’innovazione come carattere dello spirito moderno Il nesso tra i termini innovazione e modernità non ha origini recenti. Da sempre il nuovo ha esercitato il fascino del rivolgimento: rerum novarum cupidus era, nella lingua latina, il rivoluzionario; portare a zero le lancette dell’orologio della storia è stato ricorrente nelle rivoluzioni, basti pensare alle date inaugurali dei calendari introdotti dopo eventi straordinari reli- giosi o civili, come la nascita di Cristo, la rivoluzione francese, l’inizio dell’era fascista. Nella sua essenza la modernità rappresenta, nell’opinione comune, una rottura con il passato e con le tradizioni che le società pre-moderne ponevano a fondamento della legittimità della loro visione del mondo. Esse infatti si fondavano su grandi racconti (grands récits) mitici che, rendendo sacra la tradizione, garantivano una certa stabilità sociale attraverso l’effetto di coesione prodotto dalla condivisione di uno stesso immaginario. La condizione moderna si è affermata attraverso un progressivo smantellamento di questi racconti e la loro sostituzione con una razionalità di tipo economi- co, che ottimizza il rapporto tra mezzi disponibili e fini che si perseguono. E lo ha fatto proprio quando, in corrispondenza del grande sviluppo della scienza nel- la prima metà del XVII secolo, la rottura con il passato nasceva dalla volontà di affermare verità esatte e di- mostrabili attraverso il metodo e la sperimentazione. Privilegiando poi il rapporto presente/futuro rispetto a quello presente/passato, il termine innovazione si è sempre più legato a quello di progresso che, insieme Privilegiando poi il ai termini di futuro e di storia, è uno dei pilastri di quella che chiamiamo condizione moderna. rapporto Oggi, dunque, il termine innovazione ha assunto presente/futuro il significato di sviluppo e miglioramento derivanti dall’avanzamento scientifico. In questa prospettiva si rispetto a quello afferma l’idea che la conoscenza scientifica sia di per presente/passato, se stessa fattore di salute, sicurezza, comfort, prospe- il termine rità e felicità: in una parola, di progresso. In realtà innovazione e progresso sono storicamente termini dal innovazione si è significato diverso e, per di più, il primo non determi- sempre più legato a na necessariamente il secondo. Fu Saint-Simon (1760-1825) a formulare per primo quello di progresso. una vera e propria dottrina del progressismo, che affidava all’industrialismo un ruolo fondamentale per realizzare gli ideali della Rivoluzione francese. Gli autori che fanno riferimento a Saint-Simon, e più

44 Innovazione: quale miglioramento? in generale quelli che, nello sguardo del socialismo scientifico di Marx, furono definiti – con una punta di disprezzo – socialisti utopisti (Owen, Fourier, Cabet, ecc.), condividono una visione dell’industria che ripo- ne grande fiducia nell’organizzazione razionale della produzione. Per Saint-Simon la crescita dell’industria – che considerava autentica istituzione moderna – era il motore di una nuova società, capace di sviluppare una politica favorevole all’interesse pubblico e alla pace sociale, con la promessa del miglioramento conti- nuo del tenore di vita collettivo. In realtà molte caratteristiche unirebbero le idee di progresso e innovazione: entrambe mettono in questione certezze, valori ereditati e tradizioni – se- gnalando una rottura con il passato – e mirano a In realtà molte integrare la conoscenza scientifica in un processo di caratteristiche sviluppo che promette una trasformazione migliorati- va del benessere collettivo. In questa chiave, innovare unirebbero le idee assume i significati di razionalizzare e modernizzare e di progresso e vede nella Ragione – come avvenne con la Rivoluzione innovazione. francese – la nuova Religione su cui fondare il cammi- no della civiltà. Oggi, però, l’innovazione corrisponde a una visione del cambiamento priva della presa e della forza di or- ganizzazione sociale che aveva prima: a venir meno è, nella visione contemporanea, il riconoscimento della conoscenza scientifica come fattore di miglioramento progressivo della condizione umana. La convinzione nel progresso della condizione moderna ha affidato alla conoscenza scientifica il ruolo di presupposto su cui realizzare un futuro di emancipazione. Così la scienza ha assunto un valore e una forza quasi religiose e ha giocato per la psiche moderna lo stesso ruolo della fede per la mentalità pre-moderna: quello di assegnare un senso al divenire umano. Sostituire, come accade oggi, l’innovazione al progres- so, significa non comprenderne la differenza. Men- tre le scienze di base vanno perdendo il loro valore originario, la tecnologia si impone sempre più come una vera e propria visione del mondo, sulla base di due false convinzioni: la capacità di miglioramento continuo e incessante e la sua neutralità. Nelle società ad alta tecnologia si ritiene che gli strumenti/oggetti messi a disposizione dei consumatori siano neutrali o oggettivi: i designer si adoperano perché la loro ado- zione appaia ovvia sotto il profilo logico, accreditando

Micol Rispoli 45 un approccio oggettivistico del fatto tecnico. In realtà, strumenti, macchine e dispositivi che compongono il fenomeno tecnico rinviano a usi costruiti socialmen- te e che andrebbero considerati nella loro globalità, all’interno di costumi e convenzioni sociali. L’approc- cio oggettivistico ritiene che le invenzioni tecniche, generate dalle scoperte scientifiche, permettano di risolvere i dilemmi vissuti dall’umanità o che possano semplificare radicalmente la vita. Nel divenire una vera e propria visione del mondo, la tecnologia ha coinvolto la conoscenza scientifica nell’ingiunzione permanente a innovare. Attribuendo alla coppia scienza e tecnologia il ruolo fondamentale Ci troviamo di per l’intero funzionamento economico industriale, fronte a una sorta per legare intimamente la produzione al consumo ininterrotto di oggetti e servizi correlati, l’innovazione di processo di programma la loro obsolescenza e stimola incessan- modernizzazione temente il loro rinnovamento attraverso il marketing, che nello stesso tempo suscita e modella i desideri permanente che dei consumatori. Ci troviamo di fronte a una sorta di si svolge però processo di modernizzazione permanente che si svolge nel quadro di un però nel quadro di un paradigma “post-progressivo”: un miglioramento scientifico e tecnologico sviluppato paradigma “post- senza una visione del mondo e senza alcuna ambizio- progressivo”: un ne politica, creando in tal modo le condizioni più fa- vorevoli al mantenimento e allo sviluppo delle logiche miglioramento capitalistiche. scientifico e L’alienazione dal mondo tecnologico Hannah Arendt propose il concetto originale di sviluppato senza alienazione dal mondo (Arendt, 1954) per indicare una visione del la posizione dell’uomo moderno che, soggiogato da una profonda convinzione nelle verità scientifiche, mondo e senza preferisce i calcoli razionali alle evidenze sensibili alcuna ambizione che costituiscono la base del semplice buon senso, i cui insegnamenti consentono alle persone di resistere politica. alle pressioni dottrinali che alimentano i totalitarismi. Perciò la Arendt sosteneva che scienza moderna e filo- sofia non solo non erano state in grado di contrastare l’ascesa della barbarie politica del XX secolo, ma le avevano in qualche modo fornito le condizioni di pos- sibilità quantomeno psicologiche. Non solo, ma questa alienazione di cui è vittima l’uomo moderno è sempre in crescita. L’iscrizione del paradigma dell’innovazio- ne nella prospettiva moderna e il riconoscimento del suo carattere scientifico e tecnico amplificano questo

46 Innovazione: quale miglioramento? fenomeno: adottando l’innovazione, intesa in questo senso, come motore economico e sociale, l’alienazione dal mondo è destinata a crescere. Allo stesso modo l’orizzonte del rinnovamento perma- nente di prodotti e servizi basati sul desiderio del con- sumatore rende vana ogni certezza di previsione e, Sostituire, come in una condizione dominata da questo paradigma, gli accade oggi, uomini rischiano di diventare estranei al loro stesso divenire. Essere attori del proprio divenire significa l’innovazione al provare, per quanto possibile, a dirigerne il corso e progresso, significa assumersene la responsabilità. non comprenderne Ridare un senso al divenire la differenza. Il modello di sviluppo indotto dalla nozione di inno- vazione si basa sul carattere più radicale del concetto di progresso: il distacco dalla tradizione con la forza del sapere. Questa volta però senza riprenderne la spinta sociale e morale. Sostituendosi al progresso nelle economie dei paesi sviluppati, l’innovazione ha davvero rinunciato a quella speranza che le aveva dato valore nella religione laica del modernismo? O forse c’è un altro modo di chiedersi cosa sia davvero un’innovazione migliorativa? E chi dovrebbe affronta- re questa domanda, gli utenti-consumatori, i politici, i filosofi e gli scienziati sociali? In ultimo, può il concet- to di innovazione essere inteso al di là o al di fuori del capitalismo? E in che modo? Oggi sembra interessante immaginare un modello di attività creativa che si collochi oltre la concezione innovativa intesa come miglioramento di un prodotto o servizio a fini commerciali e che possa contribuire a costruire comunità dagli interessi, forme di azione Essere attori del e obiettivi spesso assai eterogenei: ingegneri e in- proprio divenire dustriali, artisti, designer, attori del mondo digitale, gruppi di utenti, cittadini, ecc. In questo sguardo si significa provare, può interpretare l’innovazione in senso politico. per quanto

Certo, la genesi dell’innovazione sfugge in gran parte ai modi possibile, a gerarchici e pianificati tipici delle organizzazioni ereditate dirigerne il corso dalla modernità; ma poiché riesce a mettere insieme attori e assumersene la molto differenti dagli interessi eterogenei, con diverse modalità di intervento e obiettivi inizialmente divergenti, responsabilità. non si presenta più come antipolitica, né come a-politica. Al contrario: la gestione di un progetto innovativo permette di sperimentare nuove forme di socialità (…) che assumono valore dal punto di vista politico; in tal senso favorisce la

Micol Rispoli 47 reinvenzione dell’interesse generale. Anche se essa riguar- da oggi, in modo ancora assai parziale, solo le modalità di gestione dell’innovazione, ci lascia intravedere la possibilità di una civiltà nuova a venire (Ménissier, 2016: 56-57).

Innovazione/partecipazione - Innovazione/condivisione Questo orizzonte, che amplia la latitudine dello sguar- do del progetto, ha trovato già in passato alcune forme di interrogazione critica. Per quanto riguarda l’archi- tettura è nota quella sviluppata da Giancarlo De Carlo, attraverso l’idea e la pratica della partecipazione. Per De Carlo

il fuoco del ragionamento (…) è la questione culturale: l’architettura come questione culturale. (…) Perché l’archi- tettura sia partecipata, occorre non tanto che la gente sia coinvolta nella sua realizzazione, ma che sia partecipe della Perché sua costruzione, non in senso tettonico, ma in senso cultu- l’architettura rale. Occorre che la società si appropri dell’architettura, la sia partecipata, faccia propria, si occupi della costruzione di un suo spazio di esistenza (Marini, 2013: 34). occorre non tanto che la gente sia Si tratta di una prospettiva che trova nella riflessione contemporanea sviluppi che vanno ben oltre le forme coinvolta nella partecipative alle quali ci si è appena riferiti. sua realizzazione, Bruno Latour, nel saggio Nessuna innovazione senza rappresentanza! Un parlamento delle cose per i nuovi ma che sia esperimenti socio scientifici, affronta esplicitamente il partecipe della sua tema di quelli che definisce esperimenti collettivi. costruzione Che cosa sono gli esperimenti collettivi, quelli che potrem- mo anche chiamare esperimenti socio-tecnici? Si tratta di esperimenti condotti senza regole? Sarebbe auspicabile sta- bilire delle regole in proposito? Che cosa significa disporre di regole secondo la vecchia definizione di razionalità o di comportamento razionale? E ancora, che cosa ha a che fare tutto ciò con il concetto europeo di democrazia? (Latour, 2006: 67-68).

Su queste domande Latour espone i termini di ciò che sta diventando un movimento di pensiero molto vasto. La sua tesi è che molti di questi esperimenti collettivi sono usciti fuori dai limiti che un tempo li confinavano in laboratori specialistici, per coinvolge- re oggi una pluralità di persone. Un tempo la scienza era un’attività praticata dentro luoghi chiusi in cui lavoravano specialisti, mentre fuori cominciava il re-

48 Innovazione: quale miglioramento? gno della pura esperienza empirica, del tutto diverso da quello della sperimentazione scientifica. Oggi il laboratorio ha in molti casi allargato i suoi confini a tutto il pianeta. I suoi strumenti sono ovun- que – basti pensare, ad esempio, al sistema globale di localizzazione, ovvero la rete satellitare che consente oggi di raccogliere dati con lo stesso grado di precisio- ne sia dentro che fuori dai laboratori, o ai sistemi di monitoraggio relativi all’acidificazione delle acque, alle attività dei vulcani e dei ghiacciai – e tengono Oggi gli sotto controllo continuo il mondo esterno. esperimenti sono Inoltre oggi gli esperimenti sono condotti da tutti noi a condotti da tutti scala reale e in tempo reale, come è diventato del tutto evidente con il problema drammatico del riscalda- noi a scala reale mento globale. In questo caso, per quanto siano in e in tempo reale, corso simulazioni, modellazioni e monitoraggi com- plessi attraverso potenti calcolatori, come è diventato del tutto evidente il vero esperimento è condotto su di noi, con noi, attraverso il comportamento di ognuno e di tutti e con la partecipazione con il problema degli oceani, della stessa atmosfera e anche della corrente drammatico del del golfo – come sostengono alcuni geografi. L’unico modo riscaldamento per sapere se il riscaldamento globale è veramente dovuto all’attività antropica è quello di misurare le emissioni nocive globale. che produciamo, di interromperle e di verificare che cosa succede a quel punto sul piano collettivo. Si tratta di un vero esperimento, ma un esperimento a scala reale nel quale siamo tutti coinvolti (Latour, 2006: 72)

Un esperimento senza neppure un proprio protocollo e senza che a nessuno sia esplicitamente assegnata la responsabilità del suo controllo. Chi ha il potere di dire l’ultima parola, di decidere per tutti noi? Per questo Latour, quando afferma che è scomparsa la distinzione tra interno ed esterno del laboratorio, ci ricorda semplicemente che il dibattito scientifico contemporaneo sta delineando la presenza di forum ibridi (Callon et al., 2001) spazi compositi che mettono insieme sapienti, esperti professionisti della politica, cittadini, autori di dibattiti socio-tecnici (dismissione del nucleare, AIDS, ecc). Finora sono esistiti soltanto un forum che aveva il compito di rappresentare le cose della natura – dove si parlava di rappresentazione come accuratezza, precisione, competenza – e un forum che aveva il compito di rappresentare gli uomini appartenenti a

Micol Rispoli 49 una società – dove si parlava di rappresentanza come affidabilità, fiducia, obbedienza. Oggi i due significati di rappresentanza si sono fusi e un esempio di forum ibrido è proprio il dibattito attuale sul riscaldamento del pianeta.

Intorno a un tavolo stanno seduti i diversi portavoce: alcuni rappresentano l’atmosfera alta, altri le diverse lobbies del pe- trolio e del gas, altri ancora le organizzazioni non governati- ve, altri ancora rappresentano nel senso proprio del termine, i rispettivi elettori. La netta differenza che prima separava i rappresentanti delle cose e quelli delle persone è sempli- cemente svanita. Ciò che conta ora è che tutti i portavoce si ritrovano insieme, in una stessa stanza, sono coinvolti nello stesso esperimento collettivo, e discutono nello stesso momento delle interconnessioni che coinvolgono persone e Le regole di metodo cose (Latour, 2006: 73). sono diventate Questo, per Latour, significa – con esplicito riferimen- regole nuove, to alle tesi sostenute da Peter Sloterdijk (1999a) – che non servono per occorre individuare una nuova politica. Con una necessaria premessa: governare il Parco Umano, ma per pensare agli artefatti in termini di progetto significa con- cepirli sempre meno come oggetti e pensarli sempre più elaborare insieme come cose. Gli artefatti stanno diventando concepibili come il protocollo complessi assemblaggi di questioni contraddittorie – questo è il significato etimologico della parola “cosa”, thing, in inglese, degli esperimenti così come in altre lingue europee. Nel momento in cui le cose collettivi. sono prese in considerazione per verificare se sono bene o male progettate, allora esse non appaiono più come materie di fatto ma come materie in questione (Latour, 2009: 265).

Da qui nasce l’espressione che egli utilizza per indi- care questa nuova politica, intesa come costituzione di un ‘Parlamento delle Cose’ (Parliament of Things). Le regole di metodo sono diventate regole nuove, non servono per governare il Parco Umano, ma per elaborare insieme il protocollo degli esperimenti collettivi. Facendo, inoltre, esplicito riferimento a una riflessione di John Dewey, Latour opera un parados- sale ribaltamento tra i significati di privato e pubblico nella condizione contemporanea. Per Dewey infatti privato non significa necessariamente individuale o soggettivo, ma qualcosa che è ben noto, prevedibile, comunemente accettato. Il pubblico, invece, inizia con

50 Innovazione: quale miglioramento? ciò che non possiamo vedere né prevedere, con le conseguenze impreviste, indesiderate, invisibili delle nostre azioni collettive. Dobbiamo oggi Contrariamente a tutti i sogni di politica razionale che hanno devastato il nostro continente per secoli, Dewey equipara il trattare i “casi” pubblico non alla superiore conoscenza da parte delle auto- scientifici e tecnici rità, ma alla loro cecità. Il pubblico nasce quando siamo con- con modalità non fusi, quando non sappiamo il perché delle cose, (…) quando non ci sono esperti in grado di determinare le conseguenze differenti da quelle dell’azione collettiva (Latour, 2006: 87). con le quali ci Nasce perciò l’esigenza di assumere quello che Latour occupiamo di tutto definisce principio di precauzione: un principio che ciò che fa parte non comporta una sospensione di iniziativa, ma che è invece un richiamo alla sperimentazione, all’invenzio- della nostra vita ne, all’esplorazione e, ovviamente, al rischio. Ciò signi- quotidiana. fica che noi dobbiamo oggi trattare i “casi” (matters of concerns) scientifici e tecnici (e cioè gran parte delle grandi questioni contemporanee) con modalità non differenti da quelle con le quali ci occupiamo di tutto ciò che fa parte della nostra vita quotidiana. Lo stesso vale per quel che riguarda piantare alberi, procreare, custodire denaro, prestarlo, armarci contro potenziali nemici, e così via. Di fronte a tutte queste decisioni, prendere dei rischi e prendere delle pre- cauzioni sono sinonimi: più rischiamo, più dobbiamo essere attenti e vigili. È ciò che chiamiamo esperienza. Lo sviluppo del principio di precauzione significa che ciò che è sempre stato vero nell’esperienza quotidia- na, diventa ora vero anche per l’ambito della scienza e della tecnologia: piuttosto che aspettare di essere assolutamente certi prima di fare la minima mossa, sappiamo che dobbiamo sperimentare mantenendo l’equilibrio tra l’audacia e la preoccupazione. Se, con Dewey, consideriamo che il pubblico non è nelle mani degli specialisti illuminati, è proprio il ruolo dell’esperto – inteso nel modo tradizionale – una figura, cioè, che ha l’incarico di mediare fra chi produce conoscenza nel chiuso dei laboratori e il resto della società, che va scomparendo. Negli esperimenti collettivi in cui siamo oggi impegnati questa divisione non esiste più. Michel Callon, Pierre Lascoumes e Yan- nick Barthe (2001) propongono di sostituire la vecchia nozione di esperto con quella più ampia di co-ricer- catore. Siamo portati tutti a formulare problemi di

Micol Rispoli 51 ricerca, sia chi è rinchiuso nel suo laboratorio sia chi è definito da questi autori ricercatore esterno (ovvero tutti noi). Siamo tutti impegnati, a vario titolo, negli esperimenti collettivi su temi diversi come il clima, l’alimentazione, il paesaggio, la salute, la progettazio- ne urbana, la cittadinanza, la comunicazione tecnica, ecc.: come consumatori, come militanti, come cittadi- ni, siamo tutti co-ricercatori. Vi è ovviamente differenza tra le diverse occupazioni, Come consumatori, ma non quella differenza che esiste tra chi produce come militanti, conoscenza e chi è investito dalle sue applicazioni. come cittadini, Conclusione: ri-costruire ambiti comunitari. siamo tutti Crisi economica, crisi ambientale e rivoluzione tec- co-ricercatori. nologica – quella informatica in particolare – stanno determinando, nel loro insieme, una radicale trasfor- mazione di stili di vita, di prospettive e di capacità di immaginare il mondo futuro. Sembra che il sapere progettuale sia divenuto strumento del tutto inade- guato per generare prestazioni ambientali, sociali, economiche e che corrisponda in qualche modo a questa condizione se non liquida, comunque instabile e incerta. Qual è il destino dell’architettura in queste condizio- ni? Appare sempre più necessaria una nuova idea di progetto dello spazio fisico. In tale prospettiva il progetto come azione sociale è al centro di molti lavori contemporanei che si interrogano su spazi, attrezza- ture e infrastrutture per l’abitare, sui quali peraltro le ultime due Biennali di Venezia (2016 e 2018) hanno posto, in diverso modo, l’accento. Tra le sperimentazioni più interessanti in tal senso va annoverata quella della piattaforma multidisciplinare spagnola Zoohaus, i cui membri, nel 2010, insieme ai residenti del quartiere La Latina, hanno occupato e assunto la gestione di un lotto libero nel centro di Madrid ribattezzato El Campo de Cebada. Grazie a operazioni quali la creazione di un orto comunitario, l’organizzazione di eventi teatrali, sportivi e musicali, l’attivazione di laboratori per bambini, il progetto può essere considerato come un esempio un commons ur- bani. Nel 2013 El Campo, diventato un modello per gli spazi della comunità in Spagna, ha ricevuto il primo premio dalla Biennale di architettura e urbanistica spagnola. Si tratta di uno dei progetti di infrastruttura open source che invitano a riconsiderare la natura

52 Innovazione: quale miglioramento? della cosa pubblica attraverso processi ricorsivi delibe- ratamente aperti al riadattamento. (Domínguez Rubio, Fogué, 2013) Un’altra sperimentazione esemplare è quella della Cooperativa La Borda che, insieme alla Cooperativa di architetti Lacol, ha promosso un modello per fornire abitazioni economiche in regime non speculativo. Per il progetto, iniziato nel 2012, di 32 unita coabitative per 60 inquilini, a Sants (Barcellona), la municipalità ha offerto un terreno, riservandosi il diritto di super- ficie, e banche legate alla economia sociale hanno favorito l’accesso al credito. Le linee guida sono: la partecipazione degli inquilini all’intero processo, la creazione di strutture flessibili riadattabili in futuro e l’introduzione di iniziative di quartiere. Attraverso workshop ogni famiglia può progettare e lavorare insieme ai tecnici, introducendo spazi produttivi e ambiti comuni per favorire la vita comunitaria e ottimizzare i servizi. Tra gli aspetti più significativi vi e un cambiamento della definizione di domesticità e una trasformazione dei limiti tra spazio pubblico e spazio individuale a favore di una condizione a meta strada tra sfera pubblica e privata. Questa modalità Questa modalità del progetto investe edifici, quartie- del progetto si ri, luoghi pubblici, infrastrutture, ecc. e si realizza attraverso processi di azione progettuale condivisa realizza attraverso che producono forme di coesione molto più intense di processi di azione quelle legate alla semplice partecipazione (almeno nel progettuale senso che questo termine ha assunto nelle esperienze precedenti). In queste azioni progettuali il concetto condivisa che tradizionale di autorialità viene sostituito da pratiche producono forme di condivisione del processo creativo che possono con- tribuire alla creazione di inedite forme comunitarie. di coesione molto Può essere questo un modo per interpretare posi- più intense di tivamente la riflessione di Peter Sloterdijk laddove, quelle legate nel terzo volume della sua trilogia (Sloterdijk, 1998, 1999b, 2004), descrive l’idea di società schiumosa, alla semplice successiva al definitivo tramonto della macrosfera partecipazione europea.

Per mezzo del concetto di schiuma, descriviamo degli agglomerati di bolle. (…) Questa espressione designa dei sistemi o degli aggregati di vicinanze sferiche in cui ogni ‘cellula’ costituisce un contesto auto complementare – in linguaggio corrente: un mondo, un luogo – (…) o ancora un focolare (Haushalt) (…). Ciascuno di questi focolari, ciascuna

Micol Rispoli 53 di queste simbiosi e alleanze è una serra di relazioni (Be- ziehung-Treibhaus) sui generis (Sloterdijk, 2004: 55).

Dunque ciò che rimane è un agglomerato di microsfe- re, correlate tra loro in macrosfere minime (del tipo delle comunità religiose o politiche), ma niente che assomigli più al sistema di inclusività totale che era la macrosfera di un tempo. Nelle schiume contempo- ranee crolla l’interconnessione che la macrosfera oc- È possibile cidentale europea (e le macrosfere in genere) dava ai stabilire processi vari momenti di cui i rapporti umani sono composti. di ricomposizione In ogni punto nella schiuma si aprono delle visioni regionali parziali, aggregati nel limitrofo, ma non si dispone di una visione d’insieme (…) quando parliamo di schiume in questo tono, ci siamo più ampi di apertamente separati dal simbolo centrale della metafisica microsfere capaci classica, la monosfera che riunisce tutto: l’Uno in forma di sfera e la sua proiezione nelle costruzioni centrali panottiche di sviluppare reti (Sloterdijk, 2004: 62-63). di interconnessioni comuni, forme Rispetto agli estremi della grande, unica sfera metafisica – di cui fortunatamente non avvertiamo più il bisogno – e comunitarie più della dissoluzione nella società liquida annunciata da ampie e condivise Bauman (Bauman, 2000), è possibile stabilire processi di ricomposizione parziali, aggregati più ampi di microsfere senza pretese capaci di sviluppare reti di interconnessioni comuni, forme totalizzanti. comunitarie più ampie e condivise senza pretese totaliz- zanti. Per farlo, piuttosto che pensare a prodotti innovativi, dar luogo a processi, procedure progettuali innovativi che coinvolgono più attori appare sempre di più oggi una strada da intraprendere, se non per scelta, quanto meno per condi- zione (Sloterdijk, 2009).

Bibliografia Akrich, M. et al. (2002), The Key Success in Innovation. The Art of Interessement, Uxbridge, Brunel University. Arendt, H. (1954), The Human Condition, Chicago, University Chicago Press; ed. it. Vita activa. La condizione umana, Mila- no, Bompiani, 1989. Bauman, Z. (2000), Liquid modernity, Cambridge, Polity Press; trad. it. di S. Minucci, Modernità liquida, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 2011. Callon, M. et al. (2001), Agir dans un monde incertain. Essai sur la démocratie technique, Paris, Le Seuil. Domínguez Rubio, F., Fogué, U. (2013), Technifying public space and publicizing infrastructures: Exploring new urban political ecologies through the square of General Vara del

54 Innovazione: quale miglioramento? Rey, “International Journal of Urban and Regional Re- search”, vol. 37. Innerarity, D. (2006), La démocratie sans l’État. Essai sur le gouvernement des societés complexes, Paris, Flammarion- Climats. Latour, B. (2006), Nessuna innovazione senza rappresentanza! Un parlamento delle cose per i nuovi esperimenti socioscienti- fici, in M. Bucchi (a cura di), Sapere, Fare, Potere. Verso un’in- novazione responsabile, Soveria Mannelli (CZ), Rubettino. Latour, B. (2009), Un Prometeo cauto? Primi passi verso una filosofia del design, in E/C serie speciale, numero monografico dal titolo Il discorso del design. Pratiche di progetto e saper fare semiotico (a cura di D. Mangano, A. Mattozzi) nn. 3/4, 2009. Marini, S. (2013), Introduzione. Scegliere la parte, in S. Mari- ni, G. De Carlo (a cura di), L’architettura della partecipazione, Macerata, Quodlibet. Ménissier, T. (2016), Innovation et Histoire. Une critique philosophique, “Quaderni Communication, technologies, pouvoir”, n. 91. Sloterdijk, P. (1998), Sphären I - Blasen, Mikrosphärologie, Frankfurt a.M., Suhrkamp; trad. it. di G. Bonaiuti (a cura di), Sfere I. Bolle, Roma, Meltemi, 2009. Sloterdijk, P. (1999a), Regeln für den Menschenpark, Frankfurt a.M., Suhrkamp. Sloterdijk, P. (1999b), Spharen 2: Globen, Frankfurt a.M., Suhrkamp; trad. it. di G. Bonaiuti (a cura di), Sfere II. Globi, Milano, Raffaello Cortina, 2014. Sloterdijk, P. (2004) Sphären III - Schäume, Plurale Sphärolo- gie, Frankfurt a.M., Suhrkamp; trad. it. di G. Bonaiuti (a cura di), Sfere III. Schiume, Milano, Raffaello Cortina, 2015. Sloterdijk, P. (2009), Du muβt dein Leben ändern. Über Religion, Artistik und Anthropotechnik, Frankfurt a.M., Suhrkamp; trad. it. di P. Perticari (a cura di), Devi cambiare la tua vita, Milano, Raffaello Cortina, 2010.

Micol Rispoli 55 abstract machines • subjectiv- ity • inno- vation pro- duction • politics • black box The Production of Project A Subversive Guide to the Subject of Innovation

Camilo Vladimir de Lima Amaral

Abstract Affiliation This paper analyses how the myth of the individual Universidade Federal de Goiás, architect as a subject of innovation is an abstract ma- Faculty of Visual chinery for capturing the work of other architects. To Arts do that, it develops a historical regressive analysis on Contacts: how innovation is actually produced, and the limits camilovla [at] in which it is bounded. Furthermore, it analyses the ufg [dot] br role of narratives in the interpellation of architectural Received: subjects, and how it defines a position from which 26 March 2019 subjects can act politically in the field. By doing so, it unveils the mechanisms behind the architectural Accepted: 04 November 2019 black boxes (the office and the prince chronicles). In order to provide a new political role for architecture, DOI: it builds a different conception of the subject that 10.17454/ARDETH05.05

produces these projects, exploiting the idea of trans- ARDETH#05 subjectivity in architecture.

57 Dead subjects of innovation In 2012, when Oscar Niemeyer died at the age of 105, he was still ‘designing’ a vast number of buildings around the world. A few days after his funeral, his grandson, the architectural director at Niemeyer’s office, declared that the firm would finish the projects already started, setting an end to 78 years of archi- tectural practice, even if one could not measure the A few days after size of Niemeyer’s contribution towards the end of his life. Nevertheless, Niemeyer remained very talkative his funeral, his and engaging in his lectures, always surrounded by grandson, declared admirers astonished by his unceasing commitment to designing. As expected, Niemeyer left a foundation to that the firm would protect the image of his architectural legacy, even if finish the projects his grandchildren were left in a fierce legal battle over already started. his heritage. The death of Zaha Hadid, in early 2016, led to a very different turn of events. At the time, Zaha Hadid Architects (ZHA) had offices in London, Beijing and Hong Kong. These offices had already developed more than 950 projects, and the firm was about to open a new office in New York, with additional plans for offices in Dubai and Mexico. Some weeks after Hadid’s death, finding the world of architecture in mourning, Patrik Schumacher, who had become a partner at ZHA in 2002, declared to the NY Times that ZHA would continue designing (Erlanger, 2016). According to Schumacher, Hadid had set a precedent; she had imbued the practice of architecture with a ‘new repertoire’ and a new ‘spirit’. On this basis, he could ensure that the firm’s 400 staff members could confidently continue her vision and research (Erlanger, 2016). In Schumacher’s words, thus lives Zaha Hadid:

any star in architecture has been born in the discipline itself, and emerges through schools, competitions and colleagues. (…) We want to tell the world that we’re still a viable, vibrant address for major work of cultural importance. (…) My ambition is to become more visible as a leader of the field to clients (…) This star signature is a relatively new phenome- non (…) We feel very confident that we will carry on and go forward with her vision and her legacy and the experimental research she established in the office (Patrik Schumaker in Erlanger, 2016).

58 The Production of ProJect The magic produced by these architects seems now not to even require them to be alive. This remarkable phenomenon may be pointing, on the one hand, to the fact that the concrete individual is not the actu- al innovative force behind architecture and, on the other hand, to the emergence of a phantasmagorical era in architecture (an era of dead architects). Thus, some new issues inevitably arise: would it be possible for a well-trained and highly tuned team to continue not only the legacy but also the innovation associated with a dead architect? And more radically, could we, for instance, resuscitate Le Corbusier? Obviously dead people cannot design, those paradox- ical questions have the purpose to reveal that these individuals – entrepreneurs, star architects, and alike – were never the creative force behind archi- tecture. Instead, they are operative images capturing The magic collective work as if it was done by a single person. These images are built by the discipline’s ideology – produced by these narratives, historiographies, biographies, myths, and architects seems so on. The critical point is that these images become now not to even instruments of power – distinctions in the words of Bourdieu 1996 – setting some architects in the control require them to be of the work of others. alive. In other words, the argument of this paper could be synthetized as follows: the myth of the architect as an enlightened genius is a form of abstract machinery for harvesting symbolic distinction in the field, which in turn is used for capturing the work of other architects. This leads us to some further questions: who is the subject of architectural production and which is the limits of his innovation? And are individuals required to envision social agency? Mariana Mazzucato (2011) has recently attacked the myths of individual ingenuity as the motor behind Production is the innovation. Most notably, she debunked the myth result of a social that the iPhone was the product of the ‘vision’ of Steve Jobs, exposing how iPhone’s major innovations and collective have come from state-funded research, i.e., they have process – a ‘general been collectively produced. Then, such innovations have simply been appropriated by companies and social knowledge’ produced by thousands of workers overseas. In this in the words of Karl sense, Mazzucato’s argument reinforces the idea Marx. that production is the result of a social and collective process – a ‘general social knowledge’ in the words of Karl Marx (no date [1857]).

Camilo Vladimir de Lima Amaral 59 Arguably, recognizing and exposing the collective nature of architectural production is a way of sub- verting the relations of power operating behind design production. This is the case because the field of architectural labour is today structured by these individualistic myths. All over the world, young archi- tect, students and interns, are enchanted, seduced and attracted by these mythological images, and they are working virtually free for them. Arguably, to under- stand architectural innovation as collective rather than individual includes changes in the very meaning and purpose of architectural work. Rather than working for mythological figures, the meaning of architectural practice becomes the struc- turing of collective subjects able to transform social space – it is worth mentioning that these collective subjects might include more than just architects. In this sense, to think on collective subjects does not eliminate the agency of single subjects, as they have a role in articulating social knowledge and structuring collectivities. What vanishes is the phantasmagorical genius. And rather than reproducing narratives, biographies and the mythological power of entrepreneurs, the The idea of purpose of architectural theory becomes a social innovation has a critique able to unveil the forces and power relations operating behind the production of space. It goes history of its own, without saying, that is not the expected social role of which can give us design – it is a subversion of it – and that opens excit- some clues. ing fields of research. If we can understand the mechanisms behind the collective production of innovation, we might be able to envision collective subjects producing any architec- tural innovation – be it technical, formal, aesthetical, methodological or applied creativity. The first step, in order to do that, is to notice that the idea of innova- tion has a history of its own, which can give us some clues. Benoît Godin (2015; 2017) has a long research on the intellectual history of the concept. Although his research concerns mainly the different uses, context and meaning of the word, without trying to find a definition of its own, it provides important insights in the matter. He demonstrates how the idea changed between negative and positive connotations. Godin (2010; 2014: 7) asserts that the word innovation (in +

60 The Production of ProJect novare) became widely used in the 16th and 17th centu- ry context of Reformation. In that context innovation had a pejorative connotation and it was used to ac- cuse others of attacking the church doctrine. Later, he argues, the connection between socialism and inno- vation was first done by its critics, rather than by its followers, whereas “Social innovation is not foreign to the idea of social reform, under a new name.” (Godin, 2017: 8). In this sense, he argues that just recently ‘technological innovation’ came to refer positively to capitalism, while ‘social innovation’ became positively related to a socialist point of view (Godin, 2017: 4). Godin (2015: 58) also notice how the idea of innova- tion was also used in Machiavelli’s seminal work The Prince as a tool to ‘stabilize a changing world’ (we shall return to the idea of the prince later). If we take this broader history in mind, and the idea If we take this that in legal terms the word novation means the substitution of a new contract in place of an old one, broader history we can make sense of the role that innovation has in mind, and the in contemporary context. The prefix in has a double idea that in legal use: it can mean a negation (as in inorganic) or it can mean an intensification (as in inland or incarnation). terms the word Arguably this sets a realm of operation to the idea novation means of innovation, which could be both understood as not creating a new contract, and at the same time as the substitution intensifying and reshuffling the arrangements inside of a new contract an old contract – especially if we focus on the realm of ‘social contracts’. The history, that Godin presents us, in place of an old shows how the controversies around the term innova- one, we can make tion in the 17th Century were disputes inside the realm sense of the role of Christianism, not representing threats of elimina- tion to the Church. Similarly, the use by Machiavelli that innovation has was not contesting the institution of the ‘principality’; in contemporary rather, it aimed to ensure those systems could endure. Among the many meaning of the word innovation, context. Godin (2008) studied from simplifications that equates newness with innovation to ‘linear models’ that places innovation in between pure science and the market. Subliminal to these discussions is rather individuals are imperious to envision or act upon the future. The standpoint of this paper is radically different. It does not conceive the subject as equal to the individual. Subjects are both under certain social rules (subjected to it) and operating in a certain way on it (within and/ or against it). Individuals is a peculiar conception of

Camilo Vladimir de Lima Amaral 61 subjects, conceiving it as autonomous atoms. ‘In-divid- uals’ presupposes a subject at the same time not fur- ther divisible (essential) and divided/separated from larger assemblies (such as society and communities). Alternatively, this paper investigates subjectivities operating inside what would be perceived as individ- ual subjects. In this sense, these “individual” subjects are seen as a structured amalgam of contradictory pre-individuali- ties (we shall discuss this further below). In this sense, individuals have neither the monopoly of agency – the ability to produce social change – neither the control of it – as long as they are not even aware of the forces operating behind their subjectivities. In this sense, this paper argues that in order to provide a practical and theoretical gateway towards an intensified social novation (in-novation as intensification) we need to confront the idea of individual subjects producing innovation. Thus, this paper is thought as a guide for that: a deconstruction of individual architects’ phan- tasmagorias.

Regressions in the assembly line of invention Jobs did not invent the abstract machinery for ex- This paper argues propriating inventions as described by Mazzucato. that in order to Thomas Edison is perhaps the most iconic modern ‘inventor’ and has been systematically depicted in provide a practical schools and by the media as the genius behind the and theoretical invention of such things as the ‘light bulb’. Neverthe- gateway towards less, a series of studies of the actual means by which the inventions (commonly attributed to Edison) were an intensified social produced shows a different picture. In the early days novation we need of the Thomas Edison laboratory in West Orange, he was employing more than 200 scientists, craftsmen, la- to confront the bourers and machinists. When the laboratory expand- idea of individual ed and became associated with a factory complex, the number of employees jumped to 5000, and today subjects producing General Electric employs more than 300,000 people innovation. (Padgett, 2016). At the beginning, these men were paid only ‘working man’s wage’; however, the famous inventor reportedly said that – in exchange for their ambition – his employees were given the opportuni- ty to work side-by-side with a genius (Bellis, 2016). However, how much of the lab’s creative labour came from Edison and how much came from his workers? Carlson (1988) has studied the process by which the

62 The Production of ProJect alkaline storage battery was invented. He argues that during the course of this invention, Thomas Edison developed a new way to produce inventions. Previ- ously, Edison would work with mechanics and crafts- men in a relatively loose way, wherein those workers would investigate diverse aspects of an invention, and Invention became eventually Edison would step in ‘only at the appro- an ‘orderly’, priate moment’ to ‘pull together the various discov- eries and improvements into a successful invention’. ‘predictable’ Later, in Edison’s laboratory, large groups of chemists, process, making engineers and college-educated scientists would work Edison’s ‘large staff on experiments focused on very specific goals, in a systematic, step-by-step arrangement of assignments. and substantial In shifting from a ‘divergent’ to a ‘convergent’ style, facilities’ an Edison became a manager who oversaw the project, a advantage to beat role that left him time to focus on strategies of produc- tivity and commercialisation (for instance, he partici- competitors. pated in the association that developed ‘programmed obsolescence’). However, the ‘most important’ role now played by Edison was to ‘motivate his research team’, using ‘decidedly informal’ techniques of ‘mo- tivating and directing’ through his ‘use of a personal, folksy style [that] may well have been deliberate’ (Carlson, 1988: 10-11).

Although this convergent approach produced highly reliable results, it came at the cost of requiring over 50,000 individual experiments. Furthermore, Edison had thoroughly routin- ized the innovation process. By breaking down the research into a sequence of small, standardized experiments, Edison had altered the creative process from hands-on ingenuity and skilled observation to persistence and careful re- cord-keeping. Gone were the last vestiges of the ‘heroic’ myth of invention in which insight came in a blinding flash; results now came by plodding through innumerable experiments (Carlson, 1988: 6).

Invention became an ‘orderly’, ‘predictable’ process, making Edison’s ‘large staff and substantial facilities’ an advantage to beat competitors, which in turn made ‘the innovation process a reliable component of busi- ness strategy’ (Carlson, 1988: 11). For these reasons, his friend Henry Ford reportedly said, ‘Mr. Edison gave America just what was needed at that moment in history. They say that when people think of me, they think of my assembly line. Mr. Edison, you built an

Camilo Vladimir de Lima Amaral 63 assembly line which brought together the genius of invention, science, and industry’ (quoted in Newton, 1987: 31). In addition to developing this abstract assembly line to expropriate the work of others, Thomas Edison cultivated his fame through vast investments in mar- keting and especially through the legal mechanism of patents. Edison alone is credited with the invention of 1,093 patents (Simonton et al., 2015). Lemley (2011) The same critique investigated how the conception of a sole inventor – Marx applied to which is implied in patent law – is a myth, as inven- the fetish of the tions come from progressive collective work and are therefore frequently produced simultaneously by commodity can be independent groups, as “Inventors build on the work applied to the fetish of those who came before, and new ideas are often ‘in of the invention. the air’ ”. Thus, a patent is also a means of privatising the work of others. In these terms, the same critique Marx applied to the fetish of the commodity (used by capitalists to alienate products from workers in industrial assembly lines) can be applied to the fetish of the invention (used by the ‘genius’ to alienate the creative work of a collec- tive). There are some remarkable examples in architecture. For instance, although Tafuri and Dal Co (Tafuri, Dal Co, 1976: 140) noted that Frank Lloyd Wright made the decisive shift towards what would become his fa- mous style by using all his wife’s fortune in The Broa- dacre City project, he fails to address how this project was produced. With that capital, Wright created the ‘Taliesin Fellowship’ (a messianic school in the middle of the desert). With this means he appropriated the work of a series of collaborators and apprentices as his own (for a vast number of previously unpublished interviews, documents and evidence of that, see Fried- land, Zellman, 2007). Wright’s style is the product of a collective that was appropriated by him. Better said, appropriated by his myth of genius. If Broadacre City brought him close to bankruptcy, it also made him a ‘symbol’ of US architecture. This was not uninten- tional. In his lectures, he was very clear in the aim to become the icon for the style of a US civilisation to be spread around the world. Architecture was a means to capture and to reproduce collective subjectivities. Therefore, the point is not to recognise that Broadacre City project is a reflex of the American society (a sat-

64 The Production of ProJect ellite image is enough to reveal how the grid and the arrangement of nature and urban interventions is just a mimesis of the Taliesin local scenario in an univer- sal image). The point is to understand how his myth further reproduce the subjectivity of other architects. In our own society of spectacle and immaterial toil, the architectural office – once an elite’s stronghold di- viding intellectual and manual work – is now becom- ing a new sweatshop. In this sense, Bjarke Ingels gives a first-hand account of what it was like to work in Rem Koolhaas’s office (Parker, 2012). The only way to rise in rank at OMA was by acquiring ‘more and more sorrows’, by creating ‘space for designers beneath me in responsibility to crank out cool stuff’. Ingels recalls episodes of yelling and ‘hurling of office supplies’ and that designers were under constant tension and stress due to negative reinforcement. At some point, he felt Knowledge is he ‘had paid [his] dues’ and decided to open his own office. What was his alternative? To create his own increasingly sweatshop, employing dozens of architects, using up- objectified into to-date behaviourist techniques: rather than ‘negative’ machines, which, he uses ‘positive’ reinforcement (a more tender way of dressage). This disciplining transforms architectur- in turn, function al work into a form of subjectification (production of as devices to subjectivities). capture more of Abstract machines to capture innovation society’s collective Arguably, the movement known as ‘Autonomism’ has investigated production through a renewed analysis productive forces. of Marx’s (no date [1857]) account of the ‘general intellect’ in the ‘Fragments on Machines’, a part of his notes called the Grundrisse. There, Marx propos- es that the actual force of production is the general knowledge that results from society’s functioning as a whole. Nevertheless, he argues, this knowledge is increasingly objectified into machines (a process he also calls thingfication, or reification), which, in turn, function as devices to capture more of society’s collective productive forces. Thus, machines function as means of control and expropriation: ‘In machin- ery, knowledge appears as alien, external to him [the labourer]; and living labour [appears as] subsumed under self-activating objectified labour’ (Marx, no date [1857]: 695). This passage in Marx has been very fruitful for contemporary critical theory because it envisions how the actual production of innovation,

Camilo Vladimir de Lima Amaral 65 science and technological development occurs under the development of mechanisms to frame and capture social work. For Paolo Virno (2001), the dialectical nature of Marx’s materialism reveals how the material conditions of production are objectified abstract scientific knowl- edge fixed into capital (one could say ‘past labour’ fixed into machines), thus revealing an ‘inter-subjec- tive foundation’ in any labour praxis. In contempo- the dialectical rary context, Virno asserts that the mass intellectuali- nature of Marx’s ty that is not objectified in machines is later captured materialism by a mass control of communication and sharing, thus further controlling living labour. Additionally, a reveals how the politics of affects and cynicism makes possible a wide- material conditions spread pseudo-solidarity with those suffering, and at the same time it becomes the basis of ferocious forms of production of competition. As Jason Reads puts it: ‘Competition is are objectified a paradoxical form of individuation in that it produc- es individuals who are all the more alike’ (Read, 2010: abstract scientific 130). knowledge fixed For Lazzarato (2014: 31), this radically changes the into capital search for a subject of history, as this condition is nei- ther a worldview nor a lack of consciousness but rath- er a mechanistic entanglement of the parts involved. In this realm, there are no individual subjects being dominated (as in personal enslavement), rather, there is diagrammatic management of a whole community of workers. In addition, David Harvey (2010: 40) stretches the emphases of Marx’s Capital into the ‘roles’ people play in the market system. In this system, social relations are presented as an exchange of things (Harvey, 2010: 41). In addition, even if one might have ethical and moral principles when dealing with people face-to- face, when buying a commodity in the market, these relations appear as relations between things (com- modity-money) and therefore as inevitable facts. For instance, at the moment you buy bread, you are rein- forcing the system just as your own retirement fund is managing assets in the global market. That creates an unavoidable condition, Harvey (2010: 47) argues, which imposes specific ‘roles’ because ‘the characters who appear on the economic stage are merely person- ifications of economic relations’. Therefore, people will, even unwillingly, become ‘the bearers’ of capi- talistic social relations. In this sense, it is not a matter

66 The Production of ProJect of a ‘bad’ architect enslaving another but rather of a whole field of practice working as a collective appa- ratus reifying subjectivities, in order to create new objects that are nothing more than bearers of fetish (social relations objectified in commodities). Thus, Marx’s fragment on machines – and his consid- erations of the production of social relations in the form of fetishism – led many authors to investigate how subjectivity is produced in contemporary society rather than to investigate how subjects could free Today, Facebook themselves towards a supposed true nature (Guattari, is the biggest 1995; Lazzarato, 2014; Read, 2010; Spencer, 2012). platform of For Jason Read (2010: 155), the expression ‘production of subjectivity’ has a double meaning: as something information ‘productive’ and as something ‘produced’. Subjectivity sharing, which is historically produced by multiple processes of in- it does without dividualisation in physical, biological, collective, psy- chic, linguistic, and cultural sensibilities and through producing any power struggles. At the same time, it is productive of content. social relations that impact the possibilities of action in society. Read rescues this idea from Marx’s Capital: the special productive power of the combined working day, is under all circumstances, the social productive power of labour, or the productive power of social labour. This power arises from cooperation itself. When the worker co-operates in a planned way with others, he strips off the fetters of his individuality, and develops the capabilities of this species (Marx, 1990: 447).

For Read, subjects are always subjects in a collective, therefore, a differentially articulated part of a whole. Therefore, subjects are individuations of a metastable field of trans-individuality. This means that subjectiv- ity is formed by a priori elements (language, culture, structure, social expectations, and so on) ‘externalised in machines and internalised in concepts, habits, and ways of thinking’ (Read, 2010: 118-119). The political problem emerges because these machines operate not as atoms but transversally, capturing the collective intellect formed by society. In the contemporary mode of production, there are many examples of such processes. The biggest new businesses are only abstract machineries, platforms that capture not only the labour of others but also their everyday lifestyle. Today, Facebook is the biggest

Camilo Vladimir de Lima Amaral 67 platform of information sharing, which it does with- out producing any content, only capturing a series of ‘interconnected’ users gladly producing content as a form of leisure, without recognising it as production. Uber might be considered the biggest transportation company in our ‘smart’ times; without owning or maintaining any vehicles, it transfers all the risks of the business to its workers while it also exploits the socially produced infrastructure of the city without paying taxes for it. Similarly, Airbnb offers the world’s largest variety of lodging, without owning any of the properties, through the creation of a new subjectivity of ‘trendy travellers’ and ‘kind hostesses’ based on people gladly providing undervalued goods and/or services in exchange for a ‘social experience’. However, the fundamental question here is how does The fundamental this fetish come to inhabit our very own abstract ma- question here is chines of design production? how does this fetish The office, or the black box of architecture Latour and Woolgar (1986) investigated how abstrac- come to inhabit our tions would acquire life when they were reified into very own abstract technical apparatuses. When scientists use an appara- machines of design tus to ‘discover new phenomena’, what they see on the other side of the ‘black box’ of the apparatus is framed production? by the past theories and hypothesis that produced that ‘black box’. Thus, he argues, the phenomena these sci- entists see only existed through the mediation of the machine, and the machine only exists because of the past labour reified on it (the theories inscribed in this material basis) (Latour, Woolgar, 1986: 64). He uses Bachelard’s idea that these scientific appara- tuses of ‘reified theories’ are phenomenon-techniques, and thus explaining how they operate as ‘black boxes’: ‘When another member handles the NMR spectrom- eter (…) to check the purity of his compounds, he is utilising spin theory and the outcome of some twenty years of basic physics research’ (Latour, Woolgar, 1986: 66). The ideas inscribed and configured on the machine were based on arguments and theories, and these were the results of discussions at conferences and disputes in journals and articles, until they were finally accepted as ‘facts’. Thus, the ‘so-called material elements of the laboratory are based upon the reified outcomes of past controversies’ (Latour, Woolgar, 1986: 87).

68 The Production of ProJect To create a theory of photography, Vilém Flusser (1985) developed a “philosophy of the black box”. Flusser (1985: 40) argued that it is the photographic camera that performs the operation of transforming It is not a matter reality into codified signals of visual communication, and the photographer is manoeuvred by the few of destroying the potentialities inscribed in the apparatus. Therefore, ‘magic’ of the black the photographer actually looks inside the apparatus box, but rather of rather than outside, thus “revealing” rather than cre- ating. However, for Cabral Filho and Baltazar (Cabral opening its internal Filho, Baltazar, 2010), analysing Flusser’s theory in mechanisms the realm of art and technology, it is not a matter of for potential destroying the ‘magic’ of the black box or of making its devices predicable and dull but rather of opening interactivity. its internal mechanisms for potential interactivity. A music box has interactivity, but only in the form of repetition; a piano does not reveal its content but allows creation and interactivity. Yet, in the same way as a photographic camera, it does so within a framed realm of possibilities. The challenge is to open the inner realms of the devices for interactivity if the goal is to create new possibilities. In the field of architecture, the emergence of appa- ratuses such as CAD, renderers, and 3D software are increasingly ‘entailing’ the production of architecture, in the same sense that a refrigerator ‘entails’ a power source (to use an example from Taylor, 2010: 44), thus transforming architects into operators of machined global systems capitalised by companies providing access to this content. Furthermore, one could agree with Mark Cousins (AA Today the ultimate School of Architecture, 2016) that whereas previously apparatus of the artist had a symbiotic relation with the ‘brush’, and the architect with the ‘pencil’, today the ultimate architectural apparatus of architectural production is the ‘office’, production is the which enables a ‘genius’ to seduce followers and ‘office’, which to channel the work of a legion of workers. With a high-profile office, an architect can expropriate the enables a ‘genius’ work of hundreds of others. However, this abstract to seduce followers machinery only works if architects desire to be part and to channel the of it. Deleuze has famously asked: how do people come to work of a legion of desire their own exploitation? For Slavoj Žižek (2014), workers. the answer of what we desire lies in fantasies: the nar- ratives a subject creates to build a logical chain of cau- salities that assures our desires as unconditional. And

Camilo Vladimir de Lima Amaral 69 that is why to deconstruct the mythology of individual innovation in architecture matters.

The reproduction of individuals by narratives Clearly, a complete analysis of the evolution of the epistemology of historical narrative is beyond the scope of this paper. Nevertheless, it is essential to un- derline the internal contradictions of different modes of architectural valorisation. In addition, and more The fundamental fundamentally, this analysis might underline how a problem of the narrative of the evolution of the discipline is related idea of ‘agency’ is to a specific form of imagining the development of architecture and the contribution of architects seen as the assumption of individuals. an ‘autonomous’ There is a long-standing dichotomy in historical subject, acting with narratives between a “chronicle of the princes” and a “history of the masses” (Rancière, 1994). For Rancière, free will, even if there is a poetical struggle in the production of his- surrounded by a tory, where those in positions of power aim to make (neutral) structure. history the result of their own actions, thus silencing the concrete history experienced by others. It is in this sense that Kracauer (1995: 101-106) argues biography to be the ‘Art Form of the New Bourgeoi- sie’. For him, the novel of the 19th century, in which individuals were immersed in an overall context, was being replaced by (and condensed in) the history of highly visible heroes. As the ‘actual life’ of individu- als gives a sense of ‘certainty’ to historical veracity. Biographies sounds as narratives ‘based on true facts’, so these facts become crystallised, and history seems to be the ultimate result of individual actions. For Kra- cauer, this is the ultimate form of ‘evasion’ from the masses and the collective character of history. In this sense, the fundamental problem of the idea of ‘agency’ is the assumption of an ‘autonomous’ subject, acting with free will, even if surrounded by a (neutral) structure. Nonetheless, to move beyond the concept of agency does not aim to deny the possibility of action; rather, it aims to engage in how subjectivities and social structures frame possible choices, condition alternatives, foment drives, and induce behaviours by expectation; and, furthermore, to engage in how sub- jects are (from the start) subjected to a past that goes beyond individuals. As we saw, the ‘biography’ genre became fundamental for the individualistic subject of capitalist society. Beneath that, the architectural imag-

70 The Production of ProJect ination is trapped in a deeper conception of history based in the chronicles of ‘princes’ and ‘princesses’. Arguably, the notion of a ‘prince’ directing history was first systematised in Machiavelli’s (2008) book The Prince (originally written in 1513). According to Althusser (2000), Machiavelli’s ultimate goal with the ‘prince’ was to create an ‘intellectual dispositive’ to in- form political practice. He was specifically concerned with fortuna, the circumstances or conjectures that a prince would have to face to ‘command and act’. The prince was a device thought to act ‘negatively’ and ‘objectively’ to control the randomness of the future. For Althusser, this negative objectivity was what Ma- chiavelli conceived as virtù. Machiavelli (cf. Althusser, 2000) was not inventing the figure of the prince per se. He was systematising a traditional practice in its purest form (as an ideal, a prince as a re-presentation). So, he deduced the representational character of the prince as an im- age, and specifically as a public image. This image, then, could support a figurative narrative of political developments and international affairs. The inter- actions among social conditions (fortuna) are then ideologically manipulated by means of the image of the ‘prince’, which aims to capture social drives and The prince is an expectations to build a new (logical) chain of necessity operative image in the form of a new linear narrative (virtù). In this (a device) that sense, the prince is an operative image (a device) that manipulates social drives to achieve specific goals. For manipulates social instance, in the case of Machiavelli, the goal was the drives to achieve unification of Italy, and a new virtuous prince should specific goals. emerge in order to articulate this social transforma- tion (in this sense, his prince was a re-presentation of a complex context, different forces and different interests that could mobilise and direct the action of a collective subject – the entire country). Thus, a prince is an operative public image of a polit- ical narrative; it is an image of power or truth rather than power or truth itself. By the means of this intel- lectual operation, the ‘prince’ becomes ‘the subject’ of history, and the majority of theories and histories of architecture are arguably based on ‘architectural princes’. This theoretical framework is also useful to under- stand why certain kinds of individuals rarely enters these narratives – as for instance minorities and

Camilo Vladimir de Lima Amaral 71 women – as traditional institutions reproduce social prejudices. In misogynistic and male chauvinist soci- eties, the images used to reproduce social power are male figures. It is not the case that the role of women and minorities are less important to architectural development, it is the case that they are strategically set aside in a supporting role – i.e. these narratives are also a form of institutionalizing and establishing systems of power. It is not the case In this sense, although much research, including Ta- that the role furi’s approach, has made great advancements in con- of women and textualising architecture in a social context, scholars have ultimately reinforced the abstract device of the minorities are ‘prince’ because their critique was centred on repre- less important sentations (mainly male white architects) conducting the evolution of architectural history. As Jodi Dean to architectural asserts, this is precisely the problem: development, it is Not only is agency privileged over structure but the pre- the case that they sumption that agents are individuals formats the alternative are strategically of autonomy or subjugation as an opposition between indi- set aside in a vidual and collective. Collectivity comes to be associated with constraint, with preventing rather than enabling creativity supporting role. and initiative. Liberal political theorists explicitly construe political agency as an individual capacity; others take the individuality of the subject of politics for granted. I argue that the problem of the subject is a problem of this persistent individual form, a form that encloses collective political subjectivity into the singular figure of the individual (Dean, 2014: 364).

For a Subversion of How We See Subjects of Architec- tural Innovation Althusser (1971: 5) argued that ‘The ultimate condi- tion of production is therefore the reproduction of the conditions of production’. For him this reproduction is based on ideology, which he conceived as the image an individual has of his place in the world (Althusser, 1971: 165). This image places the subject in a specific relation to the world, and in a position from which this subject can act in the world. For Althusser, this image is created through ideological apparatuses (material-immaterial objects such as advertisement, books, institutions, or buildings) that positions the individual in a set of expected relations, reinforcing existing beliefs. Those apparatuses are, therefore, ob-

72 The Production of ProJect jectified social relations that frames the subjects. But, Jodi Dean (2014) inverts Althusser’s famous formula by saying that it is not the case that ideology inter- pellates the individual as subject, rather, capitalism interpellates subjects as individuals. Simondon (2013) builds his approach not on the basis of the individual but on the basis of the process of individuation. The error, he argues, resides in giving to the atom already-individualised a status of prin- ciple, i.e., in presupposing the individual already individuated as an essence, instead of looking for how and from where this individual came from. Simon- don’s (2013: 24-25) effort is to conceptualise being as becoming, to acknowledge the individual by means of its actual process of becoming – its concrete opera- tion of individuation – and not the opposite way. In this sense, being is not seen as substance, nor matter, The error, resides nor form but as a system in a precarious state of (not in giving to the fully) resolved tensions and in a continuous process of transformation. atom already- individualised a There are two views according to which the reality of being as individual can be approached: a substantialist view, status of principle, considering being as consisting in its unity, giving to itself, instead of looking founded upon itself, not generated, resistant to what is not it- for how and self; and a hylemorphistic view, considering the individual as generated by the encounter of form and matter. But in those from where this two views there is something in common (…) Departing from individual came the created individual, the effort [of these views] is to reach from. back to the conditions of its existence (…) it considers the individual, as long as constituted individual, the reality to be explained (…) Such a perspective of research gives ontolog- ical privilege to the constituted individual. Thus, it risks not approaching a truthful ontogenesis, of not positioning the individual inside the system of reality in which the individu- ation is produced (Simondon, 2013: 23, our translation).

Alternatively, an ontogenesis considers becoming as a dimension of being, thus relations can receive the status of beings (such as relations between interi- or and exterior), without naming any new obscure substance. In the case of becoming as a dimension of the living being, the individual reveals a continuous ‘theatre of individuations’ (Simondon, 2013: 29). As we are always absorbing and purging matter, the living individual is the one who continuously re-enacts the

Camilo Vladimir de Lima Amaral 73 operation of its becoming/individuation in a continu- ous exchange between inside and outside. An individualisation is always also collective because the individual is just a provisional actualisation of a shared field of pre-individualities, thus it is formed of internal ‘disparations’. In this sense, the subject is a mediation (a resolution/structuration) of disparate social subjectivities. This collective dimension of individuality is what Simondon calls the transindi- The first step would vidual. In the case of the individuation of the subject be to subvert the of architectural innovation, one could argue that an abstract machinery architect is never just an isolated genius. She/he is the mediation of a broader and diverse subjectivity, the reproduced by general intellect of his profession. the discipline of Although the concept of trans-subjectivity enables the understanding of the emergence of transformation, architecture in the theory of Simondon does not advance in the poli- order to recognize tics behind these transformations: the struggle for the the collective emergence of new subjectivities. Arguably, the first step for that would be to subvert the abstract machin- force behind ery reproduced by the discipline of architecture in architectural order to recognize the collective force behind archi- production. tectural production. Conclusions As we saw, dead architects should not be able to inno- vate – they are dead! – and yet they seem to be doing it! The reason why we are entering this era of phan- tasmagorical architects is the intensification of these images of individuals (the operative work of the ideo- logical image of these star architects, princes, prin- cesses, and so on). That is why we are entangled in a politics of subjectivity: the way we narrate and see the innovation process of architecture sets a framework of power relations. This paper started with this paradox, in order to reveal how current understanding of architectural innovation limits the role of architects and reproduc- es specific sets of power relations. As the investigation goes back regressively into the abstract machinery of invention, it is made clearer that the image of the ge- nius is an apparatus that captures a collective ‘general intellect’. Nowadays, in architecture this machinery is mainly framed through The Office. As a black box, The Office stablishes a set of reified social relations and it is operational because architects believe in the narra-

74 The Production of ProJect tives and biographies of geniality it entails. The deconstruction of how these disciplined narra- tives limits the understanding of architecture is the first step to subvert the understanding of architecture as an individual agency. Thus, to build awareness on the collective processes that moves architecture in- novation is the second step to subvert the way we see and act as subjects of architecture. That allows a new field of research and practice as it repositions architecture’s relation to the world: on the one hand, we can see how black boxes are controlling what architecture can do, and on the other hand, we can see how architecture operates in the reproduc- tion of social subjectivities through the reification of social relations into space (something perhaps as old as Leon Battista Alberti’s book titled De Re Aedifica- toria, which literally means ‘the thing building’, i.e. spatial thingfication or the production of spatial black boxes). In addition, this small guide also allows us to see a new transversal position from which architects can act in the world – namely, through the articulation of collective subjects. To see the possibility of social change mediated by collective subjects of architecture is, in itself, a subverted form of social innovation.

Acknowledgements CAPES provided funding for this research with a PhD fellowship. I would like to thank [Douglas Spencer, Ro- land Karthaus and Alan Chandler] for the stimulating discussion of the ideas presented in this paper.

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Camilo Vladimir de Lima Amaral 77 collective housing • compu- tational thinking • paramet- ric design • open form • Parametrizzare la mente dell’architetto. Il caso di Tour Bois le Prêtre

Grazia Pota

Abstract / Parameterizing the Architect Mind. The Case Affiliation Of Tour Bois Le Prêtre Università degli Stu- di di Napoli “Federi- The following work is part of a research aimed at co II”, Dipartimento investigate how to involve parametric software in di Architettura the design of contemporary dwelling, in a process of Contacts: urban regeneration which starts from the transfor- grazia [dot] mation of residential buildings of the last century in pota [at] order to provide new forms of living able to accom- unina [dot] it

modate different categories of users and respond Received: directly to their needs. 26 February 2019 In particular, this paper intends to present an applica- Accepted: tion, developed starting from the study of Tour Bois 11 November 2019 Le Prêtre transformation project designed by Lacaton & Vassal, which aims translating the main design DOI: 10.17454/ARDETH05.06 choices in the parameters of an algorithm able to reproduce the logics of the intervention. ARDETH#05 The objective of the research is to focus on a set of pa- rameters to be used for the development of a software useful for dwelling design, in which the project is direct result of the analysis of specific conditions and users needs.

79 Residenza collettiva e pensiero computazionale Oggigiorno è sempre maggiore l’attenzione data al processo progettuale e diversi aspetti di quest’ultimo, incluso il ruolo dell’architetto e quello degli utenti, sono spesso messi in discussione. Inoltre, l’eterogenei- tà della domanda attuale della società, da intendere comunque come organismo dinamico in continuo cambiamento e non come entità statica (Rattray, 1952: 27-32), richiede di ripensare la risposta in termini I significati architettonici delle abitazioni. Il patrimonio edilizio attribuiti a parole dell’ultimo secolo, infatti, è spesso riconosciuto come come funzione e una conseguenza della cristallizzazione delle idee razionaliste, le cui intuizioni originali nel tempo sono existenzminimum state interpretate con eccessiva rigidezza (De Carlo, hanno portato 2017: 56). I significati attribuiti a parole come funzio- ne e existenzminimum hanno portato ad architetture ad architetture incapaci di interpretare le effettive necessità degli incapaci di utenti perché basate sull’analisi dei comportamenti convenzionali dell’uomo-tipo senza considerare la interpretare le complessità sociale, culturale e identitaria degli indivi- effettive necessità dui (De Carlo, 2017: 50). Di fronte a tale eredità spesso degli utenti. si opta per la demolizione mentre sono pochi i casi in cui si tenta di recuperare tali strutture. Eppure questa operazione potrebbe rivelarsi vantaggiosa al fine di progettare, partendo da elementi già esistenti, nuove residenze in grado di rispondere meglio ai bisogni della società contemporanea (Druot et al., 2007). I presupposti teorici introdotti dal Team 10 a partire dagli anni Cinquanta (Smithson, 1963), l’appropriazio- ne degli spazi di Alison e Peter Smithson, la partecipa- zione di Giancarlo De Carlo, i concetti di flessibilità e trasformabilità introdotti da numerose avanguardie del secondo Novecento, sono alcune delle tematiche da cui oggi possiamo ripartire per progettare residenze collettive in grado di rispondere ad esigenze ed utenze differenti, fornire spazi a diversi livelli di condivisio- ne, e soprattutto progettare abitazioni più vicine alle abitudini e agli usi delle persone reali che le abitano. In quest’ottica, nel lavoro presentato di seguito, si rifiuta l’ipotesi dell’applicazione di un tipo standard di alloggio, privilegiando l’idea che il progetto di architet- tura sia il risultato di un processo, più o meno analitico, fatto di scelte e valutazioni dipendenti dall’analisi del contesto fisico, economico e sociale. Per questo motivo si individua nel pensiero computazionale un approccio possibile allo studio e all’analisi della questione abitati- va contemporanea. Esso è da intendere come l’insieme

80 Parametrizzare la mente dell’architetto dei processi mentali coinvolti nella formulazione di un problema e della sua soluzione(i), in modo tale che un utente, uomo o macchina, possa effettivamente eseguir- lo (Wing, 2006). L’approccio computazionale, quindi, non comporta necessariamente l’utilizzo del computer e non serve solo a individuare una soluzione ma anche e soprattutto a formulare un problema. Pensare in maniera computazionale significa approcciare a un problema complesso riformulandolo in una forma che lo renda risolvibile, utilizzando processi di scomposi- zione e astrazione. Pensiero computazionale significa: rappresentare correttamente un problema e individua- re i suoi aspetti rilevanti al fine di renderli trattabili; ricorrere alle invarianti per descrivere il comporta- mento di un sistema in maniera sintetica e dichiarati- va; pianificare, apprendere e programmare, anche in presenza di incertezza; avere la capacità di utilizzare, modificare e influenzare un sistema complesso senza doverne specificare ogni dettaglio, interrogandosi inve- ce sul comportamento generale (Wing, 2006). Pertanto, il pensiero computazionale si sovrappone al pensiero logico e a quello sistemico, include il pensiero algorit- mico e il pensiero parallelo, che a loro volta coinvolgo- no altri tipi di processi di pensiero come il ragionamen- Pensare in maniera to compositivo, il riconoscimento di schemi e modelli, il pensiero procedurale e quello ricorsivo (Wing, 2011). computazionale Inoltre, l’approccio computazionale non si attua neces- significa sariamente con la programmazione di software e altri strumenti digitali, si tratta più che altro di un lavoro di approcciare a concettualizzazione che richiede la capacità di pensare un problema a più livelli di astrazione (Wing, 2006: 35). L’astrazione è il più alto processo mentale sfruttato complesso dal pensiero computazionale. Essa è utilizzata per riformulandolo in dedurre schemi e modelli a partire da singoli casi, generalizzare un concetto e parametrizzare un siste- una forma che lo ma, acquisendo le proprietà invarianti comuni a un renda risolvibile, insieme di oggetti e tralasciandone le caratteristiche irrilevanti che li distinguono, allo scopo di generare utilizzando processi dei “meta-progetti” che possono essere formulati con di scomposizione e degli algoritmi. L’astrazione consente di ridimensio- astrazione. nare e gestire la complessità lavorando con criteri e valori comuni a tutti i dati senza dover visualizzare ciascun dato singolarmente. Applicare ricorsivamen- te un processo di astrazione consente di costruire sistemi sempre più complessi a partire da singoli casi meno complessi (Wing, 2011).

Grazia Pota 81 Approcci computazionali in architettura Nell’ultimo secolo l’approccio computazionale è già stato utilizzato, spesso in maniera inconsapevole, per meglio definire il processo cognitivo legato alla progettazione in architettura. Un esempio in questo senso è dato dal pattern language, formulato da Christopher Alexander nel 1977, in cui l’intero problema della progettazione architettonica viene sintetizzato in un linguaggio e ogni aspetto del problema diventa un termine di questo Nell’ultimo linguaggio, un pattern (Alexander et al., 1977). Lo stesso secolo l’approccio metodo per la progettazione razionale degli alloggi mi- computazionale è nimi elaborato da Alexander Klein nel 1929 rappresenta un primo tentativo di trascrivere il processo progettuale già stato utilizzato, in un processo analitico chiaro con precisi dati in in- spesso in maniera gresso e in uscita (Baffa Rivolta et al., 1977). Altri esempi di approcci critici e analitici al progetto in architettura inconsapevole, per sono Using Goals in Design di Antonino Saggio (Saggio, meglio definire il 1988) e Community and Privacy scritto dallo stesso Chri- stopher Alexander diversi anni prima della pubblicazio- processo cognitivo ne di A Pattern Language (Alexander et al., 1963). legato alla Tra gli strumenti oggi usati in architettura che progettazione in sfruttano l’approccio computazionale, i software di progettazione parametrica sono sempre più utilizzati, architettura. principalmente per la progettazione di architetture basate sull’utilizzo di forme non elementari e orga- niche. In questo caso, però, si vuole indagare sulla possibilità di utilizzare gli stessi strumenti a suppor- to del progetto della residenza da un punto di vista organizzativo e concettuale anziché formale, imma- ginando che i dati di partenza di un progetto possano rappresentare gli input di un algoritmo in grado di indagare più soluzioni in risposta ad un determinato problema progettuale. I vantaggi di tale approccio possono essere molteplici; in primo luogo, esso risulta utile a definire meglio il problema della progettazione di alcuni spazi ritenuti oggi necessari nelle residenze contemporanee – per le loro caratteristiche di neu- tralità e invito all’appropriazione – individuandone i criteri fondamentali per il loro progetto; in secondo luogo, esso è utile a rendere chiaro e trasmissibile il processo progettuale, identificandone scelte e valu- tazioni attraverso la loro traduzione nei parametri di un algoritmo; infine, esso può essere utile a indagare e accrescere il campo delle possibilità grazie alla capacità degli strumenti informatici di analizzare un gran numero di dati e rispondere ad un problema con innumerevoli soluzioni in breve tempo.

82 Parametrizzare la mente dell’architetto Lacaton e Vassal: progettare forme aperte Il progetto di ricerca PLUS portato avanti da Lacaton e Vassal insieme a Frédéric Druot nasce come una rispo- sta alternativa alle azioni del governo francese che all’inizio del 2000 decise di abbattere gran parte del patrimonio edilizio post-bellico per costruire nuovi edifici residenziali. Con PLUS gli architetti propongo- no un approccio differente che non mira a demolire il patrimonio esistente, ma a ripartire da questo come base per aggiungere, modificare e riutilizzare (Druot et al., 2007). Con un approccio decisamente ottimista e fiducioso delle potenzialità del progetto architetto- nico, essi confidano nel fatto che esista sempre una soluzione in grado di trasformare quello che già c’è in qualcosa di interessante, spendendo meno di quanto si spenderebbe abbattendo e ricostruendo (Lacaton et al., 2017: 57). Nei progetti di Lacaton e Vassal si va oltre l’applica- zione di schemi tipologici prefissati. Al contrario, il progetto è diretto risultato dell’analisi delle condizioni e di quelle che inizialmente possono sembrare limi- tazioni, legate al contesto, al sito, alla normativa, ma che, se sfruttate a proprio favore, possono portare ad un progetto valido (Lacaton et al., 2017: 68) e, perché no, ad una forma inedita. Quest’ultima però è solo È necessario conseguenza e non obiettivo del processo. Il progetto progettare della Torre di Varsavia è un esempio di questo tipo di approccio e, ancora, il concetto di loft che i due luoghi intermedi architetti applicano agli alloggi è l’esempio di come e ambigui che l’utilizzo di alcune misure, riconosciute come date grazie alle loro e immutabili – la profondità massima di un blocco residenziale in questo caso – possa essere superato caratteristiche grazie ad un progetto ben pensato per quelle che sono spaziali lasciano le circostanze specifiche (Lacaton et al., 2017: 65-67). Se da un lato il problema della tipologia è superato, libero l’utente di dall’altro si pone molta attenzione alle persone e al scegliere come modo in cui queste vivono gli spazi. Lacaton e Vassal non progettano mai al minimo, al contrario, fornisco- utilizzarli. no spazi supplementari per lasciare libertà di uso e non costringere le possibilità di movimento. I corridoi dell’Università Grenoble, ad esempio, grazie alla loro generosa profondità vengono usati dalle associazioni studentesche per organizzare esposizioni (Lacaton et al., 2017: 54). Ma oltre ad una questione dimensionale si tratta anche e soprattutto di una questione qualitati- va; è necessario progettare luoghi intermedi e ambigui

Grazia Pota 83 che grazie alle loro caratteristiche spaziali lasciano libero l’utente di scegliere come utilizzarli (Lacaton et al., 2017: 53) (Fig. 1). Oggigiorno fornire questo tipo di spazi è una necessità (Lacaton et al., 2017: 54), essi in- fatti consentono di ottenere forme aperte in grado di adattarsi nel tempo ad usi diversi e allo stesso tempo fanno sì che le persone possano appropriarsi dei luo- ghi in cui vivono, identificarsi in essi e personalizzarli, aumentando così il benessere dell’alloggio. Nel lavoro presentato di seguito, quindi, si è voluto approfondire il progetto di questa categoria di spazi, al fine di individuarne le strategie progettuali, attra- verso una applicazione che sfrutta gli strumenti di Nel lavoro progettazione parametrica come mezzo di indagine su presentato di un caso studio. seguito, si è voluto Caso studio: Tour Bois le Prêtre approfondire il Il progetto di Tour Bois le Prêtre fu portato a termine progetto al fine da Lacaton e Vassal insieme a Frédéric Druot nel 2011. La torre residenziale costruita negli anni Sessanta di individuarne lungo la tangenziale di Parigi era destinata a demoli- le strategie zione ma gli architetti evitarono il suo abbattimento presentando un progetto di trasformazione. progettuali, Tre sono le principali azioni che i gli architetti com- attraverso piono per trasformare la rigida struttura degli alloggi strumenti di preesistenti. In primo luogo, scelgono di garantire una vista diretta verso l’esterno in gran parte degli progettazione ambienti della casa. In particolare, fanno sì che vista parametrica come sia garantita all’ingresso dell’abitazione e nelle stanze principali (cucina, soggiorno e alcune stanze da letto mezzo di indagine. prossime alla facciata esterna). In secondo luogo scel- gono di fornire spazi aggiuntivi – i giardini d’inverno – che si configurano come spazi neutri e ambigui, capaci di porre un punto interrogativo nelle persone che li attraversano; come dovrei usare questo spazio? (Laca- ton et al., 2017: 75-77). Questi spazi sono costruiti per avere due caratteristiche principali; molta luce natu- rale ed una vista gradevole. Queste prime due azioni vengono eseguite in tutti gli alloggi, mentre una terza scelta è applicata in alcuni alloggi. Essa è in linea con la seconda – ovvero si vogliono realizzare spazi sup- plementari – ma in questo caso tale volontà si traduce nell’ampliamento di alcune stanze o nell’aggiunta di altre. Questi luoghi, a differenza dei precedenti, sono classici ambienti della casa; stanze da letto più grandi o aggiuntive, utili, ad esempio, successivamente

84 Parametrizzare la mente dell’architetto Fig. 1 - Diversi utilizzi dei giardini d’inverno in Tour Bois le Prêtre.

Grazia Pota 85 all’ampliamento della famiglia. Spazi supplementari sono forniti anche nelle aree comuni con il riposizio- namento di due dei tre ascensori presenti all’interno della struttura. Queste semplici scelte hanno portato ad un progetto molto diverso dal precedente in grado di dimostrare, tra le altre cose, quanto dettagli e inter- venti puntuali possano fare la differenza (Fig. 2). Lavorando con Grasshopper, linguaggio di program- mazione visiva, sono state analizzate e scomposte due delle principali scelte progettuali, immaginando di re- plicare gli interventi effettuati nella trasformazione di un alloggio tipo (T3) su un intero piano del complesso. Queste scelte, quindi, sono state tradotte nei parame- tri di un algoritmo. Grasshopper è una piattaforma free e open source che lavora anche grazie all’integrazione di numerosi plug- La simulazione in sviluppati spesso dagli utenti stessi e Kangaroo è uno di questi. Solitamente usato per simulare fenome- ottenuta è il ni fisici e quindi per lavori di form-finding ed ottimiz- risultato della zazione strutturale, in questo caso è stato utilizzato traduzione in per tradurre gli interventi effettuati dai due progetti- sti in Tour Bois le Prêtre, replicandone il processo. forma algoritmica L’algoritmo è strutturato nel seguente modo: una delle scelte serie di dati in input vengono raccolti in un insieme di obiettivi, che sono poi sintetizzati all’interno di un effettuate dai risolutore che ha lo scopo di soddisfare gli obiettivi progettisti. posti restituendo un output. L’output ottenuto, quindi, è pari ai dati in input modificati in base al soddisfaci- mento degli obiettivi prefissati e si presenta come una simulazione. La scelta di strutturare l’algoritmo in questo modo è conseguente all’utilizzo di Kangaroo che lavora con obiettivi e risolutore allo scopo di ottenere degli output che simulino il comportamento fisico di particolari strutture sottoposte a determinate sollecitazioni fisiche. In questo caso, però, le sollecitazioni sono state utilizza- te come forze attrattive o repulsive in grado di deter- minare il posizionamento di uno spazio, attratto da un determinato panorama o orientamento, e per definire altre caratteristiche legate alla configurazione di tale spazio. La simulazione ottenuta come output dello script, quindi, è il risultato della traduzione in forma algoritmica delle scelte effettuate dai progettisti nel pro- getto di trasformazione di Tour Bois le Prêtre e quindi dei criteri progettuali alla base dell’intervento (Fig. 3). L’algoritmo è costruito prima di tutto sulla base di pre-

86 Parametrizzare la mente dell’architetto Fig. 2 - Pianta di Tour Bois le Prêtre prima dell‘intervento (in alto) e dopo l’inter- vento (in basso).

Grazia Pota 87 Fig. 3 – Simulazione dell’intero complesso (sinistra) e del singolo alloggio (destra) con dati in input (in alto) e output (in basso).

88 Parametrizzare la mente dell’architetto cisi dati planimetrici – ovvero le piante dell’edificio antecedenti l’intervento – a partire dai quali vengono riconosciuti i muri e identificati i confini delle singo- le stanze, dei singoli alloggi, e dell’intero edificio. A questi si aggiungono altri dati non fisici, che rappre- sentano le condizioni al contesto con cui gli architetti si sono confrontati al momento del progetto, ovvero l’orientamento e la presenza o meno di una vista par- ticolarmente interessante in determinati punti della struttura. Questi dati condizionano le scelte legate al posizionamento dei giardini d’inverno e sono, quindi, parametri importanti dai quali dipende la scelta di alcune strategie progettuali piuttosto che altre. I dati fino ad ora presentati sono dati fissi, rappresen- tativi dello stato di fatto del complesso antecedente l’in- tervento. A questi si sommano altri dati variabili che costituiscono quindi dei parametri modificabili in base Un primo insieme alle scelte del progettista. Questi parametri sono quelli utili a definire dimensioni, forma e proporzioni, dello di obiettivi è spazio aggiuntivo da anteporre in facciata all’edificio. utilizzato per Questo spazio, composto dal giardino d’inverno e dal calcolare il giusto balcone, viene costruito planimetricamente come un rettangolo da definire nella sua profondità, risultante posizionamento dalla somma della profondità del giardino d’inverno e di questo spazio di quella del balcone – entrambe variabili e specificate dal progettista attraverso la manipolazione di due pa- rispetto all’edificio. rametri distinti – e nella sua lunghezza, che non com- pare come parametro manipolabile perché è calcolata in funzione dello sviluppo in facciata dell’alloggio. Un primo insieme di obiettivi è utilizzato per calcola- re il giusto posizionamento di questo spazio rispetto all’edificio. In particolare esso non deve sovrapporsi alla superficie interna dell’alloggio ma posizionarsi al di fuori di essa, inoltre uno dei lati del giardino di inverno – quello la cui dimensione è definita in funzione della facciata dell’alloggio – deve coincidere con il fronte illuminato dell’alloggio. Quest’ultimo è individuato dall’algoritmo come il lato della curva di confine dell’alloggio appartenente simultaneamente anche alla curva di confine dell’edificio. Nel caso in cui l’appartamento abbia più fronti che comunicano con l’esterno il posizionamento dipenderà da dove si trova la vista più interessante o l’esposizione migliore. A questi si aggiungono altri obiettivi di carattere ge- ometrico, necessari affinché lo spazio non si deformi durante la simulazione (Fig. 4).

Grazia Pota 89 Un secondo insieme di obiettivi è legato alla volontà di avere una vista diretta verso l’esterno all’ingresso dell’alloggio e in alcuni ambienti della casa. Per fare ciò vanno individuati i punti dai quali si vuole avere la possibilità di guardare fuori o in alternativa le stanze che devono avere questa caratteristica – in questo caso verranno presi come punti i centri delle stanze (Fig. 5). Tutti gli obiettivi sono sintetizzati all’interno del risolu- tore che elabora la simulazione e restituisce un output allo scopo di soddisfare gli obiettivi imposti (Fig. 6). Successivamente l’algoritmo costruisce dei coni ottici Fig. 4 – Sulla sinistra; di ampiezza variabile che collegano i punti preceden- i dati planimetrici e il riconoscimento dei temente individuati alla facciata esterna dell’alloggio. confini delle stanze La costruzione dei coni ottici rende possibile indivi- di un alloggio. In alto; la costruzione dello duare i muri interni all’alloggio che ostruiscono la spazio aggiuntivo vista verso l’esterno. Questi muri sono rappresentati (giardino d’inverno + dalle linee che intercettano i coni, che dopo essere balcone) con i para- metri legati alla sua state individuate vengono cancellate, suggerendo profondità. In basso; in questo modo la demolizione di quei determinati il riconoscimento elementi (Fig. 7). del fronte esterno dell’alloggio. Sulla de- Nel primo insieme di obiettivi il progettista muove i se- stra; il primo insieme guenti parametri: profondità dello spazio supplementa- di obiettivi utili al posizionamento dello re, eventuale preferenza rispetto al suo posizionamen- spazio aggiuntivo. to, dipendente da orientamento e vista. Nel secondo

90 Parametrizzare la mente dell’architetto insieme di obiettivi, invece, i parametri mossi dal progettista sono: scelta di punti o stanze da cui si vuole avere una vista verso l’esterno e ampiezza del cono Questi parametri ottico. Pertanto questi dati rappresentano l’insieme dei parametri manipolabili, in base ai quali può variare sono in grado di il risultato finale. Questi parametri sono in grado rap- rappresentare sia presentare sia dati fisici, nel caso della profondità del giardino d’inverno e del balcone, sia dati immateriali, dati fisici, sia dati negli altri casi – con conseguenze, comunque, sulla immateriali, con fisicità dello spazio. Oltre a ciò il risultato finale varia in funzione dei dati planimetrici dell’edificio, che sono conseguenze, sulla stati presentati come fissi perché non dipendono dalle fisicità dello spazio. scelte del progettista ma che possono comunque essere modificati nel caso in cui si voglia applicare lo stesso processo su un edificio diverso. In quest’ultimo caso l’algoritmo avrà come output lo stesso tipo di interven- to effettuato da Lacaton e Vassal su Tour Bois le Prêtre, applicato però su un edificio differente.

Conclusioni I risultati ottenuti hanno permesso di individuare, a partire dal caso studio di Tour Bois le Prêtre, le Fig. 5 – Secondo strategie progettuali legate ad un intervento di questo insieme di obiettivi, utili all’individuazione tipo, in cui la progettazione di uno spazio in aggiunta dei punti di vista.

Grazia Pota 91 Fig. 6 – Risolutore ai classici ambienti della casa viene proposta come e output della simu- lazione relativa a un alternativa per incrementare le possibilità di perso- alloggio (lo spazio nalizzazione dello spazio da parte dei residenti e di aggiuntivo è corretta- identificazione con esso. Attraverso la costruzione mente posizionato in facciata all’edificio). dell’algoritmo si è effettuato quel processo di astra- zione, proprio dell’approccio computazionale, che ha permesso di trasformare il progetto di intervento di Tour Bois le Prêtre in un processo chiaro ed esplicito, espresso attraverso una serie di passaggi che esplici- tano le scelte dei progettisti e che sono manipolabili attraverso parametri. Ciò significa che dal caso par- ticolare è stato desunto e isolato il processo. Questo permette di indagare il progetto interrogandosi sui suoi contenuti oltre che sulla sua forma, estrapolando- ne i criteri fondamentali con la conseguente possibi- lità di applicare lo stesso tipo di intervento anche in altri casi. Oltre ai risultati specifici ottenuti dall’ap- plicazione effettuata sul caso studio, questo lavoro si presenta anche come un primo tentativo di utilizzare gli strumenti di progettazione parametrica a supporto di un progetto non finalizzato ad un determinato e ricercato risultato formale, ma attento all’indagine qualitativa dello spazio abitativo. Lo scopo principale,

92 Parametrizzare la mente dell’architetto quindi, è quello di indagare le potenzialità che il pen- Fig. 7 – In basso; costruzione dei coni siero computazionale può avere nell’analisi dell’ap- ottici. Sulla sinistra; proccio progettuale in architettura, in particolare nel individuazione delle progetto della residenza, focalizzando l’attenzione sul linee che intercet- tano i coni ottici e, programma piuttosto che sulla forma. Se infatti da un quindi, degli elementi lato la tecnologia ha già ampiamente contribuito ad da demolire. innovare il processo di progettazione della forma, c’è ancora molto da esplorare su come la tecnologia possa essere utilizzata nell’attuazione del programma in architettura.

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Grazia Pota 93 Benevolo, L. (1960), Storia dell’architettura moderna, Bari, Laterza. Blake, P. (1983), La forma segue il fiasco, Firenze, Alinea Editrice. De Carlo, G. (1970 [2018]), Il Pubblico dell’architettura, “La piramide rovesciata. Architettura oltre il ’68”, Macerata, Quodlibet. De Carlo, G. (1973 [2017]), L’architettura della partecipazione, “L’architettura della partecipazione”, Macerata, Quodlibet. De Fusco, R. (2007), Storia dell’architettura contemporanea, Roma-Bari, Laterza. Druot, F., Lacaton, A., Vassal, J. P. (2007), Plus. La vivienda colectiva. Territorio de excepción, Barcelona, Gustavo Gili. Eco, U. (2016), Opera aperta. Forma e indeterminazione nelle politiche contemporanee, Milano, Bompiani. Frampton, K. (2007), Modern Architecture: A Critical History, London, Thames & Hudson, trad. it. Storia dell’architettura moderna, Bologna, Zanichelli, 2007. Friedman, Y. (1970), L’architecture mobile. Vers une cité conçue par ses habitants, Paris, Tournai, Casterman, trad. it. L’architettura mobile. Verso una città concepita dai suoi abitanti, Alba, Edizioni Paoline, 1972. Friedman, Y. (1971), Pour une architecture scientifique, Paris, Belfond, trad. it. Per una architettura scientifica, Roma, Offi- cina, 1971. Habraken, N. J. (1961), De dragers en de mensen. Het einde van de massawoningbouw, Amsterdam, Scheltema & Holke- ma nv., trad it. Strutture per una residenza alternativa, Mila- no, il Saggiatore, 1973. Lacaton, A., Vassal, J. P., Druot, F. (2007), Plus. La vivienda colectiva. Territorio de excepcion. Large-scale Housing Devel- opment, Barcelona, Gustavo Gili. Lacaton, A., Vassal, J. P. (2017), Actitud, Barcelona, Gustavo Gili. Negroponte, N. (1970), The Architecture Machine. Toward a more human environment, Cambridge (MA), The MIT Press. Negroponte, N. (1975), Soft Architecture Machines, Cambridge (MA), The MIT Press. Perriccioli, M. (a cura di) (2015), Re-cycling social housing. Ricerche per la rigenerazione sostenibile dell’edilizia residen- ziale sociale, Napoli, Clean. Ratti, C. (2014), Architettura open source. Verso una proget- tazione aperta, Torino, Einaudi. Rattray, T. (1952), The social basis of town planning, “Archi- tects’ year book 4”, London, Paul Elek, pp. 27-32. Saggio, A. (1988), Using goals in design, Pittsburgh, Carnegie Mellon University. Smithson, A. (a cura di) (1968), Team 10 Primer, London, Studio Vista.

94 Parametrizzare la mente dell’architetto Smithson, A. (1982), The emergence of Team 10 out of CIAM, London, Architectural Association. Smithson, A. P. (2001), The Charged Void. Architecture, New York, Monacelli Press. Zevi, B. (1950), Storia dell’architettura moderna, Torino, Einaudi. Wing, J. M. (2006), Computational Thinking, “Communica- tions of the ACM”, vol. 49, n. 3, pp. 33-35. Wing, J. M. (2011), Computational Thinking, What and Why?, “thelink” [Online]. Available at: http://people.cs.vt.edu/~kaf- ura/CS6604/Papers/CT-What-And-Why.pdf (Accessed: 28 November 2019).

Grazia Pota 95 archi- tecture • fax ma- chine • Aldo Rossi Faxing Architecture Aldo Rossi’s Transnational Practice, 1986-1997

Sebastiano Fabbrini

Abstract Affiliation In 1986, Aldo Rossi opened a satellite office in New Università Iuav di Venezia, Diparti- York City to oversee his first major design commis- mento di Culture sions on the other side of the Atlantic. This moment del Progetto marked a transition from traveling to establishing a Contacts: permanent presence in the United States. And, more sfabbrini [at] importantly, it turned Rossi’s practice into a transna- iuav [dot] it tional organization. It is fair to say that most of his Received: subsequent projects were developed on the Milan - 25 March 2019 New York axis. The trait d’union was the fax machine, which allowed materials and ideas to be exchanged Accepted: 02 September 2019 with an unprecedented level of immediacy. This research paper explores how faxing impacted the DOI: production of architecture within this decentralized 10.17454/ARDETH05.07

system, intersecting multiple key topoi of the archi- ARDETH#05 tectural discourse of the time. While the literature on Rossi tends to focus on the work and the loud theo- retical apparatus that accompanied it, his (largely unexplored) American archive compels us to engage with the process of working and the silent technologi- cal apparatus that made it possible.

97 Fig. 1 - Aldo Rossi’s The studio fax transmissions on Two sets of photographs, both taken at the turn of the Milan - New York axis, 1991 the 1980s, offer a good introduction into the relation Canadian Centre for between Rossi’s workspaces in Milan and New York. Architecture, Aldo Rossi Fonds, Project: The first is a series titled “Studio di Aldo Rossi,” made Eurodisney. by Luigi Ghirri, renowned photographer and friend © Eredi Aldo Rossi, of the architect: it includes both the studio in Via courtesy Fondazione Aldo Rossi. Maddalena, where Rossi operated from 1969 to 1989, and the studio in Via Santa Maria alla Porta, where he spent the last seven years of his career. Widely published and exhibited, Ghirri’s photographs played a pivotal role in constructing the particular imagery 1 – This set of photographs is held of Rossi’s Milanese studio (Costantini, 2016). The sec- in the Archive of ond is a set of pictures of the Manhattan office taken the MAXXI (Rome), 1 Fondo Aldo Rossi: by Rossi himself, with a basic compact camera. They Materiale Fotografi- were meant for private use and recorded the situation co e Video. in the satellite office shortly after its inauguration. 2 – In addition to The interaction between these environments is key the satellite office to understanding the last decade of Rossi’s career. in Manhattan, Rossi opened two shops While he had already worked in numerous counties, in The Hague (1987) the opening of the American office gave a different and Tokyo (1989) structure to these centrifugal forces, setting in mo- to oversee local 2 projects. These dy- tion a truly transatlantic design process. The turning namics are detailed point was not operating and building all over world, in the website of but rather developing the projects in a transnational the Fondazione Aldo Rossi. framework.

98 Faxing Architecture Firstly, there is a semantic divergence: the terms studio 3 – Morris Adjmi, and office reflect two dissimilar approaches toward interview by the author, 10 April the production of architecture (Buren, 1979; Jones, 2016. 1995; Van Meel, 2000; Martin, 2003; Agamben, 2017). In 4 – Conversation Ghirri’s photographs, the studio is presented as Rossi’s with Saverio Fera at wunderkammer – a highly aestheticized environment, the conference Aldo Rossi: Perspectives full of objects of affection and devoid of both laborers from the World, Po- and machines. As noted by Morris Adjmi, the Amer- litecnico di Milano, ican architect who helped create and then directed 12 June 2018. Fera worked in Rossi’s the Manhattan office, the Milanese space was indeed Milanese studio very low-tech: all the drawings were done by hand, from 1987 to 1991. Rossi and his collaborators did not use computers and, apparently, there was only one telephone in the entire studio.3 According to one of Rossi’s Italian employees, the first computer was installed in the studio of Via Maddalena around 1988: it was a “bulky Macintosh” and was used only for writing, not drawing.4 One of the key aspects of this curated environment is the underlying sense of domesticity it conveys. In a short piece written on the occasion of the 1990 Pritzker Prize ceremony, Kurt Forster mentioned vis- iting Rossi’s “apartment and studio,” both located in a nineteenth-century enclave of Milan, and alluded to the “haunted familiarity” of the architect’s workspace (Forster, 1990). He went as far as to compare it to the residence of a latter-day John Soane. But Ghirri’s photographs evoke a different sense of The turning point familiarity, with a more intimate and sensuous under- tone. Particularly interesting is the image of Rossi’s was not operating bed in the studio of Via Santa Maria alla Porta. Both and building all the presence of a bedroom and the fact that a photog- over world, but rapher like Ghirri would shine a light on it speak to a very specific understanding of the environment of the rather developing studio. Bringing to mind Leo Steinberg’s reflections on the projects in the flatbed picture plane, Ghirri’s image seems to sug- gest a continuity between the bed and the desk – the a transnational surfaces associated with making (Steinberg, 1972). Not framework. only the bed is surrounded by drawings, hung on the blue walls, but multiple rolled-up drawings are placed on its horizontal surface, above the white sheets. Interestingly, some of these drawings appear to be faxes. In fact, while this technology is commonly associated with corporate milieus, the development of faxing went hand in hand with a trend towards the domestication of labor. For example, roughly a third of all new businesses registered in Europe and the

Sebastiano Fabbrini 99 While this United States in 1989, right around the time of Ghir- ri’s photoshoots, operated out of a home. And the fax technology machine, whose sales grew by 2000% over the course is commonly of the 1980s, was a key factor in this reconsideration of the home as a place of business, at the dawn of the associated with digital revolution (Quinn, 1989). corporate milieus, The interplay between the bed and the drawings also speaks to a broader iconographic horror vacui, the development of which characterized the entire representation of the faxing went hand Milanese studio. In Ghirri’s photographs, even the bookshelves are wrapped in drawings, some of which in hand with a (again) show the typical marks of faxing. What is not trend towards the visible, however, is the process behind such overload domestication of of drawings. Only the footprint is on display, not how it was made or who made it. While the studio appears labor. to be full of heterogenous objects – souvenirs, mario- nettes, porcelains and several other things describable as toys – there are no machines, and most of the man- ual drawing tools are confined to a secondary room. Fig. 2 - Aldo Rossi’s office in New York In this space, which Ghirri does not photograph, the City, 1988 tools are hung on the wall, next to a variety of other Museo delle Arti del objects. There is no solution of continuity, or differ- XXI Secolo, Fondo Aldo Rossi, Materiale entiation in treatment, between a pencil sharpener fotografico e video. and a wooden statuette, or between a compass and an © Eredi Aldo Rossi, exotic shell. Even in the equipment room, it is impos- courtesy Fondazione Aldo Rossi. sible to draw a line between tools and toys.

100 Faxing Architecture The office 5 – Douglas Mo- In New York, things were presented in a substan- reland, interview by the author, 28 tially different way. First, it is easy to see that the March 2016. photographs taken by Rossi in 1988 were less choreo- 6 – Morris Adjmi, graphed than Ghirri’s pictures. They were not meant interview by the to be published and, in fact, no images of the satellite author, 10 April office were ever made public. The opening picture, the 2016. one showing the entrance, is particularly noteworthy. The initial contact with the office is through a room framed by machines, including a computer, a printer and a fax machine. And this space is populated by laborers, photographed while being busy in front of a computer screen. Unlike Ghirri’s photos, this image Analyzing Rossi’s documents work being done, showing both the people photographs, this and the machines involved in the process. Clearly, Rossi was not the first European architect to office can hardly branch out in the United States. In fact, one could an- be associated with alyze the genealogy of this phenomenon throughout the organizational the twentieth century, culminating in the opening of OMA’s office in New York in the year 2000. But Rossi’s logic and the move shines a light on a particular juncture in this physiognomy historical trajectory – just before the advent of the digital age, as the United States were approaching the of American end of the Reagan era and Europe had just launched corporate the project of a new single market. Douglas Moreland, an architect who worked as a proj- architecture. ect manager for Disney and collaborated with Rossi in the early 1990s, used the terms “creative” and “corpo- rate” to explain the structure of the Manhattan office.5 Hypothesizing an ideal spectrum of environments from creative to corporate, he placed Rossi’s office near the creative end of the spectrum, on the opposite side of his own office at Disney. Looking at it from a different perspective, Adjmi described the New York office as being informed by “an American approach,” pointing to the application of advanced technologies, The same space as well as the overall organization of the workspace, and contrasting it with the Milanese state of affairs.6 was perceived Analyzing Rossi’s photographs, however, this office and described in can hardly be associated with the organizational logic and the physiognomy of American corporate architec- different ways ture (or, at least, with its stereotypical imagery) and, by a number of even though the work was mostly computerized, no individuals who one would interpret it as an “information age interi- or” (Martin, 2003; Harwood, 2003). Besides, as noted came in contact by New York architect Richard Hayes, Rossi’s office with Rossi. was located in a historical building near the Flatiron

Sebastiano Fabbrini 101 7 – Conversation District, in Midtown Manhattan – an area described as with Richard Hayes having a distinctly “European flair.”7 Clearly, assign- at the conference The Tools of the Ar- ing labels is not the point. What is interesting is the chitect, Technische fact that the same space was perceived and described Universiteit Delft, 23 November 2017. in different ways by a number of individuals who came in contact with Rossi, depending on their profes- 8 – Morris Adjmi, sional background and, sometimes, their nationality. interview by the author, 10 April Therefore, in an attempt to understand the interaction 2016. between Milan and New York in Rossi’s practice, it may be more productive to focus on what the two spaces produced. As it turns out, this interaction was based on a specific division of labor, which involved both the modes of production and the content being produced. Not only the work was done by hand on one side of the Atlantic and by computers on the other side. As pointed out by Adjmi, there was also a distinction in the type of work that was assigned to Milan and New York.8 For example, Milan focused primarily on preliminary sketches and final presentation drawings, while New York produced most of the technical drawings. Milan dealt with façade design, while New York took care of massing and logistics, and so on. From this perspective, different expertise and working methodologies came Fig. 3 - Global Art to be organized in a framework where each center was Fusion: Faxing set up to produce specific things with specific technolo- performance at the Vienna Museum of gies. The technology that kept everything together was Modern Art, 1985. the fax machine.

102 Faxing Architecture The politics of faxing 9 – In 1990, Tele- What was the state of the discourse on faxing when COOPicem, an education network this process was set in motion? To give some context, based in France, few months before the opening of Rossi’s satellite organized a project in which French and office in New York, Andy Warhol collaborated with Spanish students Joseph Beuys and Kaii Higashiyama in a project titled were asked to send to each other faxes Global Art Fusion. Presented as “fax art,” this project explaining what it involved sending a fax with drawings of all three meant to be Euro- artists within 32 minutes around the world – from peans. Dusseldorf via New York to Tokyo, and finally Vienna, where the fax was exhibited at the Palais Liechten- stein Museum of Modern Art (Warhol et al., 1986). This fax was declaredly intended as a symbol of peace, against the backdrop of the global tensions caused by the Cold War during the 1980s. In the same period, experimental architectural practices like ARX started to talk about a “fax design process.” And the idea was Fax was declaredly given a good amount of publicity by an issue of ANY devoted to “electrotecture” in 1993 (Davidson, 1993). intended as a At the same time, this technology was starting to be symbol of peace, recognized for its political potential, especially in against the Europe. For example, in November 1989 (the same month of the fall of the Berlin wall), the Council of backdrop of the Europe launched a program called Fax! The objective global tensions was to produce a multi-lingual newspaper, created by students from all over Europe, using only fax ma- caused by the Cold chines. At the core of this project was the conviction War. that this new communication technology was more than a means towards an integrated Europe: by its very nature, faxing was viewed as an embodiment of that process of integration. And this was not an isolated case. It was followed by similar publications, such as Le Petit Faxeur in France and Lingua Fax in Spain, just to name a few exam- ples. On a larger scale, faxing was also at the center of a project promoted by several cultural institutions throughout Europe, on the theme “What does being European mean to you?”.9 In all of these instances, faxing did not just provide the infrastructure through which this debate could unfold: it was approached from a political point of view, as a technology that in itself conveyed a specific message regarding the disso- lution of national borders. This idea was taken one step further by American artist Lillian Bell: on the occasion of the 1992 Earth Summit in Brazil, she designed an installation for the

Sebastiano Fabbrini 103 display of faxes sent by artists from around the world, and this led to the creation of a network called F’AXis, which included 220 artists from 29 countries. Bell imagined her fax machine as a gallery without walls: The importance of “Fax is a new technology for duty-free and bound- faxing in the early ary-free art, and represents the abolition of time and debate on the art space” (Bell, 1994). The importance of faxing in the early debate on the and architecture art and architecture of the electronic age was quickly of the electronic overshadowed by the advent of the computer, and ev- erything else that came with it. A key aspect of faxing age was quickly was that, while participating in the mechanization of overshadowed by design, it did not quite belong to the digital world: the fax machines used by Rossi’s generation were mostly the advent of the based on analog technologies. While the computer computer. was related to a new digital age, the fax embodied the swan song of an analog world that still had paper as its indispensable medium. In one of the most comprehensive studies of this tech- nology, Jonathan Coopersmith presents the history of faxing as a trajectory with a clear beginning and end (Coopersmith, 2015). His survey begins in 1843 with a patent written by Scottish watchmaker Alexander Bain, and ends in 2000, when a standards commit- tee for facsimile merged into a committee on data transmission standards. The first year represents legal recognition of facsimile as a concept. The latter, its bureaucratic absorption into computer-based commu- nications. However, most historians of technology agree that the fax machine truly became a commodity only in the 1980s, as a result of the formation of a system of inter- national standards, that guaranteed compatibility and allowed faxing to function properly on a global scale. Hence, the rise and fall of the fax machine is gener- ally inscribed in a period of less than two decades, a period corresponding more or less to the lifespan of Rossi’s transatlantic practice. By the time of the archi- tect’s death in 1997, faxing had just started to lose its primacy and independent existence to digital commu- nications in the form of the internet, the world wide web, PDF, cell-phones and other technologies. In 1994, Liz Farrelly described faxing as “the last form of hardcopy messaging in an increasingly comput- erized world” (Farrelly, 1994). Since faxing operated in a paper-based dimension and was still dealing

104 Faxing Architecture with hardcopies, a key aspect of this mode of com- 10 – Take as an munication was its printing technology. What made example the docu- mentation related faxing possible was the advent of thermal printing – a to Rossi’s housing technology that relied on a particular type of paper, project in Mount Pocono, Pennsylva- coated with a chemical that changed color when ex- nia, 1988 – Archive posed to heat. of the Canadian Centre for Archi- The particularity of this so-called “thermal paper” tecture (Montreal), is its extreme lack of durability. For example, upon Aldo Rossi Fonds: opening a beginner’s guide to fax machines published Projects. in 1988, one of the first paragraphs reads: “A faxed document left on the dashboard of a car on a hot sum- mer day will turn completely black” (Fishman, King, 1988). Regardless of where the document was left, however, not long after the printing, the image-form- ing coating tended to detach from the medium, slowly destroying the document. In other words, the drawing self-destructed after a few years. Which is why faxes are not accepted by most archives. Faxing architec- ture, therefore, meant operating in an ephemeral and non-archivable dimension. From this perspective, it is interesting to note that the cult of the drawing – one of the premises of Rossi’s success, especially in Ameri- ca – was accompanied by the development of a mode of communication that literally disintegrated the drawing itself. Faxing architecture, Just like with fiscal receipts, the only way to preserve meant operating a faxed document is to make a photocopy. In the early 2000s, after acquiring a significant portion of Ros- in an ephemeral si’s collection, the Canadian Centre for Architecture and non-archivable started to address this issue. And this led to a peculiar dimension. condition within the Rossi archive. In fact, many doc- uments have now multiple versions: the fax, which is usually in a state of decay, and – attached to it with a paper clip – a photocopy, which often constitutes the only legible record. On the occasions when the so-called original-the piece of paper that was faxed in the first place-is also available, then the same object can be seen on three different mediums. The whole operation is always announced by a clear sign on the photocopy: “Photocopie faite à partir d’un fax dans le fonds Aldo Rossi au CCA.”10 Rossi’s faxes were often accompanied by a rather ar- ticulated piece of communication infrastructure: the cover sheet. In this case, an entire page was devoted to defining the details of the fax transmission and describing its content. Next to a multitude of adminis-

Sebastiano Fabbrini 105 11 – Ibid. trative options, there was a particularly problematic

12 – This document checkbox: it said “Original Drawings.” When drawings is held in the were included in a fax transmission, the sender would Archive of the Getty check this preset box, but would usually cross out the Research Institute (Los Angeles), Aldo word “Original.”11 Rossi Papers: Drafts This detail is significant because it reveals an under- and Writings. standing of the complicated position occupied by the fax vis-à-vis the concepts of the copy and the original. A drawing sent via A drawing sent via fax, by definition, cannot be an original drawing: it’s a facsimile, a copy of something fax, by definition, else. But, given the complexity of the transmission cannot be an process, faxing required to think about this dichotomy original drawing. in a different way, reflecting on the oxymoronic pos- sibility of an original facsimile – a contradiction that would later be exploded by the digital revolution. Building on Walter Benjamin’s work, Bruno Latour has addressed this conundrum by suggesting that the aura of originality is not immobile, but can actually “travel” and “migrate to the newest and latest copy” (Latour, 2010). In Rossi’s case, it is worth noting that, while constantly addressing the issue of reproduction in his writings and design works, he operated through a technological apparatus that fundamentally chal- But, given the lenged the notion of originality. complexity of In the American context, the Teatro del Mondo is a the transmission particularly fitting example: after the international success of the 1980 Biennale (First Lady Nancy Reagan process, faxing went as far as to promote a diplomatic mission to required to bring the floating structure to the other side of the think about this Atlantic), Rossi started to include replicas of the Vene- tian theater in many of his American projects, from dichotomy in a the campus of the University of Miami to the projects different way. for Disney (Ornaghi, Zorzi, 2015). This act was part of a broader approach to design, whereby a limit- ed number of forms extracted form a few selected projects – such as the Teatro del Mondo, the Modena Cemetery and the Gallaratese – could be constantly reproduced and reassembled in different milieus. Among other reflections on originality and repetition in Rossi’s writings, this sentence annotated on a loose piece of paper in 1980 is particularly fitting: “The original – real or presumed – will be an obscure object that will identify with the copy.”12

106 Faxing Architecture Fig. 4 - Cover of the Council of Europe’s booklet of The Fax! Programme, 1989.

Sebastiano Fabbrini 107 Working through fax machines As a whole, the archival material held by the CCA – both the surviving faxes and their photocopies – is key to understanding how this technology impacted the design process within Rossi’s practice. The most evident effect involves the format of the work. In fact, while faxing imposed a limited width to all documents, their length was virtually unlimited, inducing what can be described as a scroll effect. The drawings had to be Due to the done on long and narrow scrolls, that were sometimes restrictions of the taped together in order to create wider documents. And, clearly, these format limitations had a significant format, faxing impact on the types of drawings that were produced. a plan was the Anyone who has ever laid out an architectural draw- ing knows that a long and narrow sheet of paper is most complicated better suited for an elevation or a section, rather than operation, and a plan. In fact, due to the restrictions of the format, usually required a faxing a plan was the most complicated operation, and usually required a good deal of cutting and good deal of cutting pasting. That is why plans were sometimes set aside and pasting. in favor of other drawings – especially axonometric drawings – that could communicate most of the essen- tial information, while being squeezed into a narrow- er sheet. But, overall, the undisputed protagonist of this scroll-like format was the façade – shining a new light on the “façadism” that is commonly associated with postmodern architecture. Many faxes included notes and signs, indicating how separate drawings were to be juxtaposed and taped together after the printing. In this respect, the process of cutting and pasting that followed some of these fax transmissions brings to mind Rossi’s renowned collages, such as the collage The Analogous City (Szacka, 2014). And, again, the breakdown of drawings into frag- ments amenable to be faxed back and forth brings to mind what is often described as the essence of Rossi’s The logic of the architecture – an additive compositional process based on a limited number of “pieces” and “parts” (Bonfanti, collage operated, 1970). While most studies have focused on the poetic in the everyday results of this process, the logic of the collage operated also on a very prosaic level, in the everyday innerwork- innerworkings ings of Rossi’s transnational practice. of Rossi’s Among other examples, this dynamic can be related to David Hockney’s contemporaneous exploration of transnational new methods of image reproduction, which included practice. making composite photographs with a polaroid cam- era and investigating the integrity of “surface” with a

108 Faxing Architecture color copier. In the late 1980s, he faxed entire exhi- 13 – This documen- bitions to galleries in San Paolo, Bradford and Tokyo: tation is held in the Archive of the huge images made from up to 288 A4 sheets were fed Canadian Centre for into a fax machine at his studio in Los Angeles, to re- Architecture (Mon- treal), Aldo Rossi materialize half way around the world and be assem- Fonds: Projects. bled in front of an audience (Melia, 1995). Even though it was never completed, Rossi’s project for a hotel at Euro Disney, in Paris, represents an interest- ing case study.13 Started in 1988, the project was entirely developed on the Milan - New York axis, sending faxes The construction of back and forth. In this case, the surviving documents a faxable document clearly show that the logic of the collage was applied to both the pre-fax and the post-fax stages of this trans- also relied on a few atlantic interaction. On the one hand, several prelimi- devices designed to nary sketches were done by cutting, pasting and taping multiple hand-made drawings – a stratification of pieces spell out the terms of paper with irregular shapes and varying sizes. On the of the transmission other hand, as already noted, the received faxes often needed to be taped together in order to recompose larg- process. er drawings. In both cases, the marks of this operation are quite noticeable, usually in the form of small pieces of yellow adhesive tape or masking tape.

Fig. 5 - CCITT fax test chart 167A, 1986.

Sebastiano Fabbrini 109 14 – Fax sent to The construction of a faxable document also relied on a Rossi by his Amer- few devices designed to spell out the terms of the trans- ican collaborators, 8 October 1991 mission process. The simplest of these devices was the – Archive of the so-called fax memo note, a small piece a paper that pro- Canadian Centre for Architecture (Mon- vided space for basic information like dates, locations, treal), Aldo Rossi names of the sender and the receiver, number of pages, Fonds: Projects. as well as short messages. Since these notes were 15 – In The Archi- attached to the top of the transmitted documents, they tecture of the City, also operated as one of the layers of Rossi’s collages. Rossi defines the locus as “a rela- For example, in the Euro Disney project, the drawings tionship between are preceded by a note indicating that the material a certain specific location and the had been exchanged between “I Discepoli” and “Il buildings that are Maestro.” The message reads: “Speriamo di essere in it; it is at once dei buoni allievi.”14 In addition to illustrating the type singular and uni- versal.” of relationship that existed between Rossi and his collaborators, the memo notes are also key to estab- lishing the geography of the drawing. In fact, there are always two entries marked as “Location.” And this does not simply indicate that the document went from New York to Milan, as in a traditional shipment. It should be read as an indication that the document existed both in New York and Milan: an object with multiple locations. Or, using a Rossian term, an object that existed in more than one locus.15 This has to do, on the one hand, with the intangible nature of the transmission process: a document that goes through a fax machine does not physically leaves its location, while at the same time appearing (in the form of a facsimile) somewhere else. And, on the other hand, it has to do with a condition of nonstop interaction, where the same object is sent back and forth so many times – adding comments and making adjustments – that no one can really tell the recipient from the sender. Reflecting on these dynamics in the early 1990s, Brit- The document ish designer Paul Elliman went as far as to define fax- existed both in New ing as a four-dimensional art: “It is like being in two York and Milan: an places at once” (Poynor, 1997). In the aforementioned issue of ANY, Cynthia Davidson took it even further: object that existed “Electrotecture calls for the refiguring of the very in more than one terms that define architectural theory and practice. When speed reaches a certain point, time and space locus. collapse and distance seems to disappear. The very conditions of spatio-temporal experience are radically transformed. At this point, does architecture finally become immaterial?” (Davidson, 1993).

110 Faxing Architecture The aesthetics of international standards 16 – Take as an From the perspective of this particular condition of example the docu- mentation related continuous dematerialization and rematerialization, to Rossi’s housing faxing provides a different way to approach another project in Este, Italy, 1994 – Archive concept that played a key role in Rossi’s theory of of the Canadian architecture: the concept of scalability. A constant Centre for Archi- tecture (Montreal), concern during this transatlantic exchange was the Aldo Rossi Fonds: scaling of the faxed materials, as evidence by a multi- Projects. tude of handwritten specifications on the drawings.16 17 – Fax sent to In a very literal sense, the challenge was to keep Rossi by Adjmi, control over the scale of objects that were repeatedly 24 March 1988 – Archive of the dematerialized and recreated in different locations. It Canadian Centre for is safe to assume that this is not what Kurt Forster had Architecture (Mon- in mind when writing about “Rossi’s uncanny shifts of treal), Aldo Rossi Fonds: Projects. scale” (Forster, 1990). For example, a note written by Adjmi on the cover sheet of a fax sent to Milan in 1988 reads: “La scala di tutto è lo stesso.”17 This message written in all caps and poor grammar, indicating that all the drawings within that fax transmission had the same scale, is emblematic of an underlying struggle to overcame a multitude of communication obstacles. Even though faxing required specific formats, the fax machines used in America did not operate with the same type of paper as the machines used in Europe. The documents fed into a fax machine in New York had the width of a US Legal page (8.5 inches), but came out in Milan with the width of an A4 page (21 centimeters), and vice The two machines versa. responded to Not only there was a dimensional gap between these different units of page sizes. On a deeper level, the two machines re- sponded to different units of measure. And, looking at measure. Looking this issue from a political perspective, this divergence at this issue highlighted a tension between state-level rules and in- ternational rules: while the Legal format was defined from a political by the American National Standards Institute, the A4 perspective, format came out of the International Organization for Standardization (Bartlett, 1984; Kinross, 2009). this divergence Most historians of technology point to two intertwined highlighted a phenomena to explain the (short-lived) success of the tension between fax machine: the deregulation of telecommunications that took place in several Western countries through- state-level rules out the 1970s and, even more importantly, the adop- and international tion and implementation of international standards in the 1980s, which enforced compatibility on a global rules. scale. As noted by Jonathan Coopersmith, developing

Sebastiano Fabbrini 111 this technology was essentially a “game of standards” (Coopersmith, 2015). The driving force behind this process was the CCITT (International Consultative Committee on Telegraphy and Telephony) – a specialized agency of the Unit- ed Nations responsible for regulating international communications. A key component of this regulatory effort was the production of a series of documents called “fax test charts” (McConnell et al, 1989). Hun- The process of dreds of thousands of these charts, always updated standardization to the latest standards, were distributed to fax users that allowed the fax around the world for years. The idea was to provide a reliable and rapid means of testing the equipment machine to become and evaluating the quality of the transmission, in light a widespread of the new international standards. In this context, the first interaction that most users had with a fax commodity went machine consisted in testing its ability to recreate a hand in hand with picture designed by an international committee – a highly curated composition of texts, drawings and the promotion of a photographs on an A4 page. specific aesthetic. These charts were more than simple utilitarian devic- es. It is easy to see that they responded to the graphic idioms and, one may dare say, the aesthetics of their time. For example, even though there is absolutely no relation between the two, there are striking analogies between the fax test chart 167A distributed by the CCITT in 1986 (as Rossi was opening his American office) and a drawing of the Modena Cemetery titled Composition with Saint Apollonia, made in 1977. Both are defined by a play on pure geometries such as pyramids and cubes, a subdivision of the page into precisely framed sections, a repetition of reg- ular patterns, a general representational flatness and systematic shifts of scale. But the most evident correspondence is the one between the photograph of the famous Eastman Kodak secretary, whose picture appeared on a number of test charts, and the painting of Saint Apollonia – the two exceptions in these other- wise abstract compositions, both placed to the left of the axis of symmetry. Evidently, this is not a formal comparison for its own sake: the point is to show that the process of stan- dardization that allowed the fax machine to become a widespread commodity went hand in hand with the promotion of a specific aesthetic which, through devices like the test charts, entered the houses and

112 Faxing Architecture workspaces of millions of people worldwide. And, 18 – Fax sent by Ar- as evidenced by the photograph of the Eastman chitect Vanni Rizzo to Rossi’s Milanese Kodak secretary, this message came with certain studio, 9 June 1992 highly-charged subtexts regarding broader social – Archive of the Canadian Centre for phenomena. Architecture (Mon- The case of Rossi highlights a constant tension be- treal), Aldo Rossi Fonds: Projects. tween these forces of globalization – with their inter- national systems of rules and regulations – and the limitations typical of any local milieu. For example, the CCITT could not do anything about a fundamental difference: the simple fact that Europeans use pages that are 21 centimeters wide, while for Americans it’s 8.5 inches. Because of this divergence in format, it was essential that all fax machines were set up to maintain the scale of the incoming drawing, rather than adjust it according to their own paper size. As is still the case in most contemporary printing machines, this option was called “Actual Size,” as opposed to the other primary printing mode, “Fit to Page.” So, not only the transmission of a fax from one place to another implied a form of dematerialization, but also the printing process called for a reflection on the relation between content (drawing) and medium (paper). In order to preserve the all-important dimen- sional integrity of the fax, the drawing needed to be Not only the dissociated from the paper of the receiving machine. transmission of In other words, the drawing could not fit to page. Abstracting the drawing from the page required to a fax implied think about scale in a different way. Both the term a form of “Actual Size” associated with fax machines and the dematerialization, expression “Stessa Scala” used by Adjmi seem to re- spond to the same logic. Neither of them provided any but also the information regarding the specific dimensions of the printing process object: what mattered was maintaining dimensional consistency throughout the faxing process. As noted called for a by one of Rossi’s collaborators in a postscript to a fax reflection on the sent in 1992, “Beware of the measurements!”18 relation between The analogy-machine content and The rift between the drawing and the page also speaks medium. to how faxing related to the architectural discourse of its time. It’s important to underline that this technology operated by scanning and transmitting images through the telephone system, in the form of audio-frequency tones. At the end of the process, the receiving machine interpreted the tones and

Sebastiano Fabbrini 113 19 – This theme has reconstructed the image, printing a paper copy. So, in recently been ex- a period in which architects were involved in the se- plored in the exhibi- tion Aldo Rossi: The miosphere up to their necks and linguistic theory was Architecture and king, practices like that of Rossi were using a machine Art of the Analo- gous City, organized that turned drawings into a sound-based language by Daniel Sherer and then back into drawings on the other side of the at the Princeton University School of world. Architecture was literally being sent through Architecture, in the the telephone line. Winter of 2018. Notably, this was the period in which Marshall McLu- han and Walter Ong addressed the impact of elec- tronic media on the rift between orality and literacy, identifying the emergence of forms of interaction and communication that put forward a “new orality” (Mc- Luhan, 1964; Ong, 1982). As noted by Liz Farrelly, fax- ing was, in effect, an extension of the oral traditional of telephone conversation: “It’s never as static as a Faxing was, piece of typed, proofed, published writing or codified computerized data” (Farrelly, 1994). Even the techni- in effect, an cal terminology seems to respond to that tradition. For extension of the example, in the fax jargon, the initial contact between oral traditional two machines is known as the handshake – a moment perceived as singing tones, in which the machines of telephone check compatibility and set the mode of transmission. conversation. And this is just the most noticeable part of a process that is entirely based on turning the signs on a page into continuous analog signals. From this point of view, the analog technology of the fax machine may also be associated with Rossi’s notion of analogy – the core of his theory of architec- ture.19 In the introduction to the American version of The Architecture of the City, Peter Eisenman argued that “the subversive analogues” produced by Rossi relied on two types of transformations: “the disloca- tion of place and the dissolution of scale” (Eisenman, 1982). Canaletto’s veduta of Venice with three Palladi- an monuments, none of which is actually in Venice, was often referenced in Rossi’s writings to explain the mechanism of this analogical design method. In this framework, the geographical transposition of multiple objects was meant to produce an ensemble that could be immediately recognized, even though it was a place of purely architectural references. If early projects like the collage The Analogous City, presented at the Biennale of 1976, were done by copying, cutting and pasting drawings on top of each other, this meth- od took on a new meaning in the last phase of Rossi’s

114 Faxing Architecture career, as drawings started to be faxed back and forth between Milan and New York. Even though this convergence went largely unnoticed, faxing allowed many of the concepts that populated Rossi’s discourse (and postmodernism at large) to overstep the bounds of theory and interact with the realm of technology, shifting the focus from product to process. The fax was the ultimate analogy-machine.

References Agamben, G. (2017), Autoritratto nello Studio, Milano, Notte- tempo. Bartlett, A. (1984), Algebra, the Golden Rectangle and Paper Sizes, “Journal of College Science Teaching,” n. 6, vol. 13, pp. 410-413. Bell, L. (1994), F’AXis, in L. Farrelly (ed), Urgent Images: The Graphic Language of the Fax, London, Booth-Clibborn Editions. Bonfanti, E. (1970), Elementi e Costruzione: Note sull’Architet- tura di Aldo Rossi, “Controspazio,” n. 10, pp. 19-28. Buren, D. (1979), The Function of the Studio, “October,” vol. 10, pp. 51-58. Celant, G. (2008), Aldo Rossi Draws in G. Celant, D. Ghirardo, L. Molinari (eds), Aldo Rossi: Drawings, Milano, Skira. Coopersmith, J. (2015), Faxed: The Rise and Fall of the Fax Machine, Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press. Costantini, P. (ed.) (2016), Luigi Ghirri / Aldo Rossi: Things Which Are Only Themselves, Montreal, Canadian Centre for Architecture - Electa. Council of Europe (1989), The Fax! Program, Strasbourg, Council of Europe Press. Davidson, C. (ed.) (1993), Electrotecture: Architecture and the electronic future, “ANY”, n. 3. Eisenman, P. (1982), Editor’s Introduction: The houses of mem- ory – The texts of analogy, in A. Rossi, The Architecture of the City, Cambridge (MA), The MIT Press - Oppositions Books. Farrelly, L. (1994), Glitch in a digital world, in L. Farrelly (ed.), Urgent Images: The Graphic Language of the Fax, London, Booth-Clibborn Editions. Ferlenga, A. (ed.) (2002), Aldo Rossi: The Life and Works of an Architect, London, Konemann. Fishman, D., King, E. (1988), The Book of Fax: An Impartial Guide to Buying and Using Facsimile Machines, Chapel Hill, Ventana Press. Fondazione Aldo Rossi (2018), Biografia di Aldo Rossi [On- line]. Available at: https://www.fondazionealdorossi.org/ biografia/ [Accessed: 1 May 2019]. Forster, K. (1990), Aldo Rossi’s architecture of recollection: The silence of things repeated or stated for eternity, in The

Sebastiano Fabbrini 115 Pritzker Architecture Prize, 1990: Presented to Aldo Rossi, Los Angeles, Jensen and Walker. Ghirardo, D. (2019), Aldo Rossi and the Spirit of Architecture, New Haven, Yale University Press. Harwood, J. (2003), The white room: Eliot Noyes and the logic of the information age interior, “Grey Room”, n. 12, pp. 5-31. Jones, C. (1995), Machine in the Studio: Constructing the Post- war American Artist, Chicago, University of Chicago Press. Kinross, R. (2009), A4 and Before: Towards a Long History of Paper Sizes, Wassenaar, Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study. Latour, B. (2010), The migration of the aura or how to explore the original through its facsimiles, in T. Bartscherer (ed.), Switching Codes, Chicago, University of Chicago Press. Lobsinger, M. (2002), That obscure object of desire: Autobiog- raphy and repetition in the work of Aldo Rossi, “Grey Room”, n. 8, pp. 38-61. Martin, R. (2003), The physiognomy of the office, in R. Martin, The Organizational Complex: Architecture, Media and Corpo- rate Space, Cambridge (MA), The MIT Press. McConnell, K. et al. (1989), Fax test charts, in K. McConnell et al., Fax: Digital Facsimile Technology and Applications, Norwood, Artech House. McLuhan, M. (1964), Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man, New York, Signet Books. Melia, P. (ed.) (1995), David Hockney, Manchester, Manches- ter University Press. Ong, W. (1982), Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word, New York, Methuen. Ornaghi, N., Zorzi, F. (2015), A conversation with Arduino Cantàfora, “Log”, n. 35, pp. 85-96. Poynor, R. (1997), Profile: Paul Elliman, “Eye”, vol. 7, n. 25. Szacka, L. (2014), Aldo Rossi, Bruno Reichlin, Fabio Rein- hart and Eraldo Consolascio: ETH Zurich, “Radical Pedago- gies” [Online]. Available at: http://radical-pedagogies.com/ search-cases/e08-eth-zurich/ [Accessed: 1 May 2019]. Van Meel, J. (2000), The European Office: Office Design and National Context, Rotterdam, 010 Publishers. Warhol, A. et al. (1986), Global Art Fusion, Bern, Art Fusion Edition.

116 Faxing Architecture fishing gear • ocean waste • ma- rine ecol- ogy • sub- sistence economy • up cycling Ghost Islands

Laurent Gutierrez (1) Valérie Portefaix (2)

Abstract Affiliation Ghost Islands is a series of installations which inves- (1) Hong Kong Polytechnic Uni- tigates numerous fishing related activities, invisible versity, School of stories, and multiple cultures. As part of a network Design of artworks set up in different regions of Asia, it ad- (2)The University of Hong Kong, School dresses the issue of fishing nets discarded or lost at of Architecture sea, as well as the health of our oceans, corals, and sea creatures. Shaped in the form of a group of islands Contacts: (1) sdlgut [at] polyu and made from a complex assemblage of bamboo [dot] edu [dot] hk poles and disused fishing nets, Ghost Islands are (2) mapoff [at] composed by the accumulation and stratification of gmail [dot] com these numerous, yet distinct, layers. In addition, the Received: construction of each new island helps to clean up the 26 March 2019 marine ecosystem through the collection of the nets Accepted: from the surrounding sea. This process also engages 04 November 2019 with activist divers and establishes connections with fisherman to create new domestic products with the DOI: 10.17454/ARDETH05.08 broken nylon threads of the collected nets. ARDETH#05

119 Ghost Islands is a series of installations which inves- tigates numerous fishing related activities, invisible stories, and multiple cultures. As part of a network of artworks set up in different regions of Asia, it address- es the issue of fishing nets discarded or lost at sea, as well as the health of our oceans, corals, and sea creatures. Shaped in the form of a group of islands and made from a complex assemblage of bamboo poles and disused fishing nets, Ghost Islands are composed by the accumulation and stratification of these numerous, yet distinct, layers. In addition, the construction of each new island helps to clean up the marine ecosystem through the collection of the nets from the surrounding sea. This process also engages with activist divers and establishes connections with fisherman to create new domestic products with the broken nylon threads of the collected nets. One fasci- nating aspect of fishing nets is that the same knot is used all around the world to weave meshes of vari- able dimensions. Yet paradoxically, it seems that fish- ing nets, although primarily intended to capture and remove live fish from the sea, are instead trapping them endlessly underwater when they become ocean waste. The aim of Ghost Islands is to give a voice to these crucial issues.

120 Ghost Islands Fig. 1 – Fishermen weaving traditional fishing nets made of coconut fibre in Koskoda Beach, Sri Lanka – MAP Office, 2018.

A brief history of fishing nets The earliest history of net making shows major points to apprehend the development of human kind along coastlines. In 1914, Finish arche- ologists excavated a net from the silty clay of a wetland with an AMS radiocarbon dating back to 8300 BC. Recorded as the ‘Antrea Net Find’, the net cords were made of willow bast, weaved together and already implemented with floats and stone sinkers. From prehistoric time, nets were used in a wide range of accomplishments beyond fishing, including land traps, military equipment, transport of goods, clothing and accesso- ries. Yet the prodigy of the net relies in its strength, potentially to be extra wide, but also its capacity to be finely meshed to catch the smallest spe- cies of fishes. From a designer’s perspective it is interesting to note that the woven geometry and the node technique are the same worldwide. So that the main difference from the original net is in its material, grass, flax, tree fibers and cotton in the early days, while today long duration nylon material is largely commonly used.

Laurent Gutierrez, Valérie Portefaix 121 1 - Satoumi is Marine foraging and subsistence defined as marine While competitive fishing industries struggle more each year, we can still and coastal land- scapes that have locate successful model of subsistence economy by the sea. In Hong Kong, been formed and traditional floating villages are a significant model of vertical lifestyle, in maintained by pro- longed interaction which a fish farm directly located underneath the living platform. between humans The contiguous fishing nets enclose many species of fish, squids and lob- and ecosystems. sters that are either consumed or traded at the market. This way, the sea replaces the land to feed directly the residents’ community. The resur- gence of the idea of foraging for food shows that there are clear benefits to wild harvesting in a society of abundance. In that sense, traditional marine foraging and activities are proving a perfect balance between the fishermen and the marine ecosystem. In Japan, this equilibrium has been promoted as satoumi1 by Professor Hiroyuki Matsuda and imple- Fig. 2 – Sectional per- mented in various coastal areas to restore a damaged sea and stimulate spective of the Island ingenious agricultural heritage systems. In South East Asia, the ‘floating of Sea enhancing the balanced life with community’ known as sea-gypsy shows other modes of subsistence at the sea of a group sea that documented in fiction film Ghost Island. Further, as researchers, of fishermen in High we are pointing the wellbeing benefits framing the coast and the sea as a Island, Hong Kong – MAP Office, 2014. treasured therapeutic landscape.

122 Ghost Islands Fish aggregating device (FAD) They are small and may seem harmless, yet Fish Aggregating Devices (FADs) are today multiplied by tens of thousands and have quickly be- come the hidden killers of ocean life.

Operating far at sea with powerful radar reflector, they allow the large fishing corporates to catch in no time a large numbers of fishes, includ- ing the juvenile. Once the radar is disactivated to bypass fishing quota restrictions, FADs are left, drifting drift at sea, especially in the Indian Ocean and along the equator trapped by the counter currents. Once they sink to the bottom of the ocean floor, they transform into ghost nets are destroying the benthic ecosystems that exist in the deep, including all marine life, and the vulnerable species. Fig. 3 – Axonometric drawing of a Fish Aggregating Device – MAP Office, 2019.

Laurent Gutierrez, Valérie Portefaix 123 Abandoned, lost or otherwise discarded fishing gear (ALDFG) Fishing industry has been one of the most challenged with monstrous factory boats over fishing entire zones, leaving little change to smaller fishing boats to make an income. Over the past ten years, ghost fishing nets have become another major threat for the reproduction of life at sea. The most recent figures are exceptionally alarming, with half of the trashes invading our oceans classified by the Food and Agriculture Orga- nization of the United Nations under Abandoned, Lost or otherwise Dis- carded Fishing Gear (ALDFG), which includes lines, traps, hooks, dredges and buoys. Developed for catching fish, the nets are now performing the

124 Ghost Islands Fig. 4 – Map of drift- ing Fish Aggregating Device drifting along the Equator – MAP Office, 2019. Source: http://marinedebris. exact opposite of their original purpose, entrapping fishes and corals un- engr.uga.edu/fish-ag- derwater. Furthermore, the shift in the manufacture of fishing nets, with gregating-devices/ high quality, solid and durable synthetic material means that they are no possibility of biodegrading, as the natural fiber nets would do. Multiple options can be implemented to prevent the proliferation of ALDFG. The first is preventive and by enforcing industrial fishing regulation a system of tags, commonly used on basic products. They could be attached to each gear in order to prevent its discard or to geo-localize it once lost at sea.

Laurent Gutierrez, Valérie Portefaix 125 Fig. 5 – Diver activist removing a Ghost Fishing Net from young corals in Krabi National Park, Thai- land – MAP Office, Ghost nets activist diving 2017. There are many ways to approach the catastrophe, upfront and once the damage is done. At the global scale, an active network of activist divers are deploying immense energy to remove the nets, one by one, in the deep sea or on the seashore. Yet it is difficult to evaluate the ratio of their action with what is left into the ocean. Also scale does not matter, as tiny nets will be as harming as large ones, entrapping baby corals trying to survive the ocean warming and acidification. In this context we should approach ghost fishing nets as an hyper material, unable to reconnect with its original purpose. Recognized as a priority issue by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), ghost nets represent massive amount of material, therefore a great opportunity that should be ad- dressed by art and design.

126 Ghost Islands Fig. 6-1 – Fisherman tools to weave net bags, Cheung Chau Island, Hong Kong – MAP Office, 2018. Upcycling and domestic activities The major problem faced by the various diver activist groups is the fu- Fig. 6-2 – Net bags weaved by retired fish- ture of ghost nets once they reach the land, often packaged into hundreds erman, Cheung Chau kilos of dirty material, crammed with crustaceans, live or dead, fishes Island, Hong Kong – MAP Office, 2018. and other debris including plastic and metal. In most cases, the informal pile is burnt creating harmful dioxins, or ends in landfill, with some potential to be sent back into the sea. Raising the fundamental question of waste, the reality is that ghost fishing net offer a very limited amount of possibilities for recycling or upcycling. Those processes mainly serve as communication to construct awareness and the necessity to address the materiality of the net with new natural fibers with biodegradable abilities. The upcycling process allows the materiality to enter the do- mestic environment and reveals the main characteristic of the material as a surface with pattern and as a container to protect or host. Net bags, hammocks, lamps, fabrics to wrap object, are the many possible devia- tions bringing a positive attitude and awareness.

Laurent Gutierrez, Valérie Portefaix 127 Fig. 7 – Ghost Island is made from an accumulation of reclaimed fishing nets that have been left behind in the sea around Krabi Nation- al Park, Thailand – Ghost Islands MAP Office, 2018. In fall 2017, MAP Office received an invitation from curator Jiang Jiehong to participate in the first Thailand Biennale, Edge of the Wonderland. It opened in the Province of Krabi in November 2018 and continued for a duration of four months. From this opportunity, we engaged the multiple components of our research based practice on the ecology and economy of the coastline. It also propelled a series of art installations giving visibil- ity of this still most unknown phenomenon that is the ghost net. For this public project, we constructed the first Ghost Island, revealing “the Edge of the Wonderland” with the upcycling of 300 kilos of fishnets rescued by multiple activist divers groups around Krabi National Park.

128 Ghost Islands Fig. 8 – Ghost Island installation with hammock made from upcycled Ghost Fishing Nets by retired fish- erman from Cheung Chau Island, Oi! Art Space, Hong Kong – This experience is now repeated in Hong Kong with the construction an MAP Office, 2019. indoor Ghost Island transformed into a small cinema inside the former colony’s Yacht Club. For this iteration, it serves as a flagship to research various local issues regarding the pollution of the sea, a space for dis- cussion involving diverse groups (politics, environmentalists, scientists, designers, etc.) with the Hong Kong group of activist divers. This new collaboration extended to a small group of retired fisherman weaving net bags and upcycling hammocks to transmit the cultural heritage of their Cheung Chau Island community.

Laurent Gutierrez, Valérie Portefaix 129 References Alfaro Giner, C. (2007), Fishing nets in the ancient world: The historical and archae- ological evidence, in Ancient Nets and Fishing Gear. Proceedings of the International Workshop, “Nets and Fishing Gear in Classical Antiquity: A first Approach”, Cadiz, November 15-17, 2007. Huntington, T., Macfadyen, G. (2009), Abandoned, Lost or Otherwise Discarded Fish- ing Gear, Roma, United Nations Environment Programme Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. Chou, C. (2009), The Orange Suku Laut of Riau, Indonesia: The inalienable gift of territory, London, Routledge. Jiang, J. (2019), Edge of the Wonderland, Bangkok, Office of Contemporary Art and Culture, pp. 196-201. Kelly, C. (2018), I need the sea and the sea needs me, “Marine Policy”, vol. 97. Tung, J. (2019), Phantom on the Horizon, Once Lost but Now Found, Hong Kong, Leisure and Cultural Service.

130 Ghost Islands panop- ticon • cartog- raphy • remote sensing A Panoptic Cartography of Remote Sensing

Marco Ferrari

Abstract Affiliation Landsat has been the longest-running program dedi- Studio Folder, Agency for Visual cated to remote sensing ever initiated, regularly imag- Research ining Earth’s landmasses since 1972. The distributed archive of data generated by the eight generations of Contacts: marco [at] satellites that followed one another in Low Earth orbit studiofolder [dot] it constitutes one of the largest collection of images in history; most of the imagery served by Google Earth Received: 03 December 2019 to the screens of billions of its daily users is still based on Landsat products. Accepted: Looking at the history of Landsat – and exposing the 28 December 2019

early challenges around the acquisition, management DOI: and processing of data that the program had to face 10.17454/ARDETH05.09 during its development – can be a productive way ARDETH#05 to question our current understanding of planetary- scale infrastructure and computation. The approach proposed by this project uses a series of visual props to advance literacy of geospatial data, and investigate the ways in which modernity’s ter- restrial imaginary has been shaped over the past few decades.

133 These data- On July 23, 1972, ERTS-1 (“Earth Resources Technol- ogy Satellite-1,” later known as Landsat-1) reached acquisition its destined sun-synchronous polar orbit on board a facilities generated Delta 900 rocket. Two days later, the first cloud-free image acquired by its multispectral scanner system a distributed was developed into film, rendering a view over archive of millions Ouachita Mountains in southeastern Oklahoma into a 80 meter-ground resolution image where lakes, rivers, of images that mountain ranges and vegetation where clearly visible projected the in their natural hues. Since then, at least one Landsat immateriality of satellite has been continuously orbiting at an altitude between 900 and 700 km above Earth’s surface: as the the information longest-running program dedicated to remote sens- generated in ing, Landsat imagery constitutes a large part of Google Earth data at a regional scale, and is still taken as a orbit, into the benchmark to evaluate the accuracy of almost any pattern of national other geospatial product. sovereignty. The Landsat program raised early questions that remain central to the understanding of contemporary, planetary-scale infrastructure: by literally encompass- ing the whole planet under its sensors, it was designed to image Earth’s landmasses recursively, in an attempt to detect any significative change of its environment; real-time processing of the vast amount of data it produced was not possibile onboard the spacecraft – and thus required a network of distributed ground stations (from the United States, to Saudi Arabia, to Australia) to download them while the satellite would transit above. These data-acquisition facilities generated a distributed archive of millions of images that projected the immateriality of the information generated in orbit (beyond the reach of any country’s borders), into the pattern of national sovereignty – while becoming one of the most politically-charged elements within the administration of the program. Issues about data sovereignty, such as the debate on the rights of sensing countries over sensed countries, led to the ratification of UN space treaties in the late 1970s and 1980s, and to the adoption in 1986 of the UN Principles Relating to Remote Sensing of the Earth from Outer Space. In 2007, the introduction of the first iPhone made satellite imagery instantly available on a personal device, removing the need for any technical under- standing of its production, and bringing the panoptic view of the satellite at the user’s fingertips. The now

134 A Panoptic Cartography of Remote Sensing familiar gesture of pinch-and-zoom (first demoed by Steve Jobs on stage of the Moscone Center in San Francisco, while zooming in on a slightly off-nadir image of the Washington Monument), embodies the way in which we navigate seamlessly across scales. Cartographic databases are used today by millions of people to move across familiar environments, plan long- or short-range trips, cross national borders, or reach shores of unknown countries in hope of a better life. They’re the product of a global remote sensing apparatus made of spacecrafts, sensors, antennas, and fibre-optic cables, owned by nation states and pri- vate corporations, and managed through an intricate network of dataprocessing facilities. The different agendas of these institutions are concealed under the smooth, colour-corrected surface of commercial im- agery, embedded in the metadata of the global digital mosaic like a footnote to the wonders of the contem- porary geographic omniscience – while delivering a profitable picture of a borderless world. On the screen where the geographic information is delivered, all that counts is a smooth navigation experience: we can go everywhere – and we belong anywhere – on the evenly accessible surface criss-crossed by GPS- calculated paths, where political and natural features This contemporary are erased under the uniform roaming of a position- ing dot. digital atlas is This contemporary digital atlas – delivered on various still, though, an platforms, and an integral part of any online query – is still, though, an asynchronous composition of er- asynchronous ratic resolutions, where the sharpness of most-popu- composition of lated areas decay into the algorithmically-interpolated erratic resolutions, gloom of high latitude coastlines and seabeds. This continuous, uncluttered view of the globe is achieved where the through the ceaseless stitching of hundreds of thou- sharpness of most- sands images, at various scales and from a variety of sources. populated areas Landsat, Copernicus, DigitalGlobe and Spot Image decay into the (just to name a few of these images’ providers) all have constellations of specialised sensors that provide algorithmically- different combinations of resolution, light spectrum interpolated gloom and periodicity between satellite overpasses. By of high latitude looking at the data attribution’s captions on Google Earth, Bing, or Apple Maps, it is possible to have a coastlines and glimpse into the structure and rules of this intricate, seabeds. tridimensional layering of commercial distribution

Marco Ferrari 135 agreements, where different image providers look at the Earth’s surface from different altitudes and at dif- ferent resolutions. The virtual sky of Google Earth, Bing, or Apple Maps, through which we zoom in and out, pinching with our fingers, represents the ideal scenography for the assemblage of this mosaic. A perpetual, pale blue haze mediates the movement across scale, while a darker hue negotiates the transition between the high- resolution domain of the land and the lesser-known digital elevations of the ocean’s seabed. This sky is a contested space where different agendas are at play, and where only the exposure of the occasional digital artefact can provide a way to peer into the seams of its construction. The research presented here, initially started as a participation to After Belonging, the 2016 Oslo Archi- tecture Triennale, aims to become a platform for the construction of a new critical atlas, a spatial index of visual footnotes to the technical spaces that we cross while tapping on our screens. The boundaries of these image products reflect na- tional, military and commercial interests that need to be part of the understanding of the way in which our planet is imaged everyday. The series of visual props presented here are the first step towards visual and spatial literacy that is fundamental in an age of increasing prominence of geospatial information, and the pervasiveness of cartographic data in the fabric of our everyday lives.

136 A Panoptic Cartography of Remote Sensing Sensing The global mosaic produced by Landsat is far from an unfaltering pano- rama of the planet: in fact, it is composed of more than 60,000 images. The sensed areas vary hugely from year to year, according to a variety of reasons: needs for cartographic consolidation, weather conditions, en- vironmental emergencies, technological compromises, military surveil- lance, political agenda, availability of ground receiving stations. The sequence of maps presented here displays the amount and distribu- tion of all the imagery collected by the Landsat programme between 1972 and 2016. All the publicly available Landsat datasets have been download- ed and parsed in order to produce a geographical representation of the imagery distribution over time, and translated into a series of maps. Each map represents the imagery available for a single year, through a visuali- sation of the satellite metadata along the actual Landsat orbital path, and plotted on a Space Oblique Mercator projection. A drawing machine has then been used to engrave the data onto globes, which had been previous- ly crafted by hand through a custom process of casting and polishing. The thickness of the lines – which represents the number of photos available for a given year – is originated by the increasing vibration of the robot’s arm, that hovers on the spinning globe while progressively drawing on it.

Marco Ferrari 137 Fig. 1 – Fig. 3 – The global mosaic pro- duced by Landsat is far from an unfalter- ing panorama of the planet: in fact, it is composed of more than 60,000 images. The sensed areas 1972 1974 vary hugely from year to year, according to a variety of reasons: needs for carto- graphic consolidation, weather conditions, environmental emergencies, techno- logical compromises, military surveillance, 1977 1981 political agenda, availability of ground receiving stations. The sequence of maps presented here displays the amount and distribution of all the imagery col- lected by the Landsat programme between 1984 1989 1972 and 2016. All the publicly available Landsat datasets have been down- loaded and parsed in order to produce a geographical representation of the imagery distribu- tion over time, and 1992 1995 translated into a series of maps. Each map represents the imagery available for a single year, through a visualisa- tion of the satellite metadata along the actual Landsat orbital path, and plotted on 1998 2001 a Space Oblique Mer- cator projection. A drawing machine has then been used to en- grave the data onto globes, which had been previously craft- ed by hand through a custom process of casting and polishing. 2004 2009 The thickness of the lines – which repre- sents the number of photos available for a given year – is originated by the increasing vibration of the robot’s arm, that hovers on the spinning globe while 2013 2016 progressively drawing on it.

138 A Panoptic Cartography of Remote Sensing Processing Svalbard is an archipelago situated between 74°N and 81°N in the Arctic Ocean. The Svalbard Treaty of 1920 recognises the full Norwegian sover- eignty over the islands, but it guarantees equal access to their territory and resources to all the signatory nations. It also forbids any military operation on its land and waters. Mostly inhabited by mining workers from Russian and Norwegian origins during the XX century, Svalbard now hosts numerous advanced research outposts from a wide range of different nationalities. It’s both a global research centre for the study of climate change and the upper atmosphere, and an emerging centrepiece of the new power race for influence and resources in the High Arctic. The ground station run by KSAT is the world’s most important satellite control centre. Svalsat sits both at the centre and at the edge of the mod- ern cartographic space: on one side, its latitude ensures the most optimal location to intercept polar-orbiting satellites; on the other, polar caps are very difficult to sense – it can take up to five years to have a fully up- dated mosaic of a region that would be otherwise covered by 10 Landsat scenes. The Svalbard archipelago offers a unique opportunity to investi- gate the production chain of the global geographic knowledge: by looking at it through a catalogue of the anomalies, fractures, and aberrations of the satellite imagery mosaic, one can read beyond the apparent smooth- ness of the charted globe.

Marco Ferrari 139 Rendering Three models represent a vertical section through the Google Earth’s sky above three sample locations: the territory of Svalbard, a high latitude area, where satellite scans are scarce and bordering tiles stretch over long periods of time; the contested border between Morocco and Western Sahara, a scarcely-populated region close to the Equator; the San Fran- cisco Bay Area – one of the best mapped portions of the planet, and a usual testbed for commercial mapping services. Each layer represents a different zoom level, starting with a 1-square-km area on the bottom and progressing upwards by 500-m intervals. The colours stand for different sources of satellite imagery.

“Uncharted - Footnotes to the Atlas” is a project by Studio Folder. Research and Design: Studio Folder (Marco Ferrari, Elisa Pasqual, Alessandro Busi, Pietro Leoni, Francesca Lucchitta, Giovanni Pignoni, Mariasilvia Poltronieri). / All photos by Mattia Balsamini, © Studio Folder.

140 A Panoptic Cartography of Remote Sensing Fig. 5 – “Uncharted - Fig. 6 – “Uncharted - Fig. 7 – “Uncharted - Footnotes to the Footnotes to the Footnotes to the Atlas”, Detail of a Atlas”, Detail of a Atlas”, Detail of a model representing model representing model representing a vertical section a vertical section a vertical section through the satel- through the satellite through the satellite lite imagery of the imagery of the Goog- imagery of the Goog- Google Maps mo- le Maps mosaic, as le Maps mosaic, as saic, as of September of September 2016. of September 2016. 2016. This visualisa- This visualisation This visualisation tion analyses the analyses the cloud- analyses the cloud- cloudless, evenly-lit less, evenly-lit skies less, evenly-lit skies skies of Google’s of Google’s mapping of Google’s mapping mapping services, services, exposing services, exposing exposing the variety the variety of sources the variety of sources of sources of the cur- of the current global of the current global rent global remote remote sensing ap- remote sensing ap- sensing apparatus. paratus. Model #02, paratus. Model #02, Model #01, Svalbard Western Sahara. San Francisco Bay Archipelago. Area.

Marco Ferrari 141 References Cosgrove, D. (2003), Apollo’s Eye: A Cartographic Genealogy of the Earth in the We- stern Imagination, Baltimore, The Johns Hopkins University Press. Gabrynowicz, J. I. (ed.), (2002), The UN Principles Relating to Remote Sensing of the Earth from Space: A Legislative History, Oxford, University of Mississippi School of Law. Goward, S. N., Williams, D. L., Arvidson, T., Rocchio, L. E. P., Irons, J. R., Russell, C. A., Johnston, S. S. (2017), Landsat’s Enduring Legacy: Pioneering Global Land Obser- vations from Space, Bethesda, American Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing. Kurgan, L. (2013), Close Up at a Distance: Mapping, Technology, and Politics, New York, Zone Books.

142 A Panoptic Cartography of Remote Sensing electronic waste • non-human • improvisa- tion • new materialism • creative re- sistance La vita delle macchine. Improvvisazione materiale creativa attraverso trasformazioni urbane a Barcellona-22@

Daniel Torrego Gómez (1), Miguel Mesa del Castillo Clavel (2)

Abstract / The life of machines. Material improvisation Affiliation: across urban transformations in Barcelona-22@ (1) (2) Escuela Poli- técnica Superior de This paper refers to the birth of the recycling and la Universidad de domestic collection of electronic waste in Barcelona as Alicante, Departa- a process of both urban innovation and social trans- mento de Expresión Gráfica y Carto- formation. It is explained as an event that reveals grafía the vital transformative capacity of matter in our societies and in our cities. With this goal, it makes Contacts: (1) dtg8 [at] alu use of Graham Harman’s critique of Sociology of As- [dot] ua [dot] es sociations to advance towards the proposal of New (2) miguel [dot] Materialisms. Innovation is expressed as a production mesa [at] ua [dot] es made by heterogeneous entities within an improvised process. In it, human and non-human entities inter- Received: act and produce differential transformations, linked 30 January 2019

by a sort of “corporal commitment”. The intrinsic Accepted: qualities of the material show themselves as creative 3 September 2019 resistances. These materials become intuitive actors DOI: in intra-action with elements of the social, giving rise 10.17454/ARDETH05.10 -from 2015- to a new sensibility of the city towards electronic household waste. ARDETH#05

145 Introduzione. Ontologie che parlano di oggetti Le descrizioni delle trasformazioni della città come assemblaggi urbani e la concettualizzazione di ciò che viene costruito come sistema socio-tecnico in cui sono associati una moltitudine di interessi eterogenei, han- no fatto parte dei concetti assimilati dalla lettura di ciò che è urbano e di ciò che viene costruito, rispetti- vamente, da un gran numero di accademici, architetti e urbanisti nell’ultimo decennio. Queste concezioni, L’attenzione derivate dalla Sociologia delle Associazioni di Latour politica del lavoro e Callon (Latour, 2005), insieme ai contributi sul tema dell’architetto è urbano di Ignacio Farías (2011) o alle metodologie di etnografia e mappatura delle controversie promosse stata accompagnata da Latour e Yaneva (2018), hanno unito l’interesse dall’emergere della comunità di designer e architetti nel rinnovare di una serie di la visione degli oggetti e degli edifici come qualcosa di statico, proponendo una comprensione dello stesso attenzioni che come qualcosa di dinamico inserito in un processo in- permettono di finito, attraversato da interessi fluttuanti e dipendente descrivere le da eventuali accordi tra attori, umani e non umani, capaci di trasformarlo. Questo interesse ha spostato il attività progettuali disegno di essere considerato di una conoscenza au- in modo più ampio tonoma e orientato verso un prodotto o oggetto finale e di inserirle in per evidenziare il suo carattere politico, e per influen- zare il processo decisionale e le partecipazioni, le ecosistemi più gerarchizzazioni, le marginalità e le invisibilità che si vasti, da cui è producono. L’attenzione politica del lavoro dell’archi- inseparabile. tetto o del designer è stata accompagnata dall’emerge- re di una serie di codici o attenzioni che permettono di descrivere le attività progettuali in modo più ampio e di inserirle in ecosistemi più vasti, da cui è insepara- bile (Jaque, 2011). D’altra parte, nonostante la sua ampia ripercussione, alcuni autori hanno indicato criticamente gli approcci delle STS e hanno offerto alcune varianti ontologiche e teoriche. Un esempio molto rilevante nel panorama architettonico contemporaneo è l’Object Oriented Ontology (OOO) di Graham Harman (2010), che pro- pone un maggiore riconoscimento degli oggetti come qualcosa che non può essere esaurito nella descri- zione delle associazioni a cui partecipa. Sulla Teoria dell’Attore-Rete, Harman sostiene, nel suo “disaccordo con Latour e Yaneva” (Harman, 2017), una difesa della qualità statica degli edifici, rifiutando di descriverli solo come momenti all’interno di una traiettoria più ampia e dinamica. Se per Latour e Yaneva il fatto che

146 La vita delle macchine ciò che viene costruito si trasforma nel tempo in fun- zioni multiple e l’iscrizione di attori diversi è la prova della sua descrizione come processo, Harman sostiene che questo è un modo di sminuire l’oggetto stesso, che non può essere spiegato soltanto dalle relazioni che promuove. Il fatto che l’oggetto performi situazioni di- verse è, per Harman, un argomento piuttosto opposto: c’è una qualità inaccessibile dell’oggetto per promuo- vere situazioni, e questo non dipende totalmente dalle relazioni stesse, che sono prese come espressione delle proprietà sensibili dell’oggetto, ma non lo com- prendono. Per Harman, questa “necessità” di spiegare la realtà è proprio la debolezza dell’ontologia delle relazioni proposta da Latour e Yaneva in architettura. Se è vero che ogni forma di conoscenza si basa sulla capacità di dire cos’è una cosa – di cosa è fatta – e di cosa fa, “il mondo non è solo un correlato di conoscen- Il neo-materialismo za” (Harman, 2017: 121). Harman rifiuta la posizione di Latour e Yaneva perché ci raccontano la storia degli si presenta come edifici solo in base alla loro origine e ai loro effetti, una corrente senza lasciare in essi nulla che possa essere tenuto affermativa chiuso nella sua “scatola nera”. Prendendo come punto di partenza questa critica, e che cerca di cercando di conciliare entrambe le proposte, questo evidenziare articolo cerca di fare una lettura di un caso urbano proprio le capacità non solo come qualcosa che non solo viene descritto dalle relazioni che si instaurano intorno al costruito generative della (Latour, Yaneva, 2008), ma anche come un processo di materia. innovazione e creazione di nuove strutture in cui la base non sono solo le loro relazioni ma anche i proces- si inerenti alla materia e il suo contatto con l’ambiente che la circonda. Un’altra critica che la Sociologia delle Associazioni ha ricevuto dai Nuovi Materialismi è il fatto che essa cerca fondamentalmente di descrivere i processi, trasformando l’essere umano nel rappresentante lin- guistico di quelle entità non umane che vi partecipa- no. Per Manuel DeLanda, in una posizione simile – per diverse motivazioni – ad Harman, è importante capire che “il mondo avviene indipendentemente dalla mente umana e ha le proprie capacità morfogeneti- che” (Farías, 2008: 82). Secondo DeLanda, Latour non è chiaro su questo punto: se gli attori materiali sono validi solo quando un essere umano dà loro una voce, la loro autonomia è messa in discussione. Il neo-ma- terialismo si presenta come una corrente affermativa

Daniel Torrego Gómez, Miguel Mesa del Castillo Clavel 147 che cerca di evidenziare proprio le capacità generati- ve della materia, concentrandosi sulla formazione di strutture -linguistiche, geologiche, biologiche, biolo- giche – come processi ancorati a fenomeni materiali concreti. Il supporto corporeo della realtà diventa il centro di questa filosofia, in modo tale che le descri- zioni che propone sono fissate in ciò che le scien- ze – fisica o biologia tra l’altro – dicono del mondo (Nuño, 2018). Ma la realtà non avviene solo attraver- so l’espressione delle qualità interne della materia, ma attraverso l’incontro di queste con le condizioni di contorno, culturali, sociali o simboliche, in cui si sviluppano fino a consolidare forme e strutture, che vengono spiegate da entrambe le parti. Così, mentre nella Actor Network Theory si propone di comprende- re le relazioni attraverso i rappresentanti nei parla- menti delle cose – per esempio, nella costruzione di un edificio – i Nuovi Materialismi si concentrano sulla questione presente negli organismi partecipanti. In questa linea, e procedente dalla teoria femminista, Karen Barad critica il discorso rappresentativo e pro- pone l’alternativa dei discorsi performativi ancorati a fenomeni materiali concreti (Barad, 2007). Barad rifiuta l’idea che ci sia una corrispondenza tra parole e cose e offre una “spiegazione causale di come le pra- tiche discorsive sono collegate ai fenomeni materiali” (2007: 45). In questo, essa critica la rappresentazione della realtà per aver incluso la convinzione che ci sia una differenza ontologica tra le rappresentazioni e ciò che esse rappresentano, poiché sono assunte come entità indipendenti. Questo focalizza il dibattito sull’accuratezza della rappresentazione per esprimere ciò che è rappresentato. Barad propone di combatte- re “la fede asimmetrica che depositiamo nel nostro accesso alle rappresentazioni sull’accesso alle cose”, che considera “parte dell’eredità della filosofia occi- dentale e non è una necessità logica; è una semplice abitudine cartesiana della mente” (2007: 47). Di fronte a ciò, negando le premesse del “rappresentazioni- smo”, propone un modo performativo di intendere le pratiche naturali e culturali, in cui la conoscenza non è stabilita dalla rappresentazione da una posizione lontana, ma da un “incontro materiale diretto con il mondo” (2007: 48). Ciò che viene qui narrato ha a che fare con questa concezione performativa del discorso, poiché il

148 La vita delle macchine discorso che guida l’innovazione che si relaziona parte proprio da forme di incontro materiale con il mondo (le strade o i rottami metallici), e questi incontri sono prodotti dall’impegno corporale degli attori del processo. Quando i corpi sono compromessi, diventano decisivi, eseguendo o rifiutando compiti: che diventano possibili o impossibili, che vengono evitati, che vengono favoriti, che vengono ripetuti, o che vengono abbandonati. Le decisioni che fanno emergere l’innovazione in questo caso non sono prese in modo razionale o orientate a uno scopo specifico rappresentato in precedenza, ma sono eseguite dagli enti partecipanti, facendo emergere l’innovazione in modo non lineare. Per analizzare il caso qui presentato, queste teorie sono utilizzate in modo tale da comporre un utile corpo di pensiero per leggere un processo di tra- Le decisioni che sformazione urbana dal punto di vista della materia inorganica. In essa viene presentato un montaggio che fanno emergere si concentra su quelle qualità materiali presenti che l’innovazione in non sono negoziabili, che non fanno parte di un tutto questo caso non fluttuante, ma sono mostrate come “resistenze creati- ve” sulla base delle quali si articola la trasformazione. sono prese in Se Harman critica il materialismo per aver indotto modo razionale una certa ambiguità nella sua concezione delle capa- o orientate a uno cità generative della materia come qualcosa di privo di forma (Àpeiron), si propone qui di leggere quelle scopo specifico qualità materiali formali e resistenti che, nel loro inse- rappresentato in rimento in contesti urbani, hanno favorito situazioni precedenza. e promosso processi in associazione corporea con altri attori. Non si tratta di riconoscere il selvaggio in senso informe, viscoso e tentacolare (Haraway, 2016), ma piuttosto, al contrario, sostiene una visione del selvaggio nei corpi a contatto con altri corpi, le loro qualità resistenti, dure e quindi formali. Il selvaggio, non in senso ontologico, come quello che converte le cose in se stessi per contraddizione (Morton, 2015), ma in un senso che ci permette di riconoscere concre- tamente forme di affetto di materia inorganica -grida, non addomesticata, non prevista, non rappresentata da parole o schemi- sulle comunità umane. Per questo motivo, l’attenzione è rivolta a quattro condizioni materiali dalle quali si può spiegare il processo di innovazione: la duttilità e la conduttività del rame, l’o- rografia di Barcellona, il grado di opacità della strada nei capannoni industriali Poblenou-22@ e l’anatomia

Daniel Torrego Gómez, Miguel Mesa del Castillo Clavel 149 dei dispositivi elettronici. Questi materiali richiamano e facilitano alcuni usi dei corpi presenti che, attraver- so successive iterazioni, eseguono l’aspetto dell’intero dispositivo di raccolta dei rottami a Barcellona.

Il caso. 22@ e i rivenditori di rottami Il caso della trasformazione urbana proposta nel quartiere Poblenou, Barcellona, è stato affronta- to dall’interesse per la realizzazione di un grande Il fenomeno progetto di Smart City (Capdevila, Zarlenga, 2015), il della raccolta recupero di spazi vuoti (Vera, Pallarés-Barbera, Tulla, informale dei 2006), l’implementazione di un modello basato su aziende tecnologiche e iperconnettività su scala globa- rottami metallici le (Leon, 2008), l’urbanistica legata all’immagine della è strettamente città e del marchio Barcelona (Sabaté Bel, Tironi Rodó, legato all’infra- 2008) o come scenario di gentrificazione produttiva nella città catalana (Jutgla, Casellas, Pallarès-Barbera, alloggiamento 2010). Questi approcci rappresentano l’attenzione presente maggioritaria che si stabilisce di un quartiere in cui, all’interno dei attraverso un approccio a livello stradale, si può verificare una realtà non espressa in quelle letture di capannoni Poblenou-22@. La lenta consumazione del modello ha industriali. perpetuato la presenza di locali e magazzini vuoti, in attesa della sua trasformazione. Il quartiere, attraver- sato da appezzamenti di terreno e magazzini in disuso -rifiuti del passato industriale della zona – è anche luogo di riferimento, centro residenziale e logistico per la moltitudine di persone dedicate alla raccolta e al recupero dei rottami metallici presenti a Barcello- na. Il fenomeno della raccolta informale dei rottami metallici è strettamente legato all’infra-alloggiamento presente all’interno dei capannoni industriali, che servono sia come luogo di stoccaggio che come luogo di lavoro di pulizia dei manufatti. Gran parte delle persone che sopravvivono informalmente all’interno dei magazzini sono impegnate nel lavoro di raccolta e pulizia dei rottami metallici, o sono in qualche modo legate al fenomeno. Per circa un decennio, il numero di persone dedicate a questo stile di vita è rimasto relativamente costante, nonostante i ripetuti tentativi del comune di ridurlo. Ciò che si può osservare, invece, nel caso della raccol- ta dei rifiuti – con un centro logistico e residenziale a Poblenou-22@ – è una trasformazione socio-tecnica che coinvolge edifici e spazi urbani (Latour, Yaneva, 2008) e ha un modello di green economy (Callén,

150 La vita delle macchine 2014), basato sul riciclaggio e su un’attenzione partico- La maggiore lareggiata e attenta ai rifiuti; una trasformazione che ha favorito la successiva creazione della cooperativa consapevolezza di raccolta Alencop, che perfeziona e formalizza le della città nei pratiche del suddetto collettivo di raccoglitori. Questa confronti dei cooperativa, ora con il sostegno del Comune, ha svolto un importante lavoro di sensibilizzazione sull’impor- rifiuti elettronici è tanza del riciclaggio dei dispositivi elettronici presenti emersa grazie alla nelle case, offrendo il servizio di raccolta domestica e presenza di gruppi quindi il collegamento con gli interessi dei cittadini, che non devono più occuparsi dello smaltimento dei di collezionisti dispositivi obsoleti. informali. Possiamo quindi affermare che la maggiore consa- pevolezza della città (rappresentata dall’amministra- zione comunale e dai suoi cittadini) nei confronti dei rifiuti elettronici è emersa grazie alla presenza di gruppi di collezionisti informali nel quartiere 22@, ipervisibilizzati e mediatizzati (articoli sulla stampa). Sia il Comune che i cittadini hanno iniziato a pren- dere decisioni relative a questo problema: il primo a Fig. 1 – Operai promuovere la cooperativa per la raccolta dei rottami Alencop al momento della selezione degli metallici e il secondo a farsi carico di richiedere il ser- oggetti per il succes- vizio e gestire la raccolta degli elettrodomestici nelle sivo smontaggio. La scelta di questi ha a loro case. che fare con il tempo Ma descrivere l’emergenza del dispositivo Alencop di lavoro che richie- dono a seconda del (con i suoi artefatti mobili, i lavoratori, la legislazione valore dei materiali in materia o il sistema di chiamate e appuntamenti) metallici contenuti.

Daniel Torrego Gómez, Miguel Mesa del Castillo Clavel 151 Fig. 2 – Sistema di come un prodotto che emerge direttamente dalla pres- stoccaggio mobile sione esercitata dai collezionisti informali nel corso Alencop. degli anni non è, secondo l’approccio seguito qui, un posizionamento che riconosce sufficientemente la presenza del non umano in questo ecosistema. La questione non dovrebbe essere presa di per sé nell’a- nalisi, ma è proprio in casi come questo -per la sua qualità emergente, non pianificata, ma eseguita- dove i fenomeni materiale-discorsivi enunciati da Barad (2007) possono essere resi più visibili. Una pratica ancorata ai fenomeni materiali è diventata un sistema di maggiore attenzione e cura per la materia, ma quali sono stati i contributi creativi dei corpi materiali nel processo? Per rendere conto di questi contributi, dal punto di vista delle teorie qui citate, è necessario dotarsi di un’altra forma di percezione della realtà (Rowan, Ro- cha, Boserman, 2015), talvolta descritta come alogica (Morton, 2015). In questo, alcuni autori appaiono spesso interessati ad altre forme di affetto, come la sensualità, l’erotismo, il tatto o la musica (Morton, 2016). Queste forme di affetto cercano di trascendere il nostro metodo più diffuso di interazione razionale con il mondo e propongono modi in cui l’informazio- ne e il controllo dello sviluppo, ad esempio, di una trasformazione urbana, non dipende esclusivamente dall’umano. Quando il linguaggio non è stabilito in un

152 La vita delle macchine ambiente esclusivamente umano, permette ad altre entità di interagire e acquisire capacità di trasforma- zione. L’interazione è sostituita dall’intra-azione (Ba- rad, 2007), che implica una certa modifica delle parti quando sono messe in relazione, non essendo trattate come autonome. Successivamente, viene narrata una serie di intra-azioni tra esseri umani (raccoglitori di rottami) e non umani (substrato orografico, involucri di plastica o metallo), che, attraverso uno scambio che avvolge i corpi, danno origine a nuove strutture e dispositivi (Alencop e i suoi artefatti).

Plastica, terra e rame Spostando l’attenzione sugli attori non umani più rilevanti in questo processo, sorgono nuove interpre- tazioni che riguardano la capacità della materia di generare effetti sulle comunità umane. Il collettivo di collezionisti Poblenou-22@ è un gruppo umano straordinariamente vulnerabile ed esposto, ma rivela anche un’elevata capacità di adattamento al territorio e di miglioramento delle tecniche, il che, nel suo caso, è possibile solo attraverso un impegno corporale con gli spazi e i materiali in competizione. L’esistenza stessa del fenomeno nella città di Barcello- na (rispetto ad altre città spagnole con profili demo- Quando il grafici simili) risponde a fattori materiali tangibili. Da linguaggio non un lato, la maggiore presenza in questa città di edifici industriali in disuso facilita l’invisibilità del lavoro di è stabilito in smontaggio e rimozione delle plastiche che ricopro- un ambiente no cavi, frigoriferi o tostapane fino a raggiungere i esclusivamente metalli più pregiati. Questo lavoro è rumoroso e può richiedere ore. Per questo motivo, e perché è fuori leg- umano, permette ge, ha bisogno di grandi spazi chiusi dove è possibile ad altre entità depositare gli oggetti trovati e lavorarli comodamente. Il disarmo dei cavi richiede anche spazi longitudinali di interagire e dove il materiale può essere allungato e organizzato. acquisire capacità I magazzini abbandonati sono il luogo ideale per offri- re condizioni di stoccaggio e opacità ottimali, facili- di trasformazione. tando il processo. E la loro presenza, in gran numero, in zone vicine a quartieri residenziali permette un trasporto veloce e sicuro. Ma Barcellona non è l’unica città con magazzini industriali in disuso. Un altro fattore differenziale che rende la città il luogo ideale per la pratica della raccolta dei rifiuti domestici è la sua orografia, in associazione con i suoi ampi marciapiedi. Sebbene

Daniel Torrego Gómez, Miguel Mesa del Castillo Clavel 153 Barcellona sia fiancheggiata dai monti Tibidabo, Turó de Rovira, El Carmel e Montjuic, tra gli altri, ha un terreno prevalentemente pianeggiante, risultato della sedimentazione dei fiumi Besòs e Llobregat alla sua foce. Prendendo come esempio la Avenida Diagonal, che divide a metà il quartiere 22@ e attraversa la città da est a ovest, ad una distanza di 7,31 chilometri linea- ri la salita totale è di 64 m, ipotizzando una pendenza media dello 0,8%. Questo, insieme alla larghezza ge- Ciò che questi nerale dei marciapiedi del ensanche, che occupa gran numeri sembrano parte del disegno urbano di Barcellona sul territorio, indicare, è rendono la città particolarmente confortevole per il transito con traffico stradale a trazione umana. I car- che l’attività relli della spesa sono l’alleato tecnologico del carattere è ben nutrita vagabondo del fenomeno. L’orografia amichevole e gli con materiali e ampi marciapiedi facilitano il trasporto di materiali di scarto con questi mezzi. presenta condizioni Dalla spina dorsale della Diagonal è possibile accedere favorevoli per a quartieri residenziali come l’Eixample e Les Corts, svilupparsi. o al quartiere centrale di Ciutat Vella. Il quartiere dell’Eixample ha una densità di 372,1 hab/Ha, che, con i suoi quasi 750 ettari di estensione semi-orizzontale e i suoi generosi marciapiedi, lo rende uno spazio ideale per la raccolta dei rottami metallici. Secondo i dati dell’Università delle Nazioni Unite, la produzione di rifiuti elettronici (intesi come aventi componenti elettronici o elettrici) prodotti nel 2014 in Spagna era compresa tra i 15 e i 20 kg per abitante. Supponendo che il distretto dell’Eixample si trovi in queste calze, in un anno avrebbe la capacità di pro- durre circa 4.500 tonnellate di rifiuti potenzialmente utilizzabili dal punto di vista del riciclaggio dei metalli. Ciò che questi numeri sembrano indicare, spesso in qualsiasi modo, è che l’attività è ben nutrita con mate- riali e presenta condizioni favorevoli per svilupparsi. Inoltre, all’interno di questi apparecchi si trova il metallo più pregiato nel mercato del riciclaggio: il rame. Una serie di caratteristiche si fondono in rame che lo rendono il materiale migliore per la conduzio- ne elettrica attraverso i cavi. Da un lato, la sua elevata duttilità, dovuta in parte alla strutturazione di vuoti e policristalli molecolari al suo interno, facilita il processo di filatura. D’altra parte, questo stesso pro- cesso è favorito dalla bassa temperatura di fusione di questo metallo, che permette di modellarlo e adattarlo con meno sforzo energetico. Peraltro, è un metallo

154 La vita delle macchine che mantiene intatte le sue funzioni nei successivi riciclaggi, cosicché circa l’41,5% della domanda è coperta dal riciclaggio,secondo il International Copper Study Group (ICSG). Queste qualità lo differenziano da altri buoni conduttori (come il ferro o l’alluminio) Fig. 3, Fig. 4 – Lavoro e favoriscono la sua presenza nei circuiti interni di un di recupero di numero infinito di elettrodomestici. rottami metallici, in Questi stessi dispositivi, presenti nelle case – ad esem- cui vengono scelti i materiali più interes- pio – dell’Eixample, vengono caricati da carrelli della santi da estrarre.

Daniel Torrego Gómez, Miguel Mesa del Castillo Clavel 155 spesa e trasferiti all’interno dei capannoni industriali di Poblenou. Lì vengono impilati e lavorati – sman- tellando i loro involucri di plastica – fino ad avere il metallo separatamente, che viene venduto con mezzi diversi alle aziende di rottami metallici. I metalli sono coabitanti di edifici industriali, in cui è anche normale trovare abitazioni informali e aree di svago o di socia- lizzazione (Callén, 2014). L’edificio industriale diventa un nodo produttivo in cui la presenza di metalli assicu- L’edificio ra la possibilità di generare reddito futuro, associando industriale diventa una maggiore quantità di materiale ad una riduzione un nodo produttivo dei rischi per la comunità. I metalli meno preziosi sono venduti a intermediari che a loro volta li consegnano in cui la presenza a rivenditori ufficiali di rottami. I metalli più preziosi di metalli assicura (come il rame) si accumulano fino a quando non vi è la possibilità di una quantità sufficiente a rendere il viaggio redditizio per ogni individuo, che è responsabile della vendita generare reddito diretta all’azienda, per massimizzare il profitto. Le di- futuro, associando verse forme di impegno con il metallo che si verificano una maggiore hanno a che fare con la sua struttura interna o il modo in cui è organizzato in elettrodomestici. quantità di materiale ad una Alencop, la cooperativa di raccolta rottami. Queste pratiche hanno trovato un consolidamento riduzione dei rischi istituzionale nel sostegno alla formazione nel 2015 per la comunità. di Alencop, la cooperativa dedicata alla raccolta di elettrodomestici e “tutti i tipi di materiale metallico” (web), finalizzata a fornire lavoro a persone di origine subsahariana abitanti dei magazzini di Poblenou-22@. Anche se la sua attuazione è limitata (solo 15 delle centinaia di collezionisti di Poblenou-22@ hanno iniziato ad accedere a questo lavoro), il sostegno sotto forma di campagne di informazione del Comune è servito ad attivare i cittadini, iscrivendoli alla gestio- ne dei rifiuti elettronici. L’opera di raccolta dome- stica collega gli interessi del raccoglitore con quelli del cittadino, che in questo modo non deve portare pesanti apparecchiature elettroniche giù per le scale. Alencop ha un sistema di diffusione con volantini che gli stessi lavoratori lasciano nei negozi dei quartieri residenziali, e un servizio di chiamate che si occupa di programmare le spedizioni e pianificare il percorso di una flotta ridotta di biciclette con piccolo magazzi- no incorporato che attraversa le strade di Barcellona raccogliendo i rottami di ferro. L’intero sistema Alencop può essere letto come un pro- dotto innovativo che perfeziona e consolida l’attenzio-

156 La vita delle macchine ne dedicata negli anni da centinaia di collezionisti del Fig. 5 – I lavoratori di Alencop scendono le Poblenou-22@ al materiale del loro ambiente. Un buon scale della comu- esempio è la mappa in cui Alencop mostra i quartieri nità di un edificio a dove offre servizi, in cui è possibile identificare una Barcellona. schematizzazione diretta dell’orografia della città. Fig. 6 – Il percorso è Così, i carrelli della spesa sono sostituiti da moderni organizzato in antic- ipo ed è limitato ad magazzini per biciclette, i capannoni industriali ab- una serie di quartieri bandonati sono sostituiti da altri nuovi, ben illuminati con poco dislivello. e dotati di tutte le attrezzature necessarie, il mecca-

Daniel Torrego Gómez, Miguel Mesa del Castillo Clavel 157 Fig. 7 – La coopera- nismo di raccolta guadagna in efficienza non dipen- tiva Alencop ha un importante supporto dendo più dalla fortuna di trovare rottami metallici di comunale per valore per raggiungere clienti specifici, e la sua pub- l’elaborazione e la blicità ha un argomento positivo – collegando i rifiuti diffusione di volan- tini, in cui vengono con concetti di sostenibilità e consapevolezza ecologi- evidenziati i valori ca (Comune di Barcelona, 2018) – invece di generare legati all’economia verde e sostenibile una cattiva immagine – collegando i rifiuti a condizio- dell’iniziativa. ni di pericolo e sovraffollamento (Verdú, 2016).

Dimensione spaziale e politica materiale L’attenzione particolareggiata alle condizioni mate- riali del quartiere 22@, e per estensione della città di Barcellona, rivela una serie di linee guida che orien- tano lo sviluppo del gruppo di raccolta dei rottami. Da un lato, su scala urbana, risponde ai limiti ammini- strativi, a loro volta intimamente legati alle condizioni orografiche del territorio. Si può osservare che l’im- pegno del servizio Alencop è simile ai limiti tracciati dalle principali pendici della città, e questo può essere dovuto alla difficoltà di accesso ai mezzi utilizzati dal- la cooperativa. Queste condizioni materiali regolano l’esercizio della mobilità. All’altro estremo, le condi- zioni corporee – o anatomiche – delle apparecchiature limitano e orientano una certa tecnica di riciclaggio, attirando una serie di attenzioni e spazialità conse- guenti. Così, mentre i cavi elettrici hanno maggiori probabilità di essere raccolti in modo informale,

158 La vita delle macchine estratti da piccoli elettrodomestici che sono stati se- dimentati individualmente dai loro precedenti utenti per le strade di Barcellona, i grandi elettrodomestici possono essere raccolti solo dal servizio comunale. La mediazione degli spazi intermedi attraverso i quali devono passare gli elettrodomestici (scale, portali, aperture di facciata…) e il peso degli stessi, guidano un tipo di raccolta e determinano il successivo per- corso degli apparecchi attraverso la città e le reti in cui sono inseriti. Anche la correlazione tra la densità abitativa e la distribuzione dei punti verdi gioca un ruolo importante. I quartieri più densi e lontani dai punti verdi hanno maggiori probabilità di generare rifiuti elettronici sulle strade, portando un paesaggio più fertile per i raccoglitori informali. I quartieri con un sistema di raccolta ufficiale più efficiente sono meno inclini alla sedimentazione di questi rifiuti sulle I quartieri più le pubbliche strade. Va anche detto che a Barcellona c’è, in ogni quartiere, un giorno alla settimana che densi e lontani permette di lasciare in strada oggetti obsoleti, e questo dai punti verdi giorno non è mai lo stesso per un quartiere e per quel- hanno maggiori lo adiacente. Questo genera un movimento mutevole degli scarti, l’attivazione e la disattivazione della map- probabilità di pa urbana, con un ritmo costante e settimanale. generare rifiuti Lo studio delle condizioni materiali e spaziali che elettronici sulle guidano il dispositivo di raccolta degli scarti è un esercizio di dimensioni maggiori dei limiti di questo strade. articolo, ma le brevi note qui espresse mostrano un modo di affrontare questi fenomeni, che si basa sulla partecipazione della materia negli assemblaggi. (Mar- res, 2016). Affrontando il caso dei rottami metallici attraverso la tracciabilità dei fenomeni che danno forma alla mo- bilità, alla visibilità o alle tecniche di smantellamento, cerchiamo il riconoscimento del materiale come base ontologica da cui sostenere proposte analitiche, in modo che siano localizzati e incarnati in processi di coesistenza e co-produzione tra esseri umani e più che umani. Come abbiamo visto prima, l’attenzione ai non umani è più accurata attraverso metodi che non sono logico-analitici ma incarnati. Così, prestare attenzione al peso, alla dimensione, all’anatomia degli apparec- chi, o alle pendici di Barcellona e allo sforzo umano, è una proposta metodologica per approfondire il rap- porto con il non umano nello studio degli assemblaggi urbani. (Farías, 2011).

Daniel Torrego Gómez, Miguel Mesa del Castillo Clavel 159 Conclusioni. Innovazione o improvvisazione? Alencop incarna un processo di innovazione urbana che emerge dalla partnership tra attori umani e non umani. Un’evoluzione in cui gli attori umani hanno la- vorato in modo creativo adattandosi a condizioni ma- teriali resistenti (orografia, rame, rivestimenti plastici, magazzini industriali) che, anziché essere ostacoli, permettono, attraverso un concreto impegno corpo- reo, di sviluppare sistemi di attenzione ai materiali altamente specializzati nel loro contesto. In questo, l’interesse dovrebbe probabilmente essere spostato dal concetto di innovazione a quello di improvvisa- zione. In casi come questo, la visione del dispositivo (ad esempio le biciclette/magazzino di Alencop) come innovazione non affronta in modo sufficiente il processo da cui dipende in definitiva, e in cui attori Este modo de con ritmi e forze diverse si associano. L’orografia di Barcellona prodotta dai sedimenti prodotti in milioni pensar haciendo di anni alle foci del Besòs e del Llobregat è un fattore tiene que estar, chiave nello sviluppo di questa iniziativa. Il proces- por necesidad, so di creazione delle biciclette di Alencop risponde meglio a un processo di improvvisazione creativa, di abierto al mundo, pensare facendo (Ingold, 2013), in cui ciò che dimostra en un continuo di avere più capacità di definizione sono i fenomeni “encontrar juntos”. materiali concreti, al di là delle idee precedenti. Este modo de pensar haciendo tiene que estar, por necesi- dad, abierto al mundo, en un continuo “encontrar jun- tos” (Ingold, 2013). Il fatto che da molti anni centinaia di persone abbiano camminato per le strade, indivi- duando un valore emergente nel materiale di scarto, imparando a classificarlo ed a lavorare con esso ha permesso una forma evolutiva di lavoro di raccolta e pulizia dei rottami altamente specializzati. E questo avviene in un impegno diretto con la materialità delle cose, producendo una conoscenza che non è, quindi, il risultato dell’incontro tra idee e cose, ma che avviene “oltre” o “esternamente” alle idee. In questo processo di improvvisazione corporale – in quanto non guidata verso un fine concreto e compromette la corporeità degli attori umani e non umani coinvolti – partecipa- no migranti, vuoti urbani, rifiuti elettronici, disposi- tivi tecnici, amministrazioni comunali e territoriali, generando corrispondenze e trasformazioni. E ci permettono di intuire un modo concreto e alternativo di intendere il materiale come qualcosa di generati- vo, al di là della vecchia discussione sull’autonomia

160 La vita delle macchine degli oggetti tecnici. Così facendo, questo contributo si avvale dei suggerimenti di Graham, curando i suoi commenti sul parlamento delle cose (Latour, 2012) o sul thing-power (Bennet, 2009). Seguendo Harman, Il riconoscimento questi approcci hanno il potere di restringere (Har- delle capacità man, 2017) o lasciare ambigue (Harman, 2014) le ca- pacità di trasformazione degli oggetti. Senza escludere materiali questi contributi, questo lavoro mira a far avanzare il generative dibattito aperto da Harman offrendo un caso specifico e alcuni atteggiamenti o qualità che ne derivano – im- è al centro. pegno corporeo, intuizione, performatività, improv- visazione creativa – in cui il riconoscimento delle capacità materiali generative è al centro.

Nota Tutte le immagini fanno parte del documentario “This Could Work” de OTOXO Productions. www.otoxoproductions.com

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Daniel Torrego Gómez, Miguel Mesa del Castillo Clavel 161 Harman, G. (2017), Buildings are not processes: A disagree- ment with Latour and Yaneva, “Ardeth”, n. 1, pp. 112-122. Ingold, T. (2013), Thinking through making, “Presenta- tion from the Institute for Northern Culture ‘Tales from the North’”. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=Ygne72-4zyo. Jaque, A. (2011), Eco-ordinary: etiquetas para la práctica cotidiana de la arquitectura= Eco-ordinary: codes for everyday architectural practices/Eco-ordinary, n. 72, Madrid, Oficina de Innovación Política Universidad Europea de Madrid. Jutgla, E. D., Casellas, A., Pallarès-Barberà, M. (2010), Gentri- ficación productiva en Barcelona: efectos del nuevo espacio económico, “Las nuevas áreas empresariales: promoción y recualificación del suelo industrial, logística y gobernanza: comunicaciones, 4”, Madrid, Asociación de Geógrafos Es- pañoles, Grupo de Geografía Económica. Latour, B. (2005), Reassembling the social: An introduction to actor-network-theory, Oxford, University of Oxford Press. Leon, N. (2008), Attract and connect: The 22@Barcelona innovation district and the internationalisation of Barcelo- na business, “Innovation, Management, Policy & Practice”, vol. 20, nn. 2-3, pp. 235-246. Marres, N. (2016), Material Participation: Technology, the Environment and Everyday Publics, New York, Springer. Morton, T. (2015), Where the wild things are, “LA+ Interna- tional Journal of Landscape Architecture”. Morton, T. (2016), Una ecología sin naturaleza, Interview at CCCB. [Online] Available at: http://lab.cccb.org/es/timo- thy-morton-ecologia-sin-naturaleza/ [Accesed: 13 December 2018]. Nuño, L. (2018), Ciencia, filosofía e ideología, Enfoques ma- terialistas [Online]. Available at https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=_tSzxHWohPc&t=2489s [Accessed: 13 December 2018]. Latour, B. (2005), Reassembling the Social: An Introduction to Actor-Network-Theory, Oxford, Oxford University Press. Latour, B. (2012), We Have Never Been Modern, Cambridge, Harvard University Press. Latour, B., Yaneva, A. (2008). Give me a gun and I will make all buildings move: An ANT’s view of architecture, “Explora- tions in architecture: Teaching, design, research”, pp. 80-89, Basel, Swiss Federal Office of Culture. Rowan, J., Boserman, C. Rocha, J. (2015), La materia con- traataca: una tentativa objetológica, “Obra digital: revista de comunicación”, n. 9, pp. 80-97. Sabaté Bel, J., Tironi Rodó, M. (2008), Globalización y es- trategias urbanísticas: un balance del desarrollo reciente de Barcelona, “Cuaderno urbano. Espacio, cultura, sociedad”, vol. 7, n. 7. Vera, A., Pallares-Barbera, M., Tulla, A. F. (2006), La Nueva Economía y los espacios industriales tradicionales: El caso

162 La vita delle macchine del 22@Barcelona, in Alonso Santos, J. A., Aparicio Ama- dor, L. J., Sánchez Fernandez, J. L. (eds), Industria y Ciudad. Geografía de una relación renovada, Salamanca, II Jornadas de Geografía Económica, pp. 1-11. Verdú, D. (2016), Refugiados de la chatarra, “El País” [Online] Available at: https://elpais.com/ccaa/2016/05/23/catalun- ya/1464020438_133524.html [Accessed: 13 July 2018]. Yaneva, A. (2012), Mapping controversies in architecture, New York, Routledge.

Daniel Torrego Gómez, Miguel Mesa del Castillo Clavel 163 data • data centers • con- trover- sies Data (Centers) Controversies

Ippolito Pestellini Laparelli

Abstract Affiliation Office for Datacenters are a new building typology, whose Metropolitan characteristics and relationships with politics, culture Architecture and economics are still undefined, unquestioned and Contacts in flux. Reflecting on the architecture of datacenters, [email protected] this visual essay examines their role in infrastructural espionage, science fiction, climate change, and pro- DOI 10.17454/ARDETH05.11 cesses of automation. As data production, consump- tion and aggregation grow exponentially, what impact ARDETH#05 do datacenters have on their environment? What do they actually look like on the inside? What role do humans play in their operations? And what role could or should architects play in shaping the future of data centers and more in general of architectures for machines?

165 On June 25th, 2018 Investigative Agency The intercept published on their website a revealing article: The Wire Taps Rooms. The NSA’s Hidden Spy Hubs in Eight U.S. Cities (Gallagher, Moltke, 2018). The investiga- tion looked at eight AT&T facilities in eight U.S. cities, which acted as a peering hub for the NSA through the course of their surveillance program famously known as FAIRVIEW. The program was designed since 1985 to collect phone, internet and e-mail data mainly of foreign countries’ citizens at major cable landing and switching stations inside the United States. Much has been said, written and reported on the NSA and on FAIRVIEW, but very little has been shown of the physical infrastructure that allowed the spying. The eight facilities presented in the report share a common look of total inaccessibility and anonymity: contemporary fortresses, with no windows or signs. They sit silently in their urban landscapes, allowing the powerful infrastructure of surveillance to be hid- den in plain site, invisible to the thousands of people passing by everyday.

Fig. 1 – NSA Verizon Washington D.C. 30 E Street Southwest, photo by Mike Osborne

166 Data (Centers) Controversies Ippolito Pestellini Laparelli 167 Fig. 2 – Google Data Center The Dalles, Oregon, 2015, photo by Tony Webster

Fig. 1 – NSA Verizon Washington D.C. 30 E Street Southwest, photo by Mike Osborne

168 Data (Centers) Controversies In the age of surveillance capitalism the same architec- tural strategies have been adopted by tech giants such as Google, Facebook, Apple or Amazon. While Data Centers are the pivotal nodes of our social, cultural, financial and energetic landscapes, their physical pres- ence remains unassuming, banal and anonymous. A look shared by numerous examples around the world that mirrors the asymmetric and abusive relationship between tech corporations and end-users.

Ippolito Pestellini Laparelli 169 Discussing about the politics of the envelope at Trans- mediale in 2017, media theorist Tiziana Terranova points that the difference between front-end and back- end of a digital platforms such as Google or Facebook, can be found in their architectures: on the one hand the headquarters – transparent, permeable, accessi- ble, cool – and on the other hand their data centers – anonymous, impermeable and impenetrable. We are all familiar with our mobile phones and the inter- faces they provide, but very little can be accessed (or understood) of what is happening behind the screens, the way our data is captured, aggregated and ultimate- ly marketed. In parallel, very little is known about those spaces where data is stored: the network is not Fig. 1 – NSA Verizon Washington D.C.accountable 30 E Street Southwest, as its architecture photo by Mike remains Osborne invisible.

170 Data (Centers) Controversies Fig. 3 – Google Campus Dublin by Camenzind Evolution

Ippolito Pestellini Laparelli 171 Fig. 4 – Astronaut in data space, collage by OMA

Fig. 2 – Google Data Center The Dalles, Oregon, 2015, photo by Tony Webster

Fig. 1 – NSA Verizon Washington D.C. 30 E Street Southwest, photo by Mike Osborne

172 Data (Centers) Controversies While our datafied existences are evaporating into bytes, we are loosing ground with reality. Identities and personhood are artificially assembled, morphed and multiplied as data from our digital interactions are processed and aggregated into alternative real- ities through the white-halls of server farms across the globe. All we are left with is fiction, and data cen- ters are often broadcasted as fictions. Mainstream images of server farms suggest on the one hand new extreme environments and on the other a new form of techno-aesthetics, clearly inspired by sci-fiction, that has pervaded the collective visual imaginary from cinema to fashion. As James Bridle – a writ- er, artist and technologist – observed: “Inside, the buildings are deliberately designed to look like you would hope the Internet would look like, [they] are meant to appeal – very explicitly meant to appeal – to the kind of sci-fi sensibility of network engineers” (Bridle, 2011).

Fig. 3 – Google Campus Dublin by Camenzind Evolution

Ippolito Pestellini Laparelli 173 This is where marketing meets data real-estate. Keeping this in mind one should not surrender too easily to the fetish of the post-human/machine envi- ronment, as reality is far less exciting, and far more generic. The Data Center industry is an ideal lens to investi- gate the relationship between humans and non-hu- mans agents (or machines). Automation is redefining so much of our built environment – from harbors, to green houses, warehouses, etc. On server farms the presence of humans is in a similar way progressively Fig. 4 occasional– Astronaut in and data residual. space, collage Data by CentersOMA are extreme buildings built for machines, but is it really possible to talk about a new form of post-human architecture? Fig. 1 – NSA Verizon Washington D.C.Things 30 E Street are Southwest,not as simple photo as by they Mike seem.Osborne

174 Data (Centers) Controversies Fig. 5 – Google NC Datacenter, Image (C) Google

Fig. 3 – Google Campus Dublin by Camenzind Evolution

Ippolito Pestellini Laparelli 175 Fig. 6 – Modulor & server rack, image by OMA

Fig. 4 – Astronaut in data space, collage by OMA

Fig. 2 – Google Data Center The Dalles, Oregon, 2015, photo by Tony Webster

Fig. 1 – NSA Verizon Washington D.C. 30 E Street Southwest, photo by Mike Osborne

176 Data (Centers) Controversies From brief to construction, human space (offices, meeting rooms, receptions)in these gigantic structures is pushed to occupy very small portions. Here design becomes whimsical, folkloristic, even symbolic, acting as a form of compensation. Instead, when we look in detail at the spaces entirely dedicated to machines – also known as white halls – it becomes evident that humans are not entirely out of the picture. The dimensions of the spaces were servers are stacked are in fact still based on our own bodily dimensions, in order to allow residual handful of engineers to access the servers and keep the system running. Tempera- tures are kept at levels that are bearable for humans and servers alike – at huge energetic costs – and light is present only for people to find their way. From this perspective data centers are paradoxically an entire architecture for machines while still modelled on human dimensions and needs.

Fig. 5 – Google NC Datacenter, Image (C) Google

Fig. 3 – Google Campus Dublin by Camenzind Evolution

Ippolito Pestellini Laparelli 177 Progressive virtualization and un-manned DCs are becoming a reality and server farms are turning gradually into complex machines, as opposed to buildings hosting machines. We are experiencing the transition from a human-to-machine landscape, to a machine-to-machine one: a fully AI controlled Fig. 7 – Datacenter site visit Amsterdam, photo by OMA environment. This is an emerging regime where threats, management, repair and control are entirely organized by algorithmic intelligences and machine interaction, and where humans are relegated to sec-

Fig. 4 –ondary Astronaut roles in data or space,worst, collage to marketing by OMA materials (such as the grotesque security theater staged by several companies with armed guards and control rooms, in Fig. 1 – NSA Verizon Washington D.C.order 30 E Street to reassure Southwest, investors). photo by Mike Osborne

178 Data (Centers) Controversies Fig. 7 – Datacenter site visit Amsterdam, photo by OMA

Fig. 5 – Google NC Datacenter, Image (C) Google

Fig. 3 – Google Campus Dublin by Camenzind Evolution

Ippolito Pestellini Laparelli 179 Fig. 8 Armed guardFig. 4 at – Astronaut the PhoenixNAP in data datacenter space, collage by OMA Fig. 2 – Google Data Center The Dalles, Oregon, 2015, photo by Tony Webster

Fig. 1 – NSA Verizon Washington D.C. 30 E Street Southwest, photo by Mike Osborne

180 Data (Centers) Controversies Data production, consumption and aggregation grows exponentially and Data Centers are expanding rapidly as an emergent urban typology. Built to shape our future, they are contributing to its destruction: if data centers were a country, they would be the eleventh most energy consuming nation in the world, a ranking doomed to escalate at a frightening pace. For architects the open question is whether we can take this transition as an opportunity to redefine the architecture of DCs, their role, presence and accessi- bility. Whether we can start thinking about DCs as the monuments of the 21st century, as crucially functional but also highly symbolic components in our built environments, open and transparent to their con- text, acting as platforms to negotiate new forms of a human-to-machine cooperation. Or, on the other side, Fig. 5 – Google NC Datacenter, Image (C) Google if we are destined to fully embrace the notion of an impermeable architecture completely liberated from

humans, one where we areFig. 3 reduced – Google Campus to an occasional Dublin by Camenzind Evolution visitor of a lightless, hot, machine environment.

Ippolito Pestellini Laparelli 181 References Gallagher, R., Moltke, H. (2018), The Wiretap Rooms, “The Intercept” [Online]. Available at: https://theintercept. com/2018/06/25/att-internet-nsa-spy-hubs/ [Accessed: 3 No- vember 2019]. Bridle, J. (2011), Data centres and Secret Servers, “Icon magazine” [Online]. Available at: https://www.iconeye.com/ design/features/item/9503-data-centres-and-secret-servers [Accessed: 3 November 2019].

182 Data (Centers) Controversies air pollu- tion • tox- icity • in- frastruc- tures • commons • specula- tion Atmospheric Infrastructures to Deal with the Toxic Air in a Common World

Nerea Calvillo

Abstract Affiliation Air pollution is making visible that we cannot take University of Warwick, Centre for the air for granted, and the geoengineering projects Interdisciplinary that aim to clean it are not the solution. To claim the Methodologies air as a global common might create a different type Contacts: of awareness, and yet, what are the infrastructures n [dot] calvillo [at] needed to do so? After specifying how infrastructures warwick [dot] and the commons might be imagined otherwise, the ac [dot] uk

design, construction and encounters with the atmos- Received: pheric infrastructure Yellow Dust will reveal how 05 September 2019 experimental infrastructures might not “solve the Accepted: problem” of air pollution, but are opportunities to 05 November 2019 think on how to have a better air, as well as on how to (better) live in a shared world. DOI: 10.17454/ARDETH05.12

ARDETH#05

185 Introduction The air is one of the indicators of the Anthropocene. Since the Industrial Revolution it is an artificial environment, although Peter Sloterdijk claims that it was not until the 20th century that the air was de- signed, when the Germans used toxic gas as a weapon during World War I (2005; 2009). And yet, as architect historian Rayner Banham pointed out, the air - and even more air pollution - has been mostly absent from We inhale and architecture and urban debates (Banham, 1969). What exhale thousands do we need to know about it in order to operate in/ of times a day, and with it? How can we, as architects, start dealing with it? Can we think about what Sloterdijk termed as “air still we take the air design” (2009), and which tools do we have to devel- for granted. op it? To respond to these questions, drawing from feminist technoscience and feminist theory literature I suggest to thinking about the urban air as a complex sociotechnical assemblage (Farías and Bender, 2010), to acknowledge its materiality, its effects, its bodies and politics. If, as a heuristic, we considered this aerial sociotechnical assemblage a city, what would its urbanisms be?

Commons and infrastructures The atmosphere is the (some times) invisible dump of capitalist practices, but it is also a fundamental component of human and more than human life. We inhale and exhale thousands of times a day, and still we take the air for granted. However, the more polluted the air is globally becoming, the more its image is shifting from an infinite resilient space with never ending waste absorption capacities, to a limited resource that needs to be taken care for. And yet, because it is needed by all living entities in the planet – although its toxic effects are distributed unevenly- it has been considered a global commons (see Helfrich, 2008; Klein, 2014). Looking at the En- glish commons of the middle ages, for instance, the common was a piece of land, a right of use, and very importantly, norms and infrastructures to manage it. Therefore, what are the infrastructures needed to manage the air as a common? Answering this question requires some specifications. First, to acknowledge the material properties of the air. The air is a relational entity, with components that react among themselves, with the weather, or any ma-

186 Atmospheric infrastructures to Deal with the Toxic Air in a Common World terial that gets suspended in it. Which implies that the air is different at a neighbourhood, national, or global scales. It is also inapprehensible, uncontrollable and un-limitable. It travels with the wind, very far away, carrying seeds, ashes, microbes, dust, or radiation to places where they may not be expected or wanted. All of which pose difficulties for its management. The second specification relates to infrastructures. When thinking about infrastructures to manage the air, the first thing that comes to mind are monitoring infrastructures (satellite, ground monitoring stations, etc). They monitor concentration levels and distribu- tion of gases and particles, and their data are used for policy-making and regulation. To intervene in the air itself it is surprising that most infrastructures are designed to clean it. But, how does one clean a global circulating entity, when the economic system that has set up this situation does not seem to be chang- ing soon? Large geoengineering projects branded as sustainable solutions are being developed in scientific institutes and tech, oil or construction corporations: from growing large quantities of algae in the seas, to sequestering carbon in the deep layers of the earth, or building massive “purifiers” of circulating air (see the air purifying tower built in Xi’an, China, or Quest, Deep structural the partnership between Shell, Canada Energy and changes, cultural, Chevron, to capture, transport and store CO2 deep underground). However, even if these projects were political, but mostly successful, the effectiveness of these interventions economic, are is minimum compared to the scale of the issue. And needed to move most importantly, they sustain the economic system that caused the pollution in the first place – consid- from a cleaning ering that many of the proponents of these infra- approach towards structures are the corporations that pollute the most. Would it not be more effective to target the origin of a non-polluting the problem and stop polluting? situation. Deep structural changes, cultural, political, but mostly economic, are needed to move from a cleaning ap- proach towards a non-polluting situation, no doubt about it. Yet, they are the only possible solution. But as feminist literary scholar and cultural theorist Laurent Berlant has argued, we need forms to deal with the transition (Berlant, 2016), which might need their own infrastructures. If the large, expensive (and polluting) engineering infrastructures that we know are not fit anymore, alternatives are needed. And this is an op-

Nerea Calvillo 187 portunity for experimentation. Or, again with Berlant, we have the responsibility to do so. To experiment, the goals of engineering infrastructures must be challenged. Artist Natalie Jeremijenko has described her projects as “lifestyle experiments”: small interventions that put to work living entities to under- stand how complex systems work (hurricanes, flood- ing, species extinction, etc), and to test the design of infrastructures that take this complexity into account We need to expand (Hannah and Jeremijenko, 2017). These interventions our understandings have multiple aims overlapped, entangled in multiple of what scales. Most importantly, they do not attempt to “solve the problem”, but to get a better (and closer) under- infrastructures standing of the specificities of each site, and to ask can do, their aims different questions that might provide alternative re- sponses. Also, if for techno-science contexts infrastruc- and objectives, tures are material devices to solve specific problems, taking into science and technology studies have well demonstrated that they are much more: socio “technical assemblag- consideration their es composed by hard, soft, human and non-human different scales and entities, situated and networked in different ways temporalities and (Graham, Stephen and Marvin, Simon, 2009; Leigh and Bowker, 2006; Schick and Winthereik, 2016; Star, their experimental 1999). Dominguez Rubio and Fogué (2013) have also capacities. demonstrated how urban infrastructures can do more than ‘just’ managing urban resources: they can make the resources participate in public life and experiment with different forms of citizenship. In alignment with Jeremijenko and Dominguez Rubio and Fogué I claim that we need to expand our understandings of what in- frastructures can do, their aims and objectives, taking into consideration their different scales and temporal- ities and their experimental capacities. Thus I am in- terested in the infrastructures that allow us to manage the “terms of transition that alter the harder and softer, tighter and looser infrastructures of sociality itself” (2016: 394); in the infrastructures able to engage with the different materialities of air, but which also take into consideration and engage openly with their social implications, and to reflect “what kind of form of life an infrastructure is” (Berlant 2016: 393). The commons is also an unruly concept, as it takes various forms and approaches depending on the con- text and author. It tends to bring together resources, property rights and regulations. But one of the prob- lems of relating the concept of the commons to limited

188 Atmospheric infrastructures to Deal with the Toxic Air in a Common World resources’ management is that the discussion ends up being about economy and costs, which does not take into consideration the effects that the production and deployment of these infrastructures might have in humans and the environment (although we already know that they are a fundamental device for coloni- sation and extraction at multiple scales). Jeremijenko suggests instead to evaluate infrastructures’ success in relation to their contributions to humans and the So in which environment’s health. And I would add, in relation to social and environmental justice. So in which other ways can an ways can an infrastructure of a common (the air) be infrastructure of also an infrastructure for the common? With this question comes another problem, because a common (the as Berlant (2016) argues, the desired common often air) be also an reinforces an idea of the collective based on agree- infrastructure for ment and belonging (to a community or a state, for instance). Considering the challenges that these the common? idealistic approaches imply in terms of who and how belongs to that common – inspired in non-sovereign critiques and decolonial theory – I follow Berlant in her proposal of focusing on proximity and detection, as “the experience of affect, of being receptive, in real time” (2016: 402), as opposed to a unified (dissident or not) collectivity. How do we start thinking about infrastructures to deal with the air in our context of industrial toxicity, financial insecurity, and perma- nent war, that enable other forms of co-habitation?

Experimental infrastructures: Yellow Dust Philosopher Marina Garcés (2013) argues that due to the complexity of our context, thinking “what to do” can be paralysing. Therefore, she proposes to think instead how to change our modes of dealing with things, with each other, and the world. If before these modes have been focused on representation and action (think about some Greenpeace campaigns, where their action is to make visible the responsible actors of environmental disasters, like hanging banners in off-shore oil ex- traction platforms), Garcés proposes to shift towards at- tention and treatment: to pay a closer attention to what surrounds us and understand what the surrounding requires us to do; and to think about and change how to treat things, the world, and also ourselves (2013: 16). I have explored these questions in practice through

Nerea Calvillo 189 1 - Yellow Dust Yellow Dust, a project we1 developed for the Seoul was designed by C+arquitectos/ Biennale of Architecture and Urbanism 2017 based In The Air (Nerea on a prototype developed at Medialab Prado in 2008. Calvillo with In line with Garcés, Yellow Dust was conceived as an Raúl Nieves, Pep Tornabell, Yee infrastructure to deal with the toxic air in a common Thong Chai, Emma world, that instead of asking what to do with the Garnett, Marina Fernandez). Devel- polluted air, aimed to test if there are other modes of oped for the Seoul paying attention to it that involve other forms of treat- Biennale of Archi- tecture and Urban- ment other than cleaning. I refer to Yellow Dust as an ism 2017, with the infrastructure (instead of an installation, for instance) support of Acción to focus on its performative capacity, to look and think Cultural Española and an impact ESRC about what it does -instead of how it looks like, for IAA grant from Uni- instance-, to reinforce its management capacities and versity of Warwick and the Economic its multiple agencies. Infrastructures that acknowledge and Social Research a broken world, but which also trigger new ways of Council (ESRC). living on it (Berlant, 2016). We took this opportunity as an invitation to speculate, as the only possible way of dealing with our troubled times (Haraway, 2016), which doesn’t only mean observing the state of reality, but also intervening in it (Guggenheim et al., 2017; Hannah, Jeremijenko, 2017). So overall, Yellow Dust Fig. 1 – Yellow was a speculation – and an experiment, in line with Dust before the opening. Image by Jeremijenko – of what air design can do to engage with the Author. the urbanisms of the air, what can it mean to care for

190 Atmospheric infrastructures to Deal with the Toxic Air in a Common World the environment, and more specifically, to care for air pollution. In other words, it asked: what can ‘air design’ do for dealing with the Anthropocene?

Designing atmospheric infrastructures Yellow Dust was a mist canopy that measured, made visible and partially remediated the particulate mat- ter that floated in the air where it was located, in one of the courtyards of The Domuimun Museum Village, one of the venues of the Biennale. It was designed through what I have retrospectively called “attentive speculation”, as some sort of design method to, as Garcés suggested, pay attention to the air and its exist- ing infrastructures and speculate by asking different questions and design an infrastructure that would respond to them (for a more detailed description of this method and the design decisions of Yellow Dust, see Calvillo, 2018). Yellow Dust became an experiment Instead of trying to test if collectively experiencing pollution instead of to make the seeing information about it produced other responses and affects towards air quality. To do so, we used the infrastructure air to represent itself through mist, intensifying some itself visible as a of its conditions, to pay attention to the air that sur- rounds us. The mist also aimed to mediate and condi- strategy to make tion the public space where it was located, to facilitate it public, the aim exchanges, conversations and eventually organisation around air pollution in Seoul. However, instead of was to become trying to make the infrastructure itself visible as a atmospheric itself. strategy to make it public, as Dominguez Rubio and Fogué propose (2013), the aim of Yellow Dust was to become atmospheric itself. Not to disappear in the background, as the internet of things trope desire, but to become atmospheric: present and blurred, sensible and inapprehensible at the same time, to intensify its experiential potential. It also aimed to create “atmo- spheric attunements” (Stewart, 2011) with the toxic air, as partially aware encounters that are registered beyond reason, that are collective, difficult to explain. To increase its contribution to the commons the project combined air quality monitoring and visual- isation, as a tool to be used by communities to make visible environmental injustice. To achieve this, it was designed to be relatively easy to build, with accessible open source code and instructions to replicate it.

Building atmospheric infrastructures When speaking about infrastructures there is a phase that is rarely discussed, which is their construction.

Nerea Calvillo 191 Fig. 2 – Water As we will see, other forms of collectivity, commons, vapor tests in and understandings of infrastructures came into play Barcelona. Image by the Author. when producing and assembling Yellow Dust -which took place between Barcelona and Seoul. To make the air visible we had to get acquainted with water vapor and its own infrastructure. We spent a long time test- ing in Barcelona, at two of the collaborators’ working and living space. We had to learn how to create mist and not water droplets, to train our eyes to the differ- ent densities of the mist, our skins to understand the difference between fresh and wet, between feeling something or not. Instead of trying to control the air Instead of trying we had to train our bodies to be affected by the mist. to control the air As there were many unknowns we left the structure to be bought and assembled in Seoul. This, together with we had to train the set-up of the sensors, the final assemblage of the our bodies to be different pieces, testing the system, and getting water, Wi-Fi and electricity, required more experimentation, affected by the which forced us to pay attention to unexpected entities mist. and to explore other forms of treating each other. We had to create alliances with everyone on site: among the team, with the local contractor to adjust their rhythms to ours – which could only be done through encounters with one of the curators, the contractor’s representative

192 Atmospheric infrastructures to Deal with the Toxic Air in a Common World on site and a translator. This was a daily negotiation, as our needs were always ahead of their capacities. We also had to learn to communicate with the sales people of the materials shops, who did not speak English and did not want to be bothered for a couple of screws. We encountered strong resistances; from the air that resist- ed to be measured, from the weather that postponed the end of the monsoon – which made our shopping and set up an unforgettable adventure. For all these, As Garcé and many feminist thinkers claim, without notic- ing we had to put our bodies – and lives – in: to build, to sweat, to argue, to test. The air and water got confronted as commons in a challenging way. Due to the delays in the restoration of the village we were provided water supply from a hose connected to the courtyard of another pavilion. The tap leaked, and the participant allocated in that pavilion refused to have the tap open. It happened to be that their project was about water management in California. So droughts in the West Coast of the US got Fig. 3 – Nego- confronted with air pollution in Seoul. One common tiation of set- versus another one. Which, of course, is at the core up space with other construction of the difficulties of managing any common: to deal works. Image by with one, others might be needed, and eventually the Author.

Nerea Calvillo 193 Fig. 4 – The tap of the controver- sy. Image by the Author.

put at risk. This conflict, as many other tensions that emerged, was not sorted out through deliberations and consensus. Temporary alliances, compromises, backs-and-forths, temporary alternatives, and a lot of stress enabled us to all to co-habit the same space, just being next to each other, as a form of commoning (Berlant, 2016).

Encountering atmospheric infrastructures Instead of creating Once the Biennale opened its doors to the public the some sort of consequences of designing the air instead of trying to control it became visible. As previous architecture parliament of projects had already demonstrated (Blur Building, the things or space for 1970 Pepsi Pavilion in Osaka , etc), when intensifying discussion about the humidity of the air with water vapor, the infra- structure became environmental itself (McCormack, air pollution, the 2016). It grew and moved depending on the wind, collectivity that making not only the quantity of the particles visible, but meteorological conditions too. In terms of the so- took place below cialities or possible commons that it created, through the mist was much an ethnography conducted by anthropologist Emma Garnett we realised how, instead of creating some sort closer to Berlant’s of parliament of things or space for discussion about proposition. air pollution, the collectivity that took place below the mist was much closer to Berlant’s proposition: people were one next to each other, engaged in different activities: asking questions about air pollution, play- ing, resting, chatting, meeting other people, taking selfies… I have argued with Garnett that this situa- tion was articulated through “molecular intimacies” (Calvillo, Garnett, 2019), where a sense of intimacy

194 Atmospheric infrastructures to Deal with the Toxic Air in a Common World and belonging was achieved through queer molecular Yellow Dust aimed exchanges between air particles, water droplets and humans’ breath and skin. However, to this time we to design the air have not heard from any group or grassroots organ- not by cleaning its isation which might have replicated Yellow Dust, pollution, but by which confirms that providing the tools might be a contribution to a possible common, but that it takes making pollution’s a huge effort to mobilise an infrastructure in other issues visible and contexts. experientiable. Conclusions Yellow Dust aimed to design the air not by cleaning its pollution, but by making pollution’s issues visible and experientiable, as a form of making questions of shared responsibilities. It moved away from framings of air pollution as an individual health risk, to consid- er it a common issue that affects public health (and the one of animals, plants, buildings, and so forth), which also affects public budgets, corporations” Fig. 5 – Queer molecular intima- (lack of) responsibility, forms of energy production, cies. Image by the social and environmental inequality, among others. Author.

Nerea Calvillo 195 As a form of From this perspective, the air is a global common, but its infrastructures need to consider also the social prototyping public common that they might be able to respond to. Its space (Corsín, infrastructures are then experiments on how to have 2014) and the air, a better air, as well as on how to (better) live in a shared world. By looking at the design, construction which might be the and use of Yellow Dust we have seen that its material one of the ways and social experiments were fragile, precarious, and to deal with the temporary. They did not “solve the problem” of air pollution, but they were an attempt to engage with infrastructures and air pollution in another way. As a form of prototyping the commons for public space (Corsín, 2014) and the air, which might be the one of the ways to deal with the infrastructures the transition. and the commons for the transition.

Acknowledgements I thank all the collaborators of Yellow Dust and In the Air for making it possible. An early version of the section Commons and Infrastructures was originally published in Imminent Commons: Urban Questions for the Near Future. Barcelona, New York: Actar.

References Banham, R. (1969), The architecture of the well-tempered environment, London, The Architecture Press. Berlant, L. (2016), The commons: Infrastructures for troubling times, “Environment and Planning D: Society and Space”, vol. 34, n. 3, pp. 393-419. Calvillo, N. (2018), Particular sensitivities, in “Accumulation - e-flux Architecture” [Online]. Available at: https://www.e-flux. com/architecture/accumulation/ [Accessed: 5 September 2019]. Calvillo, N., Garnett, E. (2019), Data intimacies: Building infrastructures for intensified embodied encounters with air pollution, “The Sociological Review Monographs”, vol. 67, n. 2, pp. 340-356. Corsín, A. (2014), The right to infrastructure: A prototype for open source urbanism, “Environment and Planning D: Society and Space”, vol. 32, n. 2, pp. 342-362. Domínguez Rubio, F., Fogué, U. (2013), Technifying public space and publicizing infrastructures: Exploring new urban political ecologies through the Square of General Vara del Rey, “International Journal of Urban and Regional Research”, vol. 37, n. 3, pp. 1035-1052. Farías, I., Benders, T. (eds) (2010), Urban Assemblages, Lon- don - New York, Routledge.

196 Atmospheric infrastructures to Deal with the Toxic Air in a Common World Graham, S., Marvin, S. (2009), Splintering Urbanism. Net- worked infrastructures, technological monilities and the urban condition, London - New York, Routledge. Guggenheim, M., Kräftner, B., Kröll, J. (2017), Creating idiotic speculators: Disaster cosmopolitics in the sandbox, in Rosengarten, M., Savransky, M., Wilkie, A. (eds), Specula- tive Research. The Lure of the Possible, London, Routledge, pp. 145-162. Hannah, D., Jeremijenko, N. (2017), Natalie Jeremijenko’s new experimentalism, in Grusin, R. (ed.), Anthropocene Feminism, Mineapolis, University of Minnesota Press, pp. 197-220. Haraway, D. (2016), Staying with the Trouble: Making Kin in the Chthulucene, Durham, Duke University Press. Helfrich, S. (ed.), (2008), Genes, Bytes y Emisiones: Bienes Comunes y Ciudadanía, Mexico, Fundación Heinrich Böll. Klein, N. (2014), This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. The Climate, New York, Simon & Shuster. Leigh, S., Bowker, G. C. (2006), How to infrastructure, in Lievrouw, L. A., Livingstone, S. (eds), The Handbook of New Media, London, Sage, pp. 230-245. McCormack, D. P. (2016), Elemental infrastructures for at- mospheric media: On stratospheric variations, value and the commons, “Environment and Planning D: Society and Space”, pp. 1-20. Schick, L., Winthereik, B. R. (2016), Making energy infra- structure: Tactical oscillations and cosmopolitics, “Science as Culture”, vol. 25, n. 1, pp. 44-68. Sloterdijk, P. (2005 [2004]), Esferas III, Barcelona, Siruela. Sloterdijk, P. (2009), Terror from the air, Cambridge (MA) - London, The MIT Press. Star, S. L. (1999), The ethnography of infrastructure, “Ameri- can Behavioral Scientist”, vol. 43, n. 3, pp. 377-391. Stewart, K. (2011), Atmospheric attunements, “Environment and Urban Planning D: Society and Space”, n. 29, pp. 445-453.

Nerea Calvillo 197 interferen- ce • design determi- nism • ar- thropods • anthropo- morphism • life-form On Interference. Designing Strange Life Forms that Don’t Always Listen

Lydia Kallipoliti

Abstract Affiliation If “we judge every object by analogy with our own The Cooper Union, The Irwin S. Chanin bodies,” as Heinrich Wölfflin argues, then Robin Ev- School of Archi- an’s piezoelectric arthropods and the Boston Dynam- tecture ic’s robotic mules are disturbing, because they are a type of self-mirroring. These mechanical creatures Contacts: that project our unchecked desires, reveal anthropo- Lydia [dot] kallipo- liti [at] cooper [dot] morphic characteristics of a contemporary subject: edu hysterically tumbling and staying afloat throughout adverse and changing external conditions, by re- Received: organizing their internal structure and operative 11 October 2019 protocols. Partially primal and partially produced Accepted: with advanced technology, they also reflect a contem- 10 December 2019 porary body of work in architectural discourse that seems particularly relevant in a time of ideological DOI: diffusion, when clusters of positions and ideas emerge 10.17454/ARDETH05.13 precariously, not as tactfully positioned manifestoes, ARDETH#05 but more so, as unnerving life-forms. This paper will unfold a story intersecting the design of anthropomorphic robots and the projection of architectural desires to the agency of living systems. It will showcase through a science-art-architecture complex the increasing integration of performative, environmental and mechanical functions in build- ing and urban systems, with architecture becoming itself a strange life-form that reacts to the teleology of determinist thinking in design processes.

199 In unearthing the roots of the Jeffrey Epstein scandal and its multifarious connections with the MIT Me- dia Lab, historian of science Orit Halpern brilliantly exhumes Joi Ito’s (former director of the MIT Media Lab) famous slogan: “Deploy or Die!” (Halpern, 2019). Halpern argues, as has Molly Wright Steenson also re- cently argued, (Steenson, 2019) that Ito’s callous call to innovate or perish was well-founded in the history of the global innovation hub. Ito’s motto echoed the one In identifying of its founder Nicholas Negroponte, “Demo or Die!”– a the origins of spin on the academic aphorism “publish or perish”. innovation Evidently, this comes as no news in the world of neo- liberal governmentality and ethics. To innovate, one in design and must overcome all barriers and initial obstacles against entrepreneurship, all odds; a vision must be maintained unbroken and it is one’s commitment to a cause unaltered that grants the positivist valor and eventually yields results. This persistence ethos of solving a in surpassing hurdles, which appeals to the corporate propaganda of productivity and the Silicon Valley difficult problem modus operandi, “think different,” “work smarter,” as envisioned from or “just do it,” has been espoused by architects. Think the start, is not of Buckminster Fuller’s biographical story that on the verge of suicide after losing his daughter, an epiphany only the residue occurred to him in developing his lifelong project. Like- of an economic wise, in the corporate world, temporary failure and its defeat, are essential stages in an individual’s progress regime, that is toward lucrative self-fulfillment (O’Connell, 2014). The neoliberalism, but most obvious example of an architect determined to also a modality trail through rejection is the fictional character How- ard Roark – possibly representative of the figure of of operating in the modern architect in the twentieth century- in Ayn the world and of Rand’s The Fountainhead. Roark’s emergence at the top of the skyscraper he envisioned from the start, be- understanding it. comes a robust material type of advocacy in marketing determinism as a courageous, ethical enterprise, di- vulging a contested relationship between architecture and neoliberalism. In identifying the origins of inno- vation in design and entrepreneurship, the positivist ethos of solving a difficult problem as envisioned from the start, is not only the residue of an economic regime, that is neoliberalism, but also a modality of operating in the world and of understanding it. Against this grain, the then young Robin Evans, author of the landmark book Translations from Drawing to Building (Evans, 1997), introduced in 1969 the concept of interference. To Evans, interference was a critical

200 On Interference Fig. 1 – Robin Evan’s diagram of interference in the transference of energy towards pur- posive human action. In Robin Evans, Translations from Drawing to Building (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1997).

Lydia Kallipoliti 201 design parameter to creatively disrupt the expected turn of events. In his thesis at the Architectural Association in London, Evans argued interference was not blocking the course of actions, but revealing a path which would have been invisible in the design process otherwise. Evans used the graphic language of electrical circuits to describe interference in the transference of energy, but was in actuality interested in the course of human actions and the course of history as a metaphor for the design process. He called interference the “resis- tance of the ambient universe to purposive action” (Evans, 1969) and attested that it was a crucial piece of the puzzle to approximate the complexity of life and design, both non-linear systems. Deviation helped derail a system from its normative end goal and there- fore unveil a “surrogate goal,” which would open new paths of investigation. The testing ground for interference was for Evans a series of piezoelectric structures that he designed

Fig. 2 – Robin Evan’s thesis at the Archi- tectural Association in London in 1969 on the creative use of piezoelectric materials. Courtesy of the archives of the Architectural Association.

202 On Interference for this thesis at the AA. As energy-fed structures, these systems were strange mechanical life-forms, alarmingly lively or full of vitality he intermittently pointed out in his notes, sometimes responding to actual needs, other times responding to random and unexpected events. Obedience and teleology were not sought after in Evans’ project; the intention was rather to “energize the artifactual world” (Evans, 1969). From early on, Evans was not designing struc- tures to be placed in a passive historized context, be Rather than the positioned inside environments. He was alternatively realization of designing structures as environments themselves, a single vision, decentralized to ambient systems of information, where organisms were not the main protagonists. the object of The protagonists were in fact the ambient spheres of creation could be interrelated forces. Evan’s peripatetic anthropods, creatures that would the crossroad of respond to environmental forces, demonstrated his several different belief in a different kind of design agency, one in one in which predetermination was obsolete. Rather than paths. the realization of a single vision, the object of creation could be the crossroad of several different paths. A similarly strange mechanical life-form, peripatetic like Evan’s anthropods though prototyped and funded by DARPA, is Boston Dynamic’s BigDog, the first four- legged rough terrain robot to leave the lab and take on the real world (Boston Dynamics, 2017). BigDog was rejected by US marines in 2015 because, as they said, it was too loud and would give away their posi- tion (Hern, 2015). What is even more disturbing, other than the screechy noise of an adolescent wounded animal, is the fact that anyone encountering a BigDog, is uncertain of whether it is an animal or a machine. In a battlefield, this ambiguity is common to both the enemy and the offender. The two are strangely, albeit unwittingly, united by their common sensation of alienation, of not knowing what it is that they are con- fronting. BigDog’s legs are excerpted from a donkey, while the jumble of wires and mechanical gadgetry on its saddle are proof of its belonging to a long legacy of cybernetic animals and machines. Despite DARPA’s funding and the ongoing need to use BigDog as an efficient pack mule in combat, BigDog is not an unyielding race horse, destined to bring unbridled chaos in combat. In fact, it looks quite ner- vous and fragile, anxious to restore its balance after

Lydia Kallipoliti 203 consistently being pushed and abused by Boston Dy- namic’s engineers. Arguably, the power of this strange mechanical life-form is not redolent of its ability to stay erect, vertical to the ground, but of its continuous state of tumbling. Even more so, the commanding effect it has on viewers is unrelated to the creature’s accomplishments of demanding tasks, but its disturb- ing resemblance to useless features and characteris- tics of living organisms, such as the chicken’s ability to keep its head straight, while the rest of its body is moving (Dillet, 2016). This commanding effect, is not simply a visual categorical mismatch, similar to descriptions of monsters and aberrations as heteroge- neous entities that stich together different creatures. Possibly, Boston Dynamic’s robot series, acquired by Google in 2013, renders more than anything aesthet- BigDog is unsettling ic preoccupations on the replication of life, in all its flaws and weaknesses; in all the tumbling effects of because it is a type creatures that might fall, yet try very hard not to. of self-mirroring. In fact, BigDog might as well be disturbing, because abstract behavioural aesthetic decisions might have It reveals preceded its operational protocols. Considering the and projects remarks of art historian Heinrich Wölfflin, that “we judge every object by analogy with our own bodies,” anthropomorphic (Wolfflin, 1964: 77) BigDog is unsettling because it is a characteristics of type of self-mirroring. It reveals and projects anthro- a contemporary pomorphic characteristics of a contemporary subject: hysterically tumbling and staying afloat throughout subject. adverse and changing external conditions, by reorga- nizing its internal structure and operative protocol. This questionable species, partially primal and partially produced with advanced technology, reflects in many ways a contemporary body of work in architectural discourse that seems particularly relevant in a time of ideological diffusion, when clusters of positions and ideas emerge precariously, not as tactfully positioned manifestoes, but more so, as unnerving life-forms. Big- Dog may also serve as an analogy for a contemporary body of design work, both in its figural character and in its metabolism. With the increasing integration of performative, environmental and mechanical func- tions in building and urban systems, architecture has become itself a strange life-form that deploys humans to nourish it (Colomina, Wigley, 2016: 75). The projection of a body to formal organization, inde- pendently of whether this body is human, animal or

204 On Interference mechanical, is as longstanding as architecture itself. Vitruvius made a sequence of claims on proportion, symmetry and harmony comparing the human body directly to a building (Vesely, 2002: 192), while Leon Battista Alberti became animalistic in De re aedifac- toria, as Caroline O’Donnell argues, understanding architecture as analogous to an animal, both as an embodiment of organizational principles, as well as architecture’s relationships to climatic and site-related givens (O’Donnell, 2015: 192). The question of balance was key to Alberti -- even numbered supports for buildings analogous to four-legged animals-- and in many respects foundational to Renaissance humanist discourse establishing buildings as whole, stable and balanced bodies. As Anthony Vidler observes, the demolition of the classical body from its privileged place in architectural theory and practice came to foster an aesthetic of calculated disequilibrium in the 1980s and 1990s (Vidler, 1992: xii). The notion of the dismembered, fragmented and composite body, most evident in Donna Haraway’s cyborg, rendered an architecture that resisted utopia and wholeness as a generic idea, proposing in its place biotic components -fragments- that can be interfaced and interconnected in endless ways. For Haraway, the cyborg reversed The disturbing and displaced the hierarchical dualisms of naturalized identities and was detached from biological processes, aesthetics of like birth (Haraway, 1991: 175). BigDog, divulge As easy as it would be to claim the BigDog and Evan’s our deeply rooted anthropods as direct descendants of the cyborg, a hy- brid of machine and organism, they imply a different sentimentality in body. It is not a renegade body that asserts itself in a vain search of the world, allowing the indeterminate to subsist as Deleuze argues for monsters (Villani, 1981: 129-131); primeval ancestral it is a destabilized body, arguably a hysteric life-form origins. that one might want to pet. Unlike, performative machines that are mimicking efficient natural func- tions, these strange life forms are tumbling; arguably, BigDog is not always taking the most efficient route, but instead trying to read the terrain it walks on, mimicking the feats and failures of donkeys. The very concept of biomimicry subordinates technical inven- tions to the supremacy of natural mechanisms, like self-filling water bottles, and other water collection systems that copy the Stenocara beetle that harvests fog water on its back for future scarcity. And yet,

Lydia Kallipoliti 205 the strange life forms are more naturalized than the Stenocara beetle water collection systems, precisely because they mimic a donkey’s stubbornness, distress and resistance beyond the teleology of performance (carrying load to a certain location). In this sense, they overcome nature, while in search of their own agency in the universe; while several computational feedback loops are at play. It is then their flaws, pathologies and state of indeterminacy that render anthropods and BigDogs disturbingly life-like and hysterically dexter- ous in recognizing its terrain and opponents. BigDog’s investment in its animalistic origins, which are manifest materially and behaviourally via ad- vanced computational protocols and algorithms, parallels the synchronized attentiveness, in the work of an emerging group of architects and theorists, on technical innovation and primal sources. Arguably the design of these robotic prototypes is linked to anthro- pomorphism, both formally, as well as in the ability of developing machines with primeval interactions, ca- pable of experiencing empathy – a sense of identifica- tion with other subjects of the exterior world. Then, if future machines are informed by premodern subjects, possibly the division that Reyner Banham announced in 1960, the one between tradition and technology, or between ‘science’ and ‘history, as he phrased it, has been eviscerated (Banham, 1960). If Banham devised a divide of architecture looking forward – in science –, and architecture looking backwards – in history –, he was firmly located in a point of linear time, in 1960. And as Vidler has argued, during the last 50 years or more, based on this division, the profession needed to re-define its limits in the midst of these competing bids for intellectual domination (Vidler, 2012). Big Dog and Evan’s anthropods, nevertheless, as well as a body of design work that is its kin, implies an arrow of time that has been skewed; it reveals a peculiar defensive reaction against the fear of the unknown, manifest by projecting the future not as an entirely new course of events but as an organic thread to primitive instincts. In this sense, the disturbing aesthetics of Big Dog, divulge our deeply rooted sentimentality in a vain search of primeval ancestral origins, or the pathology of pastoralism as Leo Marx put it in his nominal book The Machine in the Garden. Marx conjures the writing of Ortega y Gasset in the 1930s and his depiction of

206 On Interference a new kind of subject rising up in the civilized world Fig. 3 – BigDog by Boston Dynamics, the Naturmensch, the naturalized man. “This new under a contract man wants a motor-car, and enjoys it, but he believes with the Defense that it is the spontaneous fruit of an Edenic tree. In Advanced Research Projects Agency the depths of this soul he is unaware of the artificial, (DARPA) to make a almost incredible character of civilization, and does Legged Squad Sup- port System (LS3). not extend his enthusiasm for the instruments to the The program’s goal is principles that make them possible.” (Marx, 1964: 7-8). to develop a walking In the case of the Big Dog, it could arguably account quadruped platform that will augment for the necessity to overlay advanced algorithms for squads by carrying rough terrain navigation with the natural movements traditional and new equipment autono- of four-legged animals. Then it is the primitive tum- mously and will be bling of this advanced autonomous robot that gratifies capable of managing complex terrains. the viewer’s need for a phantom truth: a stretched notion of time between the past and the future. The tumbling anthropomorphism of these strange life forms has urgency today. Architecture critics have never ceased to venture in new projections of the body to architectural form, but our contemporary moment shares surprisingly much with the lineage of a primal, unstable, yet skilled tumbling life form that asserts itself, albeit hysterically. Are strange life forms reflective of a modern sub- ject that is tumbling and navigating precariously

Lydia Kallipoliti 207 in rough terrains? Today, the only way to navigate through the unimaginable carcass of information we receive, store and upload daily is relative to oneself. Networks, flows and connections between individual units are on their way to extinction. There is only a hyperobject, as Timothy Morton has proposed, which is constantly moving;(Morton, 2010: 130) and, it does not allow you to understand it, which fundamentally alters your mode of existence in space. You are lost Our contemporary unless your only point of origin for navigation is your- moment shares self alone. This tumbling corresponds to an ontogenet- ic, and phylogenetic stage of development (the stage surprisingly much of the “protopsyche”), an operative self-containment, with the lineage of at which the organism has control over nothing but a primal, unstable, itself. Therefore, the subject enters a state of precar- ious tumbling relative to its surroundings, a volun- yet skilled tumbling tary sense of loss relative to its context. To navigate life form that a rough terrain today, one must use only direction from the self as parameter. In this sense, our need for asserts itself, albeit embeddedness in the world might be obsolete. hysterically. Notes Part of this paper has already been published in M. F. Gage (ed.) Aesthetics Equals Politics. New Discourses across Art, Architecture, and Philosophy, Cambridge (MA), The MIT Press, 2019.

References Banham, R. (1960a), Architecture after 1960, “Architectural Review”, vol. 127, n. 755. Banham, R. (1960b), 1960: Stocktaking, “Architectural Re- view”, vol. 127, n. 756, pp. 93-100. Banham, R. (1960c), The science side, “Architectural Review”, vol. 127, n. 757, pp. 188-190. Banham, R. (1960d), The future of universal man, “Architec- tural Review”, vol. 127, n. 758, pp. 253-260. Banham, R. (1960e), History under revision, “Architectural Review”, vol. 127, n. 759, pp. 325-332. Banham, R. (1960f), Propositions, “Architectural Review”, vol. 127, n. 760. Boston Dynamics (2017), BigDog [Online]. Available at: https://www.bostondynamics.com/bigdog [Accessed: 14 October 2017]. Colomina B., Wigley, M. (2016), Are We Human? Notes on an Archaeology of Design, Zurich, Lars Muller Publishers. Dillet, R. (2016), Boston Dynamics CEO Marc Raibert demos the spot at disrupt, “Tech-Crunch” [Online]. Available at: https://techcrunch.com/2016/09/14/boston-dynamics-ceo-

208 On Interference marc-raibert-demos-the-spot-at-disrupt/ [Accessed: 22 August 2017]. Epstein Jones, D., Roberts, B. (2014), New ancients, “Log”, n. 31, pp. 10-12. Evans, R. (1969), Piezoelectric structures, Thesis at the Archi- tectural Association, Archives of the Architectural Associa- tion in London. Evans, R. (1997), Translations from Drawing to Building and Other Essays, Cambridge (MA), The MIT Press. Halpern, O. (2019), A History of the MIT Media Lab shows why the recent Epstein scandal is no surprise, “Art in America” [Online]. Available at: https://www.artnews.com/art-in-amer- ica/features/mit-media-lab-jeffrey-epstein-joi-ito-nicholas-ne- groponte-1202668520/ [Accessed: 23 November 2019]. Haraway, D. (1991), A cyborg manifesto: Science, technol- ogy and socialist-feminism in the late twentieth century, in Simians, Cyborgs and Women. The Reinvention of Nature, New York, Routledge, pp. 149-181. Hern, A. (2015), US marines reject BigDog robotic packhorse because it’s too noisy, “The Guardian” [Online]. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/dec/30/us- marines-reject-bigdog-robot-boston-dynamics-ls3-too-noisy [Accessed: 21 August 2017]. Marx, L. (1964), The Machine in the Garden; Technology and the Pastoral Ideal in America, Oxford, Oxford University Press. Morton, T. (2010), The Ecological Thought, Cambridge (MA), Harvard University Press. Morton, T. (2013), Hyperobjects: Philosophy and Ecology After the End of the World, Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press. O’Connell, M. (2014), The stunning success of ‘fail’ better, “Slate” [Online]. Available at: http://www.slate.com/articles/ arts/culturebox/2014/01/samuel_beckett_s_quote_fail_bet- ter_becomes_the_mantra_of_silicon_valley.html [Accessed: 3 June 2018]. O’Donnell, C. (2015), Niche Tactics: Generative Relationships Between Architecture and Site, New York, Routledge. Ortega y Gasset, J. (1950 [1930]), The Revolt of the Masses, New York, New American Library. Vesely, D. (2002), The architectonics of embodiment, in G. Dodds, R. Tavernor (eds), Body and Building: Essays on the Changing Relation of Body and Architecture, Cambridge (MA), The MIT Press. Vidler, A. (1992), The Architectural Uncanny: Essays in the Modern Unhomely, Cambridge (MA), The MIT Press. Vidler, A. (2012), Troubles in Theory Part III: The great divide: technology vs tradition, “The Architectural Review”, vol. 232, n. 1386, pp. 96-101. Villani, A. (1999), La guêpe et l’orchidée, Paris, Belin.

Lydia Kallipoliti 209 Wolfflin, H. (1964), Renaissance and Baroque, London, Collins. Wright Steenson, M. (2019), Media Lab’s storied history of courting the rich and powerful, “Gen” [Online]. Available at: https://gen.medium.com/what-you-make-up-for-in-gall- ca1a221122af [Accessed: 19 November 2019].

210 On Interference

RE: di- aspora • sac- rifice • loss • lie Innovation as Loss? In Dialogue with Three Contemporary Practices

Commentary _

Andrea Alberto Dutto (Ed.)

Sara Dean - VUCA Nicholas Korody - Adjustments Agency Seiche

Abstract Affiliation Accepting the challenge launched by this issue of Politecnico di Torino, Dipartimen- Ardeth, this commentary is conceived as a short in- to di Architettura e terview with three innovative architectural practices Design involved in the last Shenzhen Bienniale, namely: Sara Contacts: Dean (VUCA), Seiche and Nicholas Korody (Adjust- andrea_dutto [at] ments Agency). By means of four questions, the three polito [dot] it practices quickly portray how the wider issue of loss DOI: influences their way they work and the way in which 10.17454/ARDETH05.14 a contemporary architectural practice is supposed to work nowadays. At stake are reasons behind their ARDETH#05 approach to architecture proving the deliberately overcoming of disciplinary borders as well as more general remarks about their acknowledgement of loss as an event involved in the process of legitimation of their practices.

213 Does innovation embed loss? Sometimes innovation appears as an alibi, an elegant and non-explicit alibi, that hides an intention of release from the past. In other cases, actually to those cases to which we are commit- ted in the domain of this commentary, the issue is more complex and perhaps less specious; this time, the ways in which loss occurs are more related to phenomena that are exogenous to the discipline and to biog- raphies, conjunctural mechanisms and job opportunities. Accepting the challenge launched by this issue of Ardeth, we confronted ourselves with three young architectural practices involved in the last Shenzhen Bien- niale: Sara Dean (VUCA) (Fig. 1), Nicholas Korody (Adjustments Agency) (Fig. 2) and Seiche (Fig. 3).

Fig. 1 - Sara Dean’s workspace.

214 Innovation as Loss? Fig. 2 - Nicholas Koro- dy in his workspace.

Fig. 3 - Seiche team co-working interface.

Andrea Alberto Dutto 215 Among our three interviewees, Seiche has already contributed to Ar- deth by means of an essay exposing research achievements. This time, however, we feel that a commentary would be useful to take a step back and ask them along with other two practices about their relationship with the discipline (openly problematic for everyone), or rather (in less orthodox terms), with the rules of the game. By means of four questions, this commentary attempts to portray how the wider concept of loss influences such practices. The first question, ‘on diaspora’, concerns the opening of the field, and the reasons behind their intention to over- come disciplinary borders. The second, ‘on sacrifice’, raises questions about loss as a sacrifice, or something that is lost with the aim to obtain something else, something promising. The third, ‘on Verlust’, relates to a German concept used by Hans Sedlmayr in his famous books Verlust der Mitte (1948), to draw about loss as a condition embedded in the turn of the discipline from modern to contemporary. The last question, ‘on lie’, raises the concept of the loss of truth and legitimate uses of lies with or without hesitations.

On diaspora 1 Do you think that overcoming disciplinary boundaries and broadening its field of action features your way of practising architecture? Can dis- ciplinary diaspora become a way through which to discover innovative sources and models for practice?

Nicholas Korody: Yeah, I’d say so. In particular, my collaborative prac- tice with Joanna Kloppenburg Adjustments Agency, which we describe as an “architecture of architecture studio,” is concerned with excavating and pushing against the circumscription of architecture and architectur- al thinking. This takes on a variety of forms, sometimes explicitly in- stitutional critique, while other times it involves pushing against more in- sidious and unstated disciplinary norms, such as the prohibition against the personal in architectural criticism. My independent research prac- tice Interiors Agency is also attempting to put pressure on disciplinary boundaries. In a way, simply by focusing on interiors and quotidian spa- tial practices like decorating, it’s already invested in a strand of feminist and queer critiques of architecture as itself a product of the gendered division of labor. So, yes, I think it’s important and fruitful to take aim at disciplinary norms in your work. Then again, one might venture that all architectural practice is already in a dance with norms, oppositional or otherwise, intentional or otherwise. Seiche: Architecture has always been considered an amalgamation of different disciplines – a harmonizing way of seeing, thinking and, ulti- mately, structuring life in space. But architecture is by no means the only discipline entitled for this unifying and territorial claim. The term dias- pora implies the non-voluntary resettlement and distribution of a group away from its origin. This is exactly what is happening to architecture as

216 Innovation as Loss? IT industries colonize the city, and established architectural practices fail to catch up to or even acknowledge the evolution of the means through which spatial organization takes place today. Seiche is a multidisciplinary practice. There’s a lot of different backgrounds additionally to architec- tural in our team, including programming, graphic design, journalism and law. At this stage we see this input diversification not only as a fuzzy path for innovation, but ultimately as a struggle for relevance. Sara Dean: Architecture for me is design in the civic space of the city. Historically that has been a scale of buildings; now physical structures are not the whole story. I’m still in search of civic space. I think an archi- tectural inclination has led me to broader spheres of work, searching for scales of action and technologies of impact in cities today. One of the ways that I broaden my practice is through collaboration with other disciplines. A discipline is a vantage point, a framework for seeing and engaging the world. But from that locus, I’m looking for possibilities at its edges. I don’t think we do that by being less architectural in our thinking, but by designing in ways we can’t accomplish on our own. The idea of the lone, charismatic genius has done a lot of damage. I prefer a practice that is built on momentum and collective action.

On sacrifice In your practice, the building seems to be investigated, because of the 2 effects it can produce. Effects that are sometimes more ambitious and far-sighted than the building itself. Bataille employs the expression of ‘sac- rifice’, to depict a similar condition by which objects shift from the order of productive consumption to something else that transcends rational thought. For Bataille, such ‘something else’ is the Sacred (with a capital S). What ‘something else’ do you think is worth investigating about buildings?

SD: The System. Buildings and objects are representations of the systems they enable or disenable. I’m much more interested in a building as a node in a network than as an enclosed, singular thing unto itself. Buildings are components of systems of economy, infrastructure, shipping, publics, phys- ics, and politics, even as latent objects. My work is concerned with how a building or object can deliberately activate or manifest large, less-tangible systems; a compass for changing environments, a house that builds more equitable housing, emoji for better disaster response. These are not fix-all solutions, but ways of accounting for externalities in systems, deliberately connecting designs with their larger contexts. NK: Well, to be frank, I don’t really care much about buildings in and of themselves. I have my own aesthetic preferences but I don’t think they matter much. The only thing I really care about is the “something else” of buildings – specifically, how architecture is always put to use, put in service of some force beyond itself. The appearance of architecture as something autonomous from that which enables it helps disguise the often violent politics at play. And so I’d be cautious against a transcendental ori-

Andrea Alberto Dutto 217 entation, which might reify pretenses of architectural autonomy. I’m much more interested in the imminent ‘something else’’s of architecture, so to speak: ie., how architecture is deployed as an instrument of finance capi- tal, a technique of subjectivization, a mechanism of statist violence, etc. S: To Bataille, discontinuity is part of our experience of normal, mun- dane, everyday life. In his conception of both ‘the Sacred’ and ‘the Erotic’, there is a notion of scaping ‘discontinuity’, which is also interpreted as an escape to controlled market consumerism. The commodified production of ‘the building’ is sacrificed in our practice, not because it lacks inter- est, but because it is sometimes a charge and handicap to other ways of thinking and structuring space. In our practice, ‘the Built’ is not stud- ied as a discontiguous object but as switch, connector and interface of broader systemic abstractions such as states, jurisdictions or trade zones. It is not a visible or tangible object, but a distributed, enabling infrastruc- ture that equals the process it executes, and contributes to the effective materialization or decomposition of abstractions, that rule what we can or can’t do in space. And there is nothing sacred about them.

On Verlust 3 Which features of your contemporary architectural practice do you think could be lost (or are inevitably destined to be lost) in future?

S: Our practice is a test, a game and a process of inquiry. It hasn’t been solidified yet and we don’t expect it to survive, at least, not as it is now. It’s the fruit of combining an unexpected array of interests and backgrounds in a very specific time and space. There is an accidental factor to it. It makes sense to think that if we killed the building as part of our practice, the techniques used to depict it are to be replaced as well. Bi-dimensional and three-dimensional representation tools might not be the best suited to depict systems. This doesn’t mean we are neglecting form, as form is always there, except this time it is embodied in abstract models of reality. We see synthesis and diagrammatic thought as both a strength and illness of architectural practice – equally useful and insufficient. Not everything can be synthesized, not everything can be structured, organized and positioned. Therefore, we depict these models by using both their structures and implications. NK: I find the question somewhat difficult to answer because the field is in- creasingly scattered and heterogenous. I don’t want to be reductive and treat my own bubble as paradigmatic. That said, in my experience, I do find that there’s increasingly a tendency to either abandon theory or instrumentalize it for the sake of form, which I believe is detrimental to architectural thinking. One might venture that politics is going the same way but, again, I’m not sure of that, and don’t want to dismiss the real political work that is happening. SD: I hope the shallow, constant deliverables involved in maintaining contemporary practice are lost in the future of architecture. I mean two things by “shallow constant deliverables.” The first is the social and oper- ational maintenance of practice: the email, brand management, texting

218 Innovation as Loss? streams, and Slack pings. These things erode deep focus and change what the work of architecture involves to responses and reactions. The second is the worldview that is shaped by investor cycles, moving business models of production to business models of growth. The modern history of late capitalism can be traced through venture capital and shareholder metrics placed on businesses, with grave consequences for society to address deep, slow problems. Boosting returns on a quarterly cycle to impress shareholders and turning society into the creation of shallow constant deliverables, is something I hope is destined to be lost.

On lie What kind of meaning do you attribute to the act of lying in the domain of 4 your practice? Is lying a legitimized device for narration?

SD: I don’t think lying is legitimate. But narration and storytelling are legitimate forms of creation. Lying implies deceit. In contrast, telling stories is deliberate, and often optimistic. Speculation is an intrinsic part of architecture – working forward, in projective timelines, in uncanny environments or cities, on buildings that don’t yet exist. By creating narrative and scenarios, social interactions, or new value systems as a basis for work, it allows us to work towards new ways of being, new social structures, or new forms of equity and empowerment. This type of lying is productive in developing design in conjunction with its context. I think what is deceitful is the notion that the implications of our work are outside of our scope. It is a lie to believe that architecture is neutral. This is a lie I’m trying to overcome through my work. S: Every projective practice deals with uncertainties associated with the future. To do so, they rely on non-binding models and visualizations. This is true for architecture as much as for insurance companies or financial markets. As a practice, we model systems that do not exist yet and depict their implications. Speculative storytelling is only one of our working methodologies. The use of fiction in our practice is not a means to hide but to reveal what otherwise might stay unseen. With this idea in mind, we have made a very clear choice to stay away from far-fetched fiction and very close to plausible reality. This proximity makes speculation confusing, but also touching, relevant and potentially real. Some models work as risk pre-emptive mechanisms, to ensure the present status quo is elongated into the future, while ours work as mechanisms to showcase or create alternative possibilities. They all give biased and simplistic accounts of reality; still, they are useful and legitimate, too. NK: Lying? I’ve never done it.

Acknowledgments These interviews have been collected between August and September 2019. I would like to thank all interviewees for their availability.

Andrea Alberto Dutto 219 RE: deep learning • design practice • artificial intelli- gence Integrating AI and Deep Learning within Design Practice Processes: XKool Technology

Commentary _

Edoardo Bruno (ed.)

Xkool

Abstract Affiliation Wanyu He, CEO and founder of XKool Technology – a Politecnico di Torino, Dipartimento di successful startup in Shenzhen – replies in an inter- Architettura e view held in March 2019 to seven questions concern- Design ing innovation within design processes, especially Contacts: considering how her company integrated the utiliza- edoardo [dot] bruno tion of Artificial Technology and Deep Learning next [at] polito [dot] it to architectural practice. DOI: Starting from their objective in freeing design force labor 10.17454/ARDETH05.15 in doing repetitive jobs to the possibility of creating crea- tive cloud networks, XKool Technology is aimed at thor- ARDETH#05 oughly transforming the interaction between humans and design production, accelerating and innovating the methodology in producing spatial configurations. In this new context, authorship acquires a new di- mension, collective and fluid, where computational processes generate instant multiple design solutions open to discussion and validation. However, this way in intending design needs a signifi- cant effort: a considerable data collection from the built environment, opening up a stage where sensing the city will be the next mandatory condition in “mak- ing transformation possible” letting transformation possible.

221 Wanyu He is the CEO and a founder of XKool Technology, a successful startup in Shenzhen inspired by the desire to link design practices with artificial intelligence (AI) and deep learning computational tools. We first met in Shenzhen in March 2019, and in addition to discussing how to include the company in the Bi-City Biennale of Urbanism/Architecture (UABB) of Shenzhen, we tackled some issues raised by Ardeth #5’s open call for papers. The result of our encounters was the following interview held in Sep- tember 2019, where Miss He replied to seven questions concerning innovation within design processes, which captured how innovation was intended and incorporated within the company’s business model and how she formed collaborative alliances between market players and communities’ expectations. XKool Technology was founded in 2016 by Wanyu He, former senior ar- chitect for OMA, Chun Li, former senior engineer for Google, and Xiaodi Yang, senior cross-over designer, and always had one goal: to free the designer labour force from repetitive operations (Pasquinelli, 2019) and allow them to concentrate on creative processes and be more competitive in the market. The company’s approach started with investigating if computational protocols could define multiple environment scenarios from the recom- bination of spatial quantities and legal restrictions, which were obtained from processing extensive data. XKool admitted that this approach was only possible because Chinese urban planning rules provided a suitable platform to decipher new methodologies for designing replicable envi- ronments. XKool’s challenge is to extend utilization in other legislative contexts where, from their perspective, the access to considerably more dispos- able data represents the real obstacle in formulating computational design solutions. This young startup proposed innovative re-assembly of the available AI technologies, redefined the ways spatial formation is done and then translated these new potentialities into collective tools. Within their platform, AIchitect, selected inputs and ex-post observations set the medium where the approach to spatial complexity acquired the characteristics of a living laboratory. To achieve this functionality, XKool Technology uses “recursivity and con- tingency” (Hui, 2019) within computational processes, where algorithm loops are flanked with systematic errors and where the machine learns from the environment, like an organism, thus extensively using deep learning. “At the beginning in 2015, it was like having 10 million children playing with simple geometric forms,” said Wanyu He during our first meeting. “Today seems more like that everyone had obtained a master’s degree.” Therefore, the core of the spatial formation is not the project’s author- ship but rather its ability to become a collective product where machines

222 Integrating AI and Deep Larning Within Design Practice Processes: XKool Technology facilitate spatial deviations by creating a continually evolving exchange platform. The “intensive time” (Virilio, 1994) through which the platform produces hundreds of possible spatial configurations in seconds leads to ques- tioning if “real-time subsequently prevails over reality” and how we are going to perceive it. XKool has affirmed that only a massive amount of data and extensive networks can enable the real potential of AI. “Ma- chines are more confident than humans in front a blank paper, while it is the contrary when they have to deepen a project already set,” continued CEO Wanyu during our conversations. Only more detailed and shared databases embedded in a sensing city can help to fill this gap, which exceedingly blurs the difference between objects and subjects and elicits Paul Klee’s obsession: “now objects perceive me.”

XKool Technology is pushing the limit of innovation in design through AI and deep learning. Which processes are transferring to the market and 1 more generally to public decision-makers engaged in urban transforma- tion?

XKool: Using AI technologies to push design innovation, we have indeed created more market and public participation in urban transformation. XKool can efficiently and reliably provide big data analytics results and decision-making support for decision-makers in the early stage of a project. It prevents investors and developers from blindly entering the market but with reasonable judgments in the case of rational cognition. The innovation of the XKool AI Design Cloud Platform is to let the com- puter address highly repetitive calculation, data analysis and application in the design process and allow the architect to focus more on the work that requires human innovation. This mode internalizes some of the ar- chitect’s expertise into the computer’s computational intelligence, which to some extent reduces the threshold of architectural design. Consequently, more people could have the opportunity to work on archi- tectural designs with the help of AI products. Therefore, we invite a larg- er group of people to participate in urban transformation via big data. In addition, our urban dynamic planning system is an interactive instal- lation which uses a human-machine interactive interface that allows the public to express their vision of a future city visually. It also has the potential to assist city council in urban development decision-making.

The creation of a design tool that can profoundly transform traditional design practices was initially one of your most essential and first concepts, 2 but what about your engagement in social activism in spatial design and your capability to place your business objectives next to collective aims?

XKool: One of our business goals is indeed to create a design tool that can change traditional design practices. Naturally, to apply the tool to

Edoardo Bruno 223 help the public work and live more comfortably and intelligently in cities is our collective aim. Therefore, participation in exhibitions such as the next UABB allows us to be closer to urban life and to understand the needs of the public; in addition, we can accumulate experience in collect- ing and analysing data in social activism. Both aspects help us develop our intelligent design tool. In the Nantou project (which we did for the UABB 2017), for example, we built a multidimensional urban digital platform. It collected and anal- ysed relevant data from the Nantou village local program distribution and public daily life behaviours. The dynamic data revealed the people’s behavioural patterns related to urban space, and furthermore, it could simulate potential people and traffic flows, which then suggest urban renewal sites, entrance locations of public facilities and adjustments in the early design decisions that were obviously inconsistent with the sim- ulated results. In the future, with the platform’s commercialization, city planners could gain objective decision support through the platform, and the public could also benefit from living in a more intelligent city.

Your company is firmly aimed to push the limits of AI within the design and 3 through the utilization of cloud networks. Is the boundary of your business goals blurred by a collective action?

XKool: Before discussing whether the boundaries of our business goals will be blurred by the collective action involved in using cloud networks technology, it is first necessary to clarify how the cloud network in the XKool product works and in what the collective action is involved. XKool’s AI Design Cloud Platform is implemented through Software-as-a- Service (SaaS) technology. We put our product on the cloud, and the users access the software and hardware service on the cloud through IDs they purchase. The users, the XKool product and our team form a network. Some users authorize us to use the data produced during their use of the XKool product. After professional evaluation and cleaning, the data is used to train the models of the XKool product to enhance its quality and intelligence. By using the feedback data, the tool that we hope to create becomes smarter and closer to our goal. This collective action through controlled data addressing does not damage the establishment of a professional and intelligent tool but contributes to the realization of our business goal.

Do you believe your utilization of AI is moving the architectural project 4 from merely personal design authorship towards new and shared belon- gings? How is the meaning of “design” changing when non-humans are becoming part of the process?

XKool: In contemporary architectural practice, architectural projects are already new and shared belongings even without the use of AI. One

224 Integrating AI and Deep Larning Within Design Practice Processes: XKool Technology architectural project is the result of the collective decision-making and hard work of the architects, engineers, construction workers, project owners, etc. We tend to no longer think that one primary architect has authorship to a building because different players influence the design decisions. The involvement of AI has strengthened this trend. When it comes to a change in the meaning of design in the era of AI, in fact, design is regarded by many people as a proof of human creativity, and it is considered as the creation of unprecedented things in the world. However, we believe that design behaviour is only useful to find the op- timal solution among all possibilities that already exist. AI only helps us complete the search for an optimal solution more efficiently.

In the extensive utilization of AI in your design processes, which material 5 consequences are capable of producing urban spatial reality?

XKool: We speculate that, even after AI is widely used in the design process, the physically built environment in the city might not seem to differ much from that in the era without AI. However, even if the urban physically built environment is not altered dramatically, some soft and invisible control systems would indeed be added, which will significantly improve the intelligence level of the city. AI is not a unique technology used in the process of transforming the built environment of a city. It will be used with other technologies, such as the Internet of Things and robotics, to design, build, and manage cities more efficiently and intelligently.

Edoardo Bruno 225 Is AI determining improvements in social realms? What kind of activism is 6 enabled within the community?

XKool: AI can reveal a user’s behavioural patterns and preferences using various behaviour data which it produces in a network with machine learning technology. Moreover, based on the similarity of these patterns and preferences, it can predict and connect different groups of people dispersed in the network. In the future, the AI system may even be able to combine the other net- work behaviours of a user, to predict that the user at some probability is an architect with the computing result, and finally to recommend him/ her to the online or offline architect community.

One of your main concepts was to free the design labour force from acting 7 like machines to better concentrate on innovating their creative approach. How is your platform enabling innovative processes?

XKool: XKool’s AI Design Cloud Platform mainly applies big data and AI to efficiently complete highly repetitive and minimally creative work in the early stage of urban design and architectural design. In general, intelligent algorithms are used to quickly generate, evaluate, and recommend schemes for architects, who will make the final selection and develop the design in a promising direction. Currently, our platform can assist architects in obtaining design schemes on the multi-site complex scale, one-site complex scale, and building scale. Specifically, these AI-gen- erated schemes have met local regulatory requirements, such as restric- tions on building spacing, requirements for spacing with the red line, and requirements for sunlight; in addition to the information on the site surroundings and specific requirements and restrictions of the project, the AI Design Cloud Platform provides real-time analysis of the maximization of the business value, coverage and profit to support design decisions. The work mentioned above, which satisfies regulatory requirements and maximizes profits, requires many calculations. These calculations often do not require much innovation, but they require substantial time and effort from the architects. Once the calculations are managed by AI, the architects can quickly skip the lengthy and complicated calculation process and directly focus on the development design phase based on the optimal scheme which satisfies regulatory and profit requirements.

References Hui, Y. (2019), Recursivity and contingency, London - New York, Rowman & Little- field International. Pasquinelli, M. (2019), Three thousand years of algorithmic rituals: The emergence of AI from the computation of space, “E-flux” [Online] Available at: https://ww- w.e-flux.com/journal/101/273221/three-thousand-years-of-algorithmic-rituals-the- emergence-of-ai-from-the-computation-of-space/ [Accessed: 15 August 2019] Virilio, P. (1994), The vision machine, Bloomington, Indiana University Press.

226 Integrating AI and Deep Larning Within Design Practice Processes: XKool Technology

(1) Marco Biraghi, L’Architetto are required to satisfy our needs also appear as the most interest- come intellettuale, Torino, for disciplinary introspection. ing aspects of the book. In fact, Piccola Biblioteca Einaudi, 209 Traditional accounts of the archi- such considerations ultimately pp. - 2019, Paperback: - € 21,00 - tectural profession (such as the reveal the intrinsic contradictions ISBN: 978-8806239923 Albertian model, a universal pro- of architectural life, instances (2) Thomas Yarrow, Architects. ducer of ideas and self-sufficient where an ideology of informality Portraits of a Practice, Ithaca maker of drawings), are no longer clashes with the inherent hier- NY, Cornell University Press, representative of the status of archies of the office, or where a the 21st-century architect, despite heroic claim of progressiveness 300 pp. - 2019, Paperback: - having guided our self-reflection is ultimately revealed as conser- $ 18,85 - ISBN: 978-1501738494 for at least half a millennium. vativism. Both Yarrow and Biraghi can be On the other hand, L’Architetto discussed here as answers to come Intellettuale is a critical and this search, in that they refer to historical attempt to locate the methods of enquiry, aspects of generalised conditions in which the discipline and interpretations architects find themselves today of its operative processes which and to propose ‘the ways of a appear so distant to each other possible overturn’. These condi- to become almost specular. tions are identified as a profound Yarrow’s book is an ethnographic (and admittedly not new) state of study of the architectural practice crisis for the architect as an ‘intel- Millar Howard Workshop (MHW), lectual’, that is, as a subject elab- a middle-size studio based in orating a theoretical thought with the English village of Chalford, operative intentions and political Gloucestershire. Yarrow pro- implications or, in Biraghi’s own poses an anecdotal narrative of words, a ‘producer’. Instead, the everyday life in the studio, with author recognises that today the conversations, routine practices architect is reduced to a special- and protocols, as well as first- ised ‘supplier’, unable to actively hand accounts of what members interpret our reality and, as such, consider as the defining condi- accessory to architecture’s capi- tions, motivations and ultimate talist commoditisation. purposes of their profession. Biraghi’s argument, validated The book belongs to a growing through the traditions of Benja- stream of ethnographic studies min, Tafuri, Cacciari and Aureli, which, from Dana Cuff to Albena therefore investigates instances Yaneva (see for example Ardeth where an architecture ‘within and #02 ‘Bottega’), seeks to investi- against’ can exist. This, however, gate the more relational, social is a question to which the book and to some extent ordinary doesn’t seem to have a definitive aspects of our profession. answer. Examples like the unbuilt As such, the actors in the study designs by Dogma, or the nearly discuss commonplace tropes, 60-year-old Economist building Both Thomas Yarrow’s Archi- such as a generalised disillusion- in London, offer only partial an- tects. Portraits of a Practice and ment for education, tensions be- swers. On the other hand, practi- Marco Biraghi’s L’Architetto come tween ‘theoretical discourse’ and tioners such as Anne Lacaton and Intellettuale offer fresh evidence ‘practical making’ and a nostalgia Alejandro Aravena are discussed of how new paradigms of study for a lost culture of craft, which as relevant figures for a recon-

228 Reviews sideration of our profession, but (1) Rania Ghosn, El Hadi the right place for an expanding whether the attribute ‘intellectual’ Jazairy, Geostories: Another technological civilization?” can be applied remains unclear. Architecture for the Environ- Gerard O’Neill If a solution to Biraghi’s ques- ment, New York - Barcelona, tion is not plainly offered, the Actar Publishing, 231 pp. Geostories is a collection of fan- ambition of the book suggests - 2018, Paperback: - € 33,98 tastical proposals for a world run at least a direction of enquiry. - ISBN: 978-1945150791 amok. The book posits proposals This consists, to put it simply, in (2) Fred Scharmen, Space Set- that harvest Antarctic ice, occupy the project of architecture. It is tlements, New York, Columbia emptied oil reserves, and make through interactive paradigms University Press, 208 pp. - 2019, monuments of landfills. These spread across the territory of Paperback: $ 24,00 - ISBN: 978- interventions are developed the project that the architect can 1941332498 through a blend of disciplinary find a raison d’etre. Interestingly, “Is the surface of a planet really representational mashups and Yarrow articulates his study along meticulous craft in drawing, with similar lines, making the proj- Easter eggs and winks to past ect-as-process the most critical utopian projects, and imagining aspect of a contemporary archi- future developments at the scale tectural practice, the space where of cities and planets. Through a dialog can be articulated and these technical and imaginative where solutions to our search for images, as well as their grand authenticity may be found. Un- scale, they harken to past gov- deniably, Biraghi would identify ernment infrastructural projects MHW as a ‘supplier’, in that the and global network economies. studio operates fully ‘within’ the As interventions, they operate interests of capitalism. However, as situated analogies–ways of there is a hopeful awareness in seeing, more than anything–the Yarrow’s narrative which suggests vast and abstract systems that a potential ‘against’ the crisis of have constructed our current values identified by Biraghi. crisis, and imagine them past In this sense, both the ethnog- their present functions. The raphy and the essay, distinct in proposals make visible, through method, breath, geography and allegory, what Saskia Sassen intention, ultimately display the calls the ‘expulsions’–systematic same coordinates to locate the brutalities across economic, envi- architect’s problematic identity. ronmental, and political realms. Through these, the authors seem to propose, we can catch the Through their visual language blurred glimpse of a possible and systems-orientations, they alternative. Such alternative, connect singular events and let’s be clear, has entirely yet to present-day configurations with become a reality. deep time, and site provocations of technological and architectural Gregorio Astengo solution-making. The drawings Syracuse University are unbelievably concise and complex, to a point of fetish, and the book should come with a dome magnifier as each image seems to operate on scales unno- ticeable to the viewer.

Reviews 229 Space Settlements is also, in exist. This ability extends to technology, cities, and society essence, a project described things that are improbable, or seems to have been lost in the 50 through a series of global-scale never even meant to get built. years since. As Space Settlements interventions explored through The dichotomy between paper points out, the formal cues of renderings, this time from the and built architecture is a fallacy this time have shown up more 1970s and in gouache, commis- in this way. To create futures, recently as corporate gestures sioned in large part by a research and inhabit them in order to of future-orientation–the Torus project led by Gerard O’Neill at better understand their implica- at the Apple Headquarters, the Princeton University and funded tions, is to make architecture. In Geodesic Dome at Facebook’s by Steward Brand. The render- that way, also, I’m unconcerned new campus. What were meant ings are explorations of imagined with whether the renderings of as social utopias have been architecture and life on space col- banded torus habitats floating in co-opted in late-capitalism into a onies. In the book, they are con- deep space were expected to be tech branding exercise. The use textualized through the trends built (they were), or whether they of these recognizable projects and threats of the moment they were thought experiments. The in Geostories feels like both an are responding to–the 1970s ability to think through concep- elucidation of the optimism of inclination for exoplanetary tual futures–through rotational these architectures, as well as habitation and assumption of speeds, interior qualities, and a reclaiming of them within the expanding past Earth’s planetary social dynamics–is the point. And discipline, in our new context limits. These inclinations were whether these particular futures of climate chaos and a moment built in part on the anticipation of were built, they never-the-less when global corporations other- nuclear annihilation, oil deple- have implications in the future wise own our futuristic dreams. tion, and population explosion. we imagine, and build towards, At the same time, Geostories Space habitation was seen by through our collective under- is constructing a future from some as the perfect solution, an standing of the shape and form a present that valorizes the architecture that was simultane- it might ultimately take. These geologic as a technological force ously ecologically and technologi- two books explore the power of of remediation–the Earth as the cally driven, and worked towards representation to create futures ultimate technology. Using repre- planetary healing and symbiotic and build alternative worlds. sentational tropes from geology, life. Many of the images in Geostories from astrophysics, from astron- These two books together make visual reference to utopian omy, and from life sciences, they exemplify the roles of architec- architecture from around the consider architecture that is in ture to build futures, envision same time that Buckminster dialogue with planetary rotation, utopian ideals, and contextualize Fuller was advocated for covering asteroids, and core temperatures the contemporary moment. In Manhattan with a geodesic rather than humans. There are particular, they demonstrate the use of architectural drawing to dome: Superstudio’s Continuous very few people in their draw- think through details and scenar- Monument levees controlled ings; these projects are human ios, the role of technology (both Antarctic melt, Archigram’s teth- wonderments, infrastructural known and anticipated) to play ered blimp makes a rainforest monuments, but not really built the role of savior or antagonist delivery, Fuller’s Dymaxion Map for humans. They don’t even in these scenarios, and the me- graphs water capacities. This is seem built for the scale of a ga-scale proposal to encapsulate apt. These projects represent a human lifespan. These drawings global, ecological, and political moment when architecture was have the effect, taken together, externalities of their formation. projective–a form of urbanist of watching the ruins of the Earth The architect works in the science fiction. The faith we had through the portal of an escape future-tense, considering the in the built environment, and pod spaceship, understanding material details and social the discipline of architecture, our shortsightedness too late. implications of things that don’t to imagine new evolutions of The looming crises of the 20th

230 Reviews century created design interven- structure. Unlike the 20th century André Corrêa d’Almeida (ed.), tions of enclosure, escape, and version, these technologies revel Smarter New York City: How autonomy. Space settlements in the complexities of ecology, City Agencies Innovate, New are the epitome of this–survival property, and economics. NASA York, Columbia University from a planet that was becoming capital is replaced with private Press, 448 pp. - 2018, Paper- too small, or in anticipation of speculation or opportunistic back: - $ 30,00 - ISBN: 978- its annihilation. The designs of schemes. In the same way that 0231183758 space habitats show our faith in leisure and nature is unques- technology to save us–a breezy tioned in the space-life render- afternoon picnic in the park ings, national advantageousness surrounded by the void of space. and competitive strategies is the The encapsulation of civilization, unexamined backdrop of the calculated in gravitational orbits, Design Earth propositions. This breathable air, and acceleration feels very true to this moment speeds. The optimism of these to me, in the same way that the renderings is not just in the space colonies of today would be peace and leisure they depict, but positioned as Amazon outposts in the normalcy the architecture or Bechtel mines. The futures we construct, in allows. No sacrifice or change, architecture as in literature, are, or even alien environment, was more than anything, represen- needed for the transition, so tations of the present. The solu- complete was our confidence in tions proposed reflect our cur- our ability to remake Earth in a rent crises more than solutions bubble. to them. But at a moment when “The [space settlement] images we once again find ourselves are terms within larger systems: The book reports the outcomes considering space habitats and not only political, architectural, and findings of a collective work escape pods as a way out of our landscape, and urban systems brought about by the Smarter constructed crisis, it’s important but also cultural systems, includ- NYCitywide Research Group, to posit new relationships we can ing ideas about science fiction where thirty scholars from twen- have to our planet, and new roles and utopian speculation on the ty-two different research institu- that architecture can play in the future. They mediate anxieties tions and ten universities worked imagination of these scenarios. If about the American city, about as a multidisciplinary team for there is a path to inhabiting the technology, and about the chang- three years, involving three hun- planet that accounts for political ing role of human beings within dred people, thirty city agencies and environmental externality, and twenty private companies. space and architecture more and valorizes qualities beyond A collection of twelve stories generally.” From “Introduction,” profit and capital, we will have to taking place in the city of New Space Settlements (p19) imagine it before we can build it. The belief in technology to save York between 1994 and present, it aims at depicting innovation us is part of our contemporary Sara Dean crisis moment as well, though California College of the Arts residing in local public adminis- this time it is seen as remedia- tration, questioning the idea that tion, repurposing, retrofitting. city agencies (public offices, city Geostories thinks through scales units and departments, etc.) are of technology about the design for the most part unmovable and of encapsulation, redistribution, ineffectual bureaucracies. property allocation, and preser- The reasearch is not providing vation at scales of planetary infra- a (further, umpteenth, motion-

Reviews 231 less) definition of what a “smart to measure results and impact; city” is, but proposes to explore 3. the delivery of analytical tools “smartness” as a process, some- to explain the complexity, non thing contextual, incremental and linearity, challenges, limitations locally based, closely related to a and lesson learnt emerging from bottom-up and top-down duality. each program/pilot. Overtaking most common ideal- A useful insight on how city ized tech-centered concerns, the departments and units are incu- relationship between the mul- bating innovation from within, tiple descriptions of smartness the research strives to witness and how innovation takes place how government agencies can in cities is framed taking into grow in flexibility and capacity to account historical, institutional, generate change – though it lacks organizational factors driving a specific and dedicated analysis local development processes. of the different roles played by Data and technology are then these organizations from time looked at within the broader to time (facilitator, promoter, city-administration ecosystem etc.), and along the processes. and in parallel with other equally Nevertheless, the book offers a internal and external innovation rich reflection about what new forces – institutional context, ways of doing, seeing, analyz- leadership and decision making, ing, deciding and assessing are networks and collaboration, orga- necessary in order to improve, nizational structure and culture. advance, evolve and optimize a “Smarter New York City” offers a city. It explores the ways in which wide and well articulated collec- trial and error unfold within city tion of cases, spanning from data agencies, looking at innovation architecture, organizational struc- from an evolutionary perspective, ture and technological infrastruc- in which individual local agen- ture of a smart city, to the galaxy cies search for, select, test, and of services (for economy, energy, implement new solutions whose water, waste, air and health) and outcomes are not necessarily safety and mobility policies. Each known or expected when they study case is analized through a are launched, and are not neces- common framework, based upon sarily succeeding at first. three principles: 1. innovation as a process of adoption and Chiara Lucchini adaptation, where problems and Urban Lab - Torino opportunities are firstly identifie, to then design programs and pilots, implement actions and finally evaluate the outcomes; 2. innovation drivers as embedded in the local institutional context, the organizational structure and culture, networking and cooper- ation skills, leadership and deci- sion-making arenas, the capacity

232 Reviews

Call

deadline / scadenza March 31, 2020 / 31 marzo, 2020

Ardeth #07

EUROPE. Architecture, Infrastructure, Territory ARCHITETTURA, INFRASTRUTTURA, TERRITORIO

Jörg H. Gleiter Theme Editor | Curatore

“Change is avalanching upon our heads and most people are grotesquely unprepared to cope with it” ar- gued the futurist Alvin Toffler in his famous book Fu- ture Shock (1970). Just like Paul Klee’s angel of history, present-day architecture appears to be incapable of accepting/enduring/absorbing change. Furthermore, it is no longer able to assert itself as a component of culture which serves a functional purpose. What are, if any, the active components of culture in the present process of reconceptualization and restructuring of the European project that purposely revolve around spatial features? Looking back at the past 30 years after the fall of the Berlin wall in 1989, the following question arises: what role has architecture fulfilled? Did it effectively contribute to the construction of a united Europe? After all, the great virtue of the architectural project lies in its ability to combine the political with the aes- thetic, the rational with the emotional, and the local with the national. A consequence of postmodernity was the desire to separate the political and the aes-

235 thetic realms; might this legacy be preventing architectural projects from actively engaging in the political process of Europe? Architecture as project has always been essential in the process of imbuing a building with identity at the regional or national level and beyond. We must also recognize the role that architecture, design, and the arts played in the identification and political stabilization processes from classicism to colonialism. Similarly, in the period following World War II, it was modern architecture that exerted a strong unifying effect on the European landscape. In all of its historic variations (including the postmodern, regardless of its centripetal forces), architecture has had a homogenizing effect. Conversely, the definitive trait of today’s design of space seems to be its divisive power. Consider the various barriers that cut through the conti- nent throughout its history. Bygone examples are the Berlin Wall or the Iron Curtain; more tangible examples include the highways separating the Parisian banlieues and the invisible though latently explosive border between Ireland and North-Ireland. Furthermore, recognize the barriers of the various national legislations that crisscross Europe and prevent it from growing cohesively. Recently, cracks in this lattice have begun to appear, as evidenced by occurrences such as the terrorist crisis that resulted in the installation of concrete barriers in the pedestrian zones of European cities, the wide- spread use of wind power stations in response to the energy crisis, and the migration crisis which has led to the rise of new fences, watchtowers and physical and virtual checkpoints. While in some locations border for- tifications were improved, in other parts of the continent, work contin- ues on huge infrastructure projects. However, in the name of preserva- tion of local identity and ecosystems, resistance against these projects is fierce. A prominent current debate is the quarrel surrounding the design of the high-speed train line connecting West to East Europe, in which the controversies related to the implementation of the Lyon-Turin section inflamed the Italian and regional political debate. Despite the successful reconstruction efforts after 1945 and 1989, the Eu- ropean project still remains unfinished in the sense of Jürgen Habermas’ famous essay Modernity – the Unfinished Project. Written in 1980, the es- say was intended to refute the postmodern notion of the end of the great narrative, the end of history, and the end of utopia. Disconcertingly, the rhetoric of “chiliasm” or the “doomsday mood” still lingers in the minds of architects, landscape architects, and urbanists today. The late 20th cen- tury’s discrediting of utopian thinking seems to be one of the causes for today’s deadlock in architecture. Programmatically, technologically, historically, administratively, and conceptually, the call for papers Europe. Architecture, Infrastructure, Territory poses the question of architecture’s role and influence in the European project. Architecture as a symbolic form (see Cassirer and Bourdieu) and as a social force are mutually dependent concepts. If one

236 Call for Papers Ardeth #07: EUROPE side of this dichotomy fails to perform its function, the other is necessari- ly doomed to fail. ARDETH invites practitioners, philosophers, sociologists, scholars of various fields and design practices to share their ideas on architecture’s multifarious and contradictory contributions to the European project. Concerning the concepts of city and countryside, technology and low tech, legislation and politics, energy efficiency, and diversity, Ardeth is seeking contributions which address the following questions:

1. What kind of spatial and territorial strategies push ahead the European project? Considering the prevalence of borders, fences, and firewalls throughout Europe, how must the relation between periphery and center, city and countryside, and the local and regional be revised? 2. How (if at all) can architectural projects regain their position as a driving force for the design of future European concepts? After its fall from grace in the 1970s, do we need to return to a utopian mode of thinking? Here, historical retrospectives and/or social and spatial analyses about realized and imagined utopias in Europe are welcome. 3. Can the architecture project be an amalgamating power relative to the centripetal forces of society? What are the spatial, territorial and material strategies which could secure architecture’s role as the most integral cultural technique which shapes our lives? 4. Is there anything like a specific profile of the European architect? Ardeth appreciates contributions with references to socioeconom- ic surveys or historical recognitions and professional profiling and its evolution around Europe. 5. How can technologies that most professionals conform to (such as BIM, parametric design strategies, AI systems application to design and spatial survey, etc.) further the notion of an ongoing reconcep- tualization and restructuring of Europe?

“Nonostante il cambiamento che ci sta travolgendo, le persone sono in pre- valenza grottescamente impreparata a gestirlo”, sottolineava il futurologo Alvin Toffler nel suo famoso libro Future Shock (1970). Anche l’architettura del presente, proprio come l’angelo della storia di Paul Klee, sembra inca- pace di fare fronte al cambiamento (accettandolo, resistendogli, assorben- dolo), oltre a non essere più in grado di proporre se stessa come risponden- te a uno scopo funzionale. Quali sono – se esistono – le componenti attive della cultura che ruotano attorno alle caratteristiche spaziali nell’attuale processo di riconcettualizzazione e ristrutturazione del progetto europeo? Guardando retrospettivamente i trent’anni dopo la caduta del muro di Berlino nel 1989, sorgono una serie di domande: quale ruolo ha svolto

Jörg H. Gleiter 237 l’architettura? Possiamo dire che abbia effettivamente contribuito alla costruzione di un’Europa unita? Dopo tutto, la grande virtù del proget- to architettonico consiste nella sua abilità di tenere insieme il politico e l’estetico, la razionalità e l’emotività, la dimensione locale e quella nazionale. Uno dei risvolti della postmodernità è stato proprio il deside- rio di separare il politico dall’estetico; è possibile che l’eredità di questo fenomeno stia in qualche modo impedendo ai progetti di architettura di partecipare attivamente nella costruzione politica dell’Europa? L’architettura in quanto progetto è sempre stata essenziale per far in- terfacciare l’identità dei luoghi con gli edifici, dal livello locale a quello nazionale e oltre. Riconosciamo facilmente il ruolo che l’architettura e le arti rivestirono nei processi di identificazione e nella stabilizzazione politica, in diversi momenti della storia europea, dal periodo classico alle fasi del colonialismo. Similmente, nel periodo successivo alla seconda guerra mondiale, fu l’architettura moderna ad esercitare un forte effetto unificante nel paesaggio europeo. In tutte le sue varianti storiche (incluso il postmoderno, a prescindere dalle sue spinte centripete) l’architettura ha avuto un effetto di costruzione degli aspetti comuni e di unità. Al contrario, il tratto che oggi caratterizza i progetti dello spazio sembra essere il loro potere divisivo. Si considerino le varie barriere che hanno tagliato il continente nel corso della sua storia. Esempi ormai passati sono il muro di Berlino o la Cortina di ferro; esempi più attuali includono invece le autostrade che separano le banlieues parigine, o il confine invi- sibile eppure potenzialmente esplosivo tra l’Irlanda e l’Irlanda del Nord. Senza contare le frontiere delle varie legislazioni nazionali che segmen- tano l’Europa, impedendole di crescere in modo coeso. Recentemente, le crepe in questo sistema hanno cominciato ad emergere, come si è reso evidente in vari casi, come l’installazione di barriere nelle aree pedonali di molte città europee in conseguenza degli episodi terro- ristici; l’uso massiccio di pale eoliche in risposta alla crisi energetica; fino ai nuovi recinti, torri di vedetta e punti di controllo materiali e virtuali, eretti in risposta alla crisi dei migranti. Mentre i confini venivano raffor- zati in alcuni luoghi, in altre parti del continente è continuato il lavoro ad enormi progetti infrastrutturali. Tuttavia, nel nome della conservazione delle identità locali e degli ecosistemi, questi progetti hanno incontrato una strenua resistenza. Un esempio è la controversia attorno al proget- to della linea ad alta velocità che collega Ovest ed Est Europa, in cui la discussione sulla costruzione del tratto Lione-Torino ha infiammato il dibattito politico italiano e locale. Nonostante gli efficaci sforzi di ricostruzione dopo il 1945 e il 1989, il progetto europeo rimane ancora incompiuto, nel senso del famoso saggio di Jurgen Habermas La modernità - un progetto incompiuto. Scritto nel 1980, il discorso intendeva rigettare la nozione postmoderna di fine delle grandi narrazioni, fine della storia e fine dell’utopia. Inaspettatamente, le retoriche millenariste o da fine dei giorni ancora albergano nelle menti degli architetti, dei paesaggisti e degli urbanisti contemporanei. Il discre-

238 Call for Papers Ardeth #07: EUROPE dito del pensiero utopico occorso alla fine del XX secolo sembra essere una delle cause dell’impasse che contraddistingue l’architettura di oggi. La call Europa. Architettura, Infrastruttura, Territorio pone la que- stione del ruolo e dell’incidenza dell’architettura sul progetto europeo nelle sue molte dimensioni: programmatica, tecnologica, storica, am- ministrativa e concettuale. L’architettura intesa come forma simbolica (pensando tanto a Cassirer quanto a Bourdieu) e l’architettura come for- za sociale sono due concetti reciprocamente dipendenti. Se un termine di questa dicotomia cessa di svolgere la sua funzione, necessariamente anche l’altro è destinato a fallire. Ardeth invita professionisti, filosofi, sociologi, studiosi di vari campi e progettisti a condividere le loro idee sui contributi multiformi e contrad- dittori che l’architettura può portare al progetto dell’Europa. Volendosi occupare di città e campagna, tecnologia e low tech, legislazione e politi- ca, efficienza energetica e diversità, Ardeth cerca proposte che risponda- no ai seguenti punti.

1. Che tipo di strategie territoriali e spaziali promuovono il progetto europeo? Considerando la pervasività di confini, recinti e barriere attraverso l’Europa, come dovrebbero riconfigurarsi le relazioni tra centro e periferia, città e zone rurali, tra scale locali e regionali? 2. I progetti di architettura come possono (se mai potranno anco- ra) riguadagnare il rango di forze propulsive per il ridisegno delle concezioni e rappresentazioni future dell’Europa? Dopo la sua caduta in disgrazia negli anni settanta, avremmo bisogno di ritornare a un modo di pensare utopista? Su questo punto sono benvenute ricognizioni storiche e/o analisi di tipo sociale e spazia- le riguardo alle utopie immaginate e realizzate in Europa. 3. Può il progetto di architettura esercitare un potere di unificazione e integrazione delle forze centripete che attraversano la società? Quali sono le strategie spaziali, territoriali e materiali che potreb- bero consolidare questo ruolo dell’architettura, intesa come la più integrale tecnica culturale che dà forma alle nostre vite? 4. Esiste qualcosa di simile a un profilo peculiare dell’architetto eu- ropeo? Ardeth considererà con interesse contributi che riportino e approfondiscano indagini socioeconomiche, inchieste e ricogni- zioni storiche sulla professione in Europa, e che ne restituiscano descrizioni aggiornate ed evoluzioni nel tempo. 5. Come possono le tecnologie a cui gran parte dei professionisti de- vono conformarsi (come il BIM, il design parametrico, i sistemi di Intelligenza Artificiale applicati al progetto e all’indagine spaziale, ecc.) estendere l’idea di una riconcettualizzazione e ristrutturazio- ne dell’Europa?

Jörg H. Gleiter 239 Stampa: Digitalandcopy, Segrate (MI)