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1 Cendrars, Corbusier, Chevrolet an Essay on Modern Times And 3 C Cendrars, Corbusier, Chevrolet An Essay on Modern Times and Urbanism Made in La Chaux-de-Fonds Hans-Peter Meier-Dallach Paper to be published in the book: La Chaux-de-Fonds–Chandigarh–Brasilia. Utopie et réalité de lʼurbanisme au XXe siècle, dirigé par K. Imesch 2013 Rue de lʼAvenir, La Chaux-de-Fonds1 Le texte noir Blaise Cendrars explored the banlieue around Paris, Robert Doisneau made his famous photos enlightening the hidden life of these wild progenies around Paris, the venerable excellency of urbanism. Blaise Cendrars provided besides the four essays the legends to these photos and added a special note: ..”malgré le dégradé de la mise au point et la puissance des objectifs, lʼoeil photographique ne pénètre pas partout et quʼune certaine zone dʼombre justement lui est interdite. Cʼest pourquoi mon texte est plus noir que les photos quʼil est censé éclairer…”2 Did he foresee the victory of the artist of the camera, Doisneau, over the writer Cendrars, the actual overflow of pictures, images and visual signs? He defended the shadow-power of the word over the light-power of pictures. 1 Copyright of all illustrations oft he article: cultur prospectiv. 2 Blaise Cendrars, La Banlieue de Paris, vol. 12, nouvelle édition des oeuvres, Paris: Edition Denöel, vol 12, 372. 1 How much light do cities tolerate in order to express its secrecy? Which dark words are capable to enlighten the life of cities behind its skylines, architectural faces, often misleading to the abuse of cameras? This methodological note seems essential to me as sociologist swimming in the sea of papers, clean words, listings, rankings and statistics about cities and modern urbanism in the era of globalisation. The reading of these materials suffers under the overexposing of the surface, facts and figures, i.e. it misses “texte noir”, the dark life of cities. Blaise Cendrars, rhapsode of mythic modernism This role takes Blaise Cendrars, one of the pioneers and contemporaries of modernisation starting from La Chaux-de-Fonds (LCF), the small but unique town embedded in the Jura landscape. Blaise Cendrars (1887 – 1961) is the speaker of urbanism pure; modernism was for him the early flight to Paris and later his love for travelling physically and mentally through various cities, continents and periods; he liked excursions to the Middle Ages and to mythology3. The global passenger. We get on the Transsibérien, an impressive and popular exploration of modernism, where unexpected “mots noirs” surprise even at the beginning of the poem: “En ce temps-là j’étais en mon adolescence J’avais à peine seize ans et je ne me souvenais déjà plus de mon enfance J’étais à 16 000 lieues du lieu de ma naissance J’étais à Moscou, dans la ville de mille et trois clochers et des sept gares Et je n’avais pas assez des sept gares et des mille et trois tours Car mon adolescence était alors si ardente et si folle Que mon coeur, tour à tour, brûlait comme le temple d’Ephèse ou comme la Place Rouge de Moscou Quand le soleil se couche. Et mes yeux éclairaient des voies anciennes 3 See the excellent comments to the volumes of the new edition by Claude Leroy, Blaise Cendrars, op. cit., and the biography written by his daughter: Miriam Cendrars, Edition Balland, Paris, 1984 (in German: Blaise Cendrars, Lenos Verlag, Basel, 1986). 2 Et j’étais déjà si mauvais poète Que je ne savais pas aller jusqu’au bout.4 Blaise Cendrars celebrates himself as “world passenger”. He starts like a rocket leaving LCF and the trip is an ecstasy addressing the borderless mobility, the speed, and Moscow, a megacity. In the poem we learn more than his youth work; his life is a struggle between imagination (“le monde est ma représentation”), and the impressions and notes of his trips through the different cities and places of Europe and of the world. He was a unique combination between an observer, the journalist and a film maker reading the journals. He liked the cameras but simultaneously and even more intensively the dark words. He creates images revealing him as a phantasmagorical, sensualist and mystic personality. 4 Cited from Blaise Cendrars, La Prose du Transsibérien et de la Petite Jehanne de France, Lenos Verlag, Basel, 16 (French/German texts and the impressing illustration by Sonia Delaunay). 3 Louis Chevrolet and the acceleration Is it accidental that our second personality has been born in the same time in LCF like Blaise Cendrars? Louis Chevrolet (1878 – 1941) is the Argonaut of high speed and motor technologies. LCF celebrates him by “Place Louis Chevrolet” as well as by “Rue Louis-Joseph, Constructeur dʼAutomobiles”. He was not a writer but a maker. He lived and worked at the frontier of the most relevant revolution at the beginning of the 20th century, the motorisation of towns, cities and villages. His life is not a poem but the practice of acceleration and speed, the new sector of production, inventing and management. Chevrolet explored the physics of locomotion, Cendrars its metaphysics. Chevrolet started with races on bicycle and advanced to a master of car races in America. His intellectual ability was invested into the development of motors for cars and later for planes. As sociologist one is fascinated that LCF, this wonderful context, is linked to the glance and harms of homo faber in the early era of modernisation. Let us mention the points joining the carrier of Chevrolet5 with that of his cultural compatriot. Cendrars was a passionate driver of cars and he experienced the feeling of speed as modern poetic sequences. – Poetry and car races are today two absolute separate worlds while Cendrars drived with only one arm through the valley of the Rhône to the Provence. 5 Martin Sinzig is the author of a biography about Louis Chevrolet: Der Rennfahrer, der Konstrukteur und der Mensch, edited 2011. See also: Aude Saunier, Louis Chevrolet, un nom, une légende, illustrated brochure. 4 World-Citizen The world passenger Cendrars is simultaneously the poetic explorer of global cities. The first place is Paris, which fascinates him during his whole life. Paris „Ville de la Tour unique du grand Gibet et de la Roue“ 6 The global city is mirrored by three metaphors: the Eiffel Tower – the illuminated city, the great gallows – the darkness of revolution and the wheel – the explosion of mobility. Blaise Cendrars is a good guide through the megacities of world society. The metaphysical „runaways“ on the Transsibérien let expect that he will be a versatile observer looking attentively and liking the unexpected. ..„O Tour Eiffel Peu d’artifice géant de l’Exposition Universelle!... Tu es tout Tour Dieu antique Bête moderne Spectre solaire Sujet de mon poème Tour Tour du monde Tour en mouvement.“7 The illuminated city, Paris. The Tour Eiffel is the light-tower of Paris; in the poetic text it starts from the world exhibition and undertakes a tour through the world regions and even history. It is a fantastic prevision of the most important field of modern urbanism. Cities are illuminated spaces where all light towers are concentrated, celebrated and diffused as worldwide symbols and design. The illuminated city parts use the glance of past, of buildings, of the potentials as global market location as well as of outlooks and perspectives for future. The illuminated city is generated by the competition of cities on a global 6 Blaise Cendrars, Transsibérien, op. cit., 64. 7 Blaise Cendrars, vol 1, op. cit., 69. 5 range, i.e. the impact of the trend to an “urban mainstream” transcending nearly all borders and continents8. In each city one finds a similar design of these options, mainly the grand gestures, the tower-buildings, the vast places, the glass and illumination design, the attractions for visitors and its infrastructures for economy, leisure and culture. The chaotic city, Saint Paul. Now, we are in Sao Paulo, in Brazil, a significant place for the explorer of modern world: „J’adore cette ville Saint Paul est selon mon coeur Ici nulle tradition Aucun préjugé Ni ancien ni moderne Seuls comptent cet appétit furieux cette confiance absolue cet optimisme cette audace de travail ce labeur cette spéculation qui font construire dix maisons par heure de tous styles ridicules grotesques beaux grands petits nord sud égyptien yankee cubiste Sans autre préoccupation que de suivre les statistiques prévoir l’avenir le confort l’utilité la plus-value et d’attirer une grosse immigration Tous les pays Tous les peuples J’aime ça Les deux trois vieilles maisons portugaises qui restent sont des faïences bleues”9 The ambiguity of modern cities is sketched. Close or more in distance to the illuminated city, we find the melting pot with the vision of multi-ethnic cohabitation. Anything goes. It is a parallelism of all possible buildings, old and modern, high and low speed traffic and mobility, various groups and activities. The regulation and order dominating the illuminated parts give way 8 This „urban mainstream“ is the relevant stream of research and debates in social science since the 90ties, see for instance: Saskia Sassen, The Global City: New York, London, Tokyo, in: Jamies Simmie (ed.), Innovative Cities, Spon Press, London / New York. Raffaele, Paloscia, INURA, The Contested Metropolis. Six Cities at the Beginning oft he 21st century, Birkhäuser, Basel, Boston, Berlin. The INURA international conference (2010) Zurich addressed the mainstream thesis as one of the most relevant issues of global cities. 9 Blaise Cendrars, vol 1, op. cit., 233. 6 to unexpected and chaotic interactions; spontaneous life overwhelms linearity, rules and strict behaviour.10 The wild city, New York.
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