Transcendental Homelessness and Escape Fantasy at the Intersection of Art and Design
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THE PHENOMENON OF THE HOME IN MODERN CULTURE: TRANSCENDENTAL HOMELESSNESS AND ESCAPE FANTASY AT THE INTERSECTION OF ART AND DESIGN A Thesis Submitted to the Graduate School of Engineering and Sciences of İzmir Institute of Technology in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in Architecture by Nilüfer TALU June, 2008 İZMİR We approve the thesis of Nilüfer TALU Asst. Prof. Dr. Emre ERGÜL Supervisor Prof. Dr. Gürhan TÜMER Committee Member Assoc. Prof. Dr. Önder ERKARSLAN Committee Member Asst. Prof. Dr. Özlem ERKARSLAN Committee Member Asst. Prof. Dr. Ebru YILMAZ Committee Member 09 July 2008 Date Assoc. Prof. Dr. Murat GÜNAYDIN Prof. Dr. Hasan Böke Head of the Architecture Department Dean of the Graduate School of Engineering and Sciences ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Initially, I would like to thank my supervisor Asst. Prof. Dr. Emre Ergül who has generously supported me throughout the process of the preparation of this thesis with his knowledge and expert guidance. I would like to thank the members of the thesis defense committee, Prof. Dr. Gürhan Tümer, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Önder Erkarslan, Asst. Prof. Dr. Özlem Erkarslan, and Asst. Prof. Dr. Ebru Yılmaz for inspiring discussion, comments as well as providing valuable sources for me. I especially wish to thank Assoc. Prof. Dr. Deniz Şengel for her careful reading of the present study with her valuable knowledge and offering helpful support. I thank, again, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Deniz Şengel not only for providing sources for me but also for her donation of countless books to the Institute Library. I thank Mr. Halil İspir for conceding to an interview and for permission to take photographs of his home where I had the opportunity to experience space as a psychological projection of the yearning for nature. I should also like to thank him for kindly and patiently answering all my questions. I thank Mrs. Özlem Ergüler, teacher to five-year-old children at the Beyaz Balon Kindergarten, for her assistance in undertaking the research project in which we asked children to draw the homes in which they wished to live. I would like to thank my friends, Dr. Deniz Güner, Dr. Seçkin Kutucu, Dr. Ülkü İnceköse, Asst. Prof. Dr. Koray Korkmaz and Evren Yerlikaya for their unwavering encouragement, valuable advice, and for materials they have generously provided. Credit is due to Shigeru Ban Architects, Timezone, awg_AllesWirdGut, Horden Cherry Lee Architects, Holzbox ZT GmbH and Sanaa for access to their archives and for permission to use photography and figure illustrations in this dissertation. I am pleased to thank the following museums and collections for permission to reproduce photographs, prints and paintings depicted in the indicated figures: Dia Art Foundation, New York, USA, for Figures 6.7 and 6.8; Vitra Design Museum Collection, Weil am Rhein, Germany, for Figures 3.29a, 3.29b, 3.31, 3.47 and 6.34; Promise Park Designstudio, Stockholm, Sweden, for Figures 6.57 and 6.58; Danish Design Center, Copenhagen, Denmark, for Figures 6.29, 6.30, 6.31, 6.32 and 6.33; The Justina M. Barnicke Gallery Hart House, Toronto, Canada, for Figure 6.9; Austrian private foundation of Friedrich and Lillian Kiesler for Figure 3.25; VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn, Germany, for Figure 6.60 and 6.61; Andrea Rosen Gallery, New York, USA, for 6.51, 6.55, 6.64a, 6.64b and 6.64c; Galleria Massimo De Caelo, Milan, Italy, for Figure 6.63; Collection of Patrizia Sandretto Re Rebaudengo, Turin, Italy, for Figure 6.52; Goetz Collection, Munich, Germany, for Figure 6.54; Hayden Gallery, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, USA, for Figure 6.21; Katonah Museum, New York, USA, for Figures 6.28a, 6.28b, and Karl Ernst Osthaus Museum, Hagen, Germany, for Figure 6.56. Finally, I especially wish to thank my husband and daughter for all the emotional support and encouragement they provided and for their great patience and love. I, again, thank my daughter, Irmak Talu. Having the chance to watch her hiding spaces under the tables, behind the doors, in the wardrobes, the closets, the chests, the drawers and the boxes, I better recognized the universe of domesticity, and the intimate immensity. She provided the inspiration for this study. ABSTRACT THE PHENOMENON OF THE HOME IN MODERN CULTURE: TRANSCENDENTAL HOMELESSNESS AND ESCAPE FANTASY AT THE INTERSECTION OF ART AND DESIGN Fragmented perception of the city; the oppressiveness of the capitalist system; the psychological conditions of the metropolis comprised integral aspects of Modernity which overwhelmed the nerves of modern urbanite. While the metropolis, the exterior, has been the source of fear and anxiety, the home, the interior, has been pointed out as the venue of escape from the outside. To the extent that the home is idealized as counterpart of the metropolis and social life, as the site of the heimlich and as one of the means of the capitalist system, becomes too a place where alienation has come to be overtly observed. The impossible desire to return to the home links up with transcendental homelessness and the escape fantasy and coalesces with the notion that ‘in the modern world one can only dwell in one’s body’. This study focuses on the discourse that renders the modern individual in the image of the traumatic due to the pathological relationship between the modern individual and home. The research method consists of the implementation of ‘discourse analysis’ as developed by Michel Foucault. Through this method, the argument is presented through art works/objects taken as critical spatial practices. In the context of this method, five fields are determined as constituting the positivity of the discourse: ‘Enterprises’, ‘Actions’, ‘Dialectics’, ‘Critical Discourses’, and ‘Critical Practices’. Through these five fields, the study analyzes such modern phenomena as individualization and alienation of the modern individual, transcendental homelessness, nostalgia, homesickness, isolation, and escape fantasy. Key Words: Modern individual, modernity, metropolis/megalopolis, modern dwelling, modernist architecture, standardization, mobility, trauma, home, domesticity, nostalgia, homesickness, uncanny, transcendental homelessness, alienation, anxiety, individualization, escape fantasy, discourse, statement, discursive formation, positivity. v ÖZET MODERN KÜLTÜRDE EV OLGUSU: SANAT VE TASARIMI ARAKESİTİNDE ZİHİNSEL EVSİZLİK VE KAÇIŞ FANTEZİSİ Modern toplumun ve metropol/megalopol koşullarının birey üzerinde yarattığı korku, kaygı ve gerilim, yalnız kamusal mekândaki davranış örüntülerini değiştirmekle kalmamış, bireyin ev ile kurduğu ilişkisinde de bu duruma özgü yeni katmanlar yaratmıştır. Metropolis ve kamusal alan korku ve endişe kaynağı olarak belirirken, huzurlu ve güvenli yer olarak ev, Metropolis ve kamusal alandan kaçış noktası olarak idealize edilmiştir. Ancak kapitalist üretim sürecine dahil olarak standartlaştırılan ve kullanıcısına yabancılaşan ev artık güvenli, huzurlu bir yer değil hatta yabancılaşma ve tekinsizliğin en çok gözlendiği yerdir. Artık ev güvenli ve huzurlu bir yer olmaktan öte, kendisi endişe, korku ve tekinsizlik kaynağıdır. Bu çalışma, modern birey ve ev arasında patolojik bir ilişki olduğu savı üzerine temellenen retorikleri ele alır ve bu retorikler üzerinden sanat mimarlık arakesitindeki çeşitli eleştirel mekân pratiklerini inceler. Bu retorikler, patolojik özel alan arayışı, nostalji, ev özlemi, zihinsel evsizlik ve kaçış fantezisi gibi olgular eşliğinde çeşitlenerek modern bireyin travmasına yönelik bir söylemi kaydeder. Burada yöntem olarak Foucaultcu söylem analizi kullanılmıştır. Bu yöntem çerçevesinde ‘girişimler’, ‘faaliyetler’, ‘diyalektikler’, ‘söylemler’ ve ‘eleştirel mekân pratikleri’ adı verilen beş alan içerisinde modern bireyin yalnızlığı ve yabancılaşması, patolojik ev ve özel alan arayışı, zihinsel evsizlik, yalıtım ve kaçış fantezisi gibi olgular incelenmiştir. Anahtar sözcükler: Modern birey, metropol/megalopol, modernite, modern konut, modern mimarlık, standartlaşma, hareketlilik, travma, ev, evsellik, nostalji, ev özlemi, tekinsizlik, zihinsel evsizlik, yabancılaşma, endişe, bireyselleşme, kaçış fantezisi, söylem, ifade, söylemsel oluşum, pozitiflik alanı. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF FIGURES……………………………………………………...………...………xii CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION……………………………………...……………………1 1.1. Definition of the Problem…………………………………..………………1 1.2. Objectives…………………………………………………..………………7 1.3. Methodology……………………………………………………………….8 1.4. Background……………………………………………………………….20 1.5. Scope and Limitations…………………………………………………….29 CHAPTER 2. ENTERPRISES……………………………………………………………..32 2.1. From the Industrial Revolution to Industrialization: Metropolis, House and Industrialized Society…………………………………………32 2.2. The Meaning of Rationalization in Industrialization……………………..40 2.2.1. The Notion of Standardization and Interchangeability: Economy, Flexibility and Variability…………………………………40 2.2.2. Mechanization in Scientific Management and Fordism: Integration of Human to Machines in Factory Work…………………43 2.3. Standardization and Mechanization of the Modern Individual in Factory Work…………………………………………………………..52 CHAPTER 3. ACTIONS…………………………………………………………………..54 3.1. Women’s Actions: Women Dream of Modernism……………………….54 3.1.1. Scientific Management in the House: Factorization of the House and Taylorization of Housework…………………………57 3.1.1.1. Catharine Beecher (1800-1878): Division of Functions as ‘Preservation and Storage’; and ‘Cooking and Serving’………57 3.1.1.2. Lillian Gilbreth (1878-1972): ‘Time-Motion Study’ for ‘One Best Way’and ‘Saving