Productive Matters: The DIY Architecture Manuals of Ant Farm and Paolo Soleri Catherine D. Smith Productive Matters: The DIY Architecture Manuals of Ant Farm and Paolo Soleri Catherine D. Smith Faculty of Architecture, Design and Planning, University of Sydney Thesis submitted for the award of the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy, September 2012 I, Catherine Smith, understand that my thesis entitled ‘Productive Matters: The DIY Architecture Manuals of Ant Farm and Paolo Soleri,’ will be lodged in the University Library and be available immediately for use. I agree that the University Librarian (or, in the case of a departmental library, the head of department) may supply a photocopy or microfilm of the thesis to an individual for research or study or to a library. Author’s Declaration: This is to certify that: I. this thesis comprises only my original work towards the Doctor of Philosophy Degree II. due acknowledgement has been made in the text to all other material used III. the thesis does not exceed the word length for this degree IV. no part of this work has been used for the award of another degree V. this thesis meets the University of Sydney’s Human Research Ethics Committee (HREC) requirements for the conduct of research. Signature:__________________________________________________________________________________ Name:_____________________________________________________________________________________ Date:______________________________________________________________________________________ Abstract Productive Matters: The DIY Architecture Manuals of Ant Farm and Paolo Soleri This thesis develops a theoretical account of DIY (Do It Yourself) architecture, specific to the DIY architecture manuals of the art/architecture collective Ant Farm, and the architect Paolo Soleri. This account will draw upon the countercultural discourse on the ‘artisanal’ as distilled from the North American discourse on DIY, and; the philosophical notion of the artisanal as developed by French philosopher Gilles Deleuze and his collaborator, psychoanalyst Félix Guattari. The DIY phenomenon emerged as an identifiable movement in post-war North America, and yet it remains significantly under- theorised and ill-defined, particularly in connection with architecture. However, although the association of DIY with architecture and the ‘artisanal’ is uncommon, it can be charted in the post-war discourse related to the North American counterculture, including Ant Farm’s and Soleri’s DIY architecture manuals. Ant Farm’s and Soleri’s DIY manuals are primarily based on their experimental works of the 1960s and 1970s in North America. Within the countercultural movement, DIY architecture manuals functioned as educational platforms for disseminating a DIY sensibility to the countercultural audience; thus the manual was crucial to the DIY mode of operation. In the post-war discourse on DIY in North America, the term ‘DIY’ has been both positively and negatively associated with the term and notion of the ‘artisanal.’ On the one hand, DIY is seen to contribute to the loss of artisanal skills and techniques; on the other hand, it extends the practices of craft and making to a broader and otherwise unskilled audience. To investigate this initially superficial connection between DIY architecture and the notion of the ‘artisanal’ further, the thesis turns to the philosophical notion of the artisanal, primarily distilled from the writings of Deleuze and Guattari. Deleuze and Guattari define the artisanal according to a set of procedures and operations that are not tied to particular materials, technologies, skill sets or expertise. Their notion is explored as a possible productive theoretical framework for ‘DIY architecture,’ a practice that also challenges conventional distinctions between the roles and practices of ‘expert’ architect, professional builder and ‘layperson’ building occupant. For Deleuze and Guattari, the artisanal mode of operation involves discovering and responding to problems and opportunities as they are directly encountered in real-life. It will be argued that the DIY mode of operation invoked in Ant Farm’s and Soleri’s manuals involves an attendance to the nuances of material phenomena within project sites, in a manner that resonates with Deleuze and Guattari’s notion of the artisanal. Deleuze and Guattari also suggest that the artisanal mode interacts with other modes of operation, including those modes which advocate an indirect and detached account of material Abstract i phenomena. One of the key problems identified in the DIY manuals relates to the divergent ways materials and techniques are described: as simultaneously site-specific and somewhat unpredictable, and as generalisable and predictable. By theorising DIY architecture through Deleuze and Guattari’s notion of the artisanal, the thesis suggests that the manuals involve a play between: actual, particular materials directly encountered in project contexts; generalised materials as represented in words, drawings and imagery; and potential materials, actions and transformations yet to come. Importantly, this DIY mode of operation invokes comprehensive transformations in all aspects of a project, including transformations in thought, identities and bodies. These transformations are seen to occur through a productive struggle with matter’s self-organisational capacities. The thesis’s significance lies in its contribution to a critical, material-focused thinking between the disciplines of architecture and philosophy, and to the under-theorised area of DIY architecture. Abstract ii Contents Acknowledgements vi List of Figures vii INTRODUCTION 1 Introduction 1.0 Introduction 1 1.1 Scope 2 1.2 Significance 4 1.3 Method 6 1.4 Chapter structure 8 1.5 Key terms and protagonists 8 DIY architecture 9 Counterculture and countercultural 10 Artisan and the artisanal 10 Matter: matter-flows, the matter-form relation, and action and becoming-matter 12 DIY ARCHITECTURE 2 The discourse on DIY in post-war North America 1940s-1970s 2.0 Introduction 23 2.1 The emergence of the ‘Do-It-Yourself’ phenomenon in 24 post-war North America 2.2 The discourse on the DIY phenomenon in the 1940s and 1950s post-war North America 25 2.3 Theories relating to DIY in 1950s post-war North America 27 2.4 The discourse on DIY in the 1960s and 1970s counterculture in post-war North America 31 2.5 The discourse on DIY and the artisanal in the 1940s-1950s, and in the 1960s and 1970s counterculture 37 2.6 Summary: DIY and the artisanal in post-war North America 43 Contents iii 3 Ant Farm, Soleri and their DIY architecture manuals 3.0 Introduction 57 3.1 The rationale for focusing on Ant Farm’s and Soleri’s DIY architecture manuals 57 3.2 Ant Farm’s and Paolo Soleri’s DIY architecture manuals: 60 Inflatocookbook 60 ‘Inflatables Illustrated’ 66 Earth Casting 70 3.3 Technological and material experimentation and the DIY manual 74 3.4 Comprehensive, experimental education and the DIY manual 79 3.5 Experimental social formations and the DIY manual 83 3.6 Summary: experimental education, materials and social formations In Inflatocookbook, ‘Inflatables Illustrated,’ and Earth Casting 87 THE ARTISANAL 4 The notion of the artisanal 4.0 Introduction and background: 109 The artisanal in countercultural discourse, and in Deleuze and Guattari’s philosophical writings 110 4.1 Flow and following 114 4.2 The matter-form relation 121 4.3 Action, matter and transforming bodies 124 4.4 Summary: flow and following; the matter-form relation; and action, matter and transforming bodies 128 Contents iv EXPLORATIONS 5 Explorations of the artisanal in Ant Farm’s and Soleri’s DIY architecture manuals 5.0 Introduction 143 Ant Farm’s and Soleri’s DIY manuals as instantiations of DIY architecture 144 5.1 Flow, following and DIY 144 Inflatocookbook 146 ‘Inflatables Illustrated’ 149 Earth Casting 152 139 5.2 Matter, form and the communicable format of the DIY manual 155 Inflatocookbook 157 ‘Inflatables Illustrated’ 162 Earth Casting 164 5.3 DIY action, materials and transforming bodies 167 Inflatocookbook 169 ‘Inflatables Illustrated’ 171 Earth Casting 174 5.4 Summary: artisanal, DIY architecture 176 6 Concluding chapter 6.1 Summary of the overall thesis aim and approach 191 6.2 Problems, issues and limitations of the thesis 193 6.3 Thesis outcomes 195 6.4 Implications and possibilities for future research 197 7 Bibliography 201 Contents v Acknowledgements This thesis would not have been possible without the thoughtful and patient advice provided by Associate Professor Glen Hill and, in particular, Associate Professor Chris. L. Smith of the University of Sydney: thank you. I would also like to express my gratitude to Professor Elizabeth Grosz of Rutgers University and the University of Sydney, for her insights into the writings of Deleuze and Guattari, and initial suggestions about the direction of this research. Finally, I would like to acknowledge the valuable advice provided during different conferences and symposiums in which various incarnations and evolutions of the present research were discussed, including: the Fourth International Deleuze Studies Conference (2011); the Annual Conference of the Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand (2010, 2011); The Right to the City symposium (2011); the Alternative Practices in Design: The Collective - Past, Present & Future symposium (2010); and Writing Architecture: A Symposium on Innovations in the Textual and Visual Critique of Buildings (2010). Contents vi List of Figures Cover