The Zen Denizens
(Originally written August 23,2016.)
The development of the metropolis through the ages is a topic with not only profound consequences but also causes. The dramaticism of the development at each step is the reflection of the wealth poured into the metropolis. Imagine wealth as a function on a graph. Those moments when there is a step up in a piece-wise behavior always results in something drastic. In architecture, that generally entails demolishing the existing to make room for the new. Extraordinary destruction to built anew. To take it a step almost too far would be to call this phenomenon the phoenix-like rebirth that is required for all celebrities; New York City is not so different from Madonna.
The issue of identity is never far from the populated metropolis. Identity is the most vital shield to combat the threat of obsolete and the trend of throwing out the old to make room for the new. Identity is vital to maintain one’s standing. To elevate identity to become an icon would be the ultimate method for preservation and continue acclaim.
(For the purposes of the article, let’s take New York City. They say if you can make it here, you can make it anywhere. A little footnote that isn’t mentioned is that to make it, you’ve got to fail first.)
The road to success is riddled with failed attempts, lessons learned, and necessary re-invigoration of one’s will. That re-invigoration can be and many times results from the need to change it up a bit, to reinvent yourself – to embrace those new characteristics that you’ve identified are required for your success. You must not only embrace, you must weave that into the very fiber of your being.
Enter the glossy pages full of celebrities, of the coveted lifestyle, of the coveted surroundings and identity markers to reflect this hard work.
But, that is where it gets a little difficult.
How does this reinvented self that reincarnates constantly to stay ahead of the competitive curve affect society and architecture?
As an almost contradictory juxtaposition is the nature of buildings. Buildings are meant to create shelter: space to rest and for a reprieve from nature (this extends to the concrete jungle). Buildings are the Zen Denizens. Humans upkeep the buildings against the weather elements of nature and the decay of time. But, buildings themselves? They exist because of humans. They sit and watch days melt into weeks into years and into decades, maybe even centuries. How are they to combat the destruction? Their problems of staying current or timeless is similar for people they shelter.
The difference is the attainability of it. The cost to make the an iconic building is astronomical, and the cost to maintain the building is an additional cost that is often underestimated.
One way to maintain identity is the propagation or marketing of the identity. Which is attainable for humans through portraiture. An example would be Andy Warhol’s portraiture work that feature Marilyn Monroe and Jackie O.
By looking at how identity is preserved or propagated for people, perhaps we can gain insight on the relationship of identity and architecture. The parallelism of architectural development to portraiture is not that farfetched. Le Corbusier’s scale of man is quite timeless. Routinely, façade engineering is described as the design and engineering of the skin. By extension, the bones are structure, and mechanical, electrical, and plumbing (MEP) engineering are the organs.
One of the current exhibitions at the Whitney is about portraiture: Human Interest. The exhibition does an incredibly impressive task of looking within its collection as well as newly acquired works to construct a narrative on portraiture post WWII though the distant past where questions of representation arose to current times, where contemporary artists are now looking at that entire history and choosing to provide portraits in whichever medium and method they choose.
For more information on the exhibition, refer to the following link: http://whitney.org/Exhibitions/HumanInterest
(Please note that all images below are photographs taken of the original works as displayed in the exhibition and are intended as visual aids only. Please refer to documentation by the Whitney Museum for more information of the works.)
LOOK AT ME!
Susan Hall’s New York Portrait 1970 (acrylic and graphite pencil on canvas)
From the museum’s plaque:
The woman in New York Portrait reclines on an arm chair, her posture relaxed and sexually self-assured. The grid pattern appearing throughout the scene coupled with the transparency of her dress and the window create an ambiguous sense of space that makes it difficult to distinguish interior from exterior. Together the skyline prominently visible in the background and the title of the work present the possibility that Susan Hall meant this not as a portrait set in New York but as a portrait of the city itself, or perhaps the city as epitomized by one of its uninhibited, youthful denizens.
The plaque suggests that “Hall meant this not as a portrait set in New York but as a portrait of the city itself, or perhaps a city as epitomized by one of its uninhibited, youthful denizens.” This begs the question of if a city can be defined: by its people or its buildings. Perhaps both because they have similar needs to make identity. Visually, the composition of the female’s subject figure is juxtaposed to the rectilinear forms of the buildings at the background. Both however have similar treatment of being shrouded in the same overlaid grid.
STOP LOOKING AT ME. THERE ARE SO MANY PEOPLE HERE. WHY ARE THERE SO MANY PEOPLE.
Some flaws in the comparison ought to be pointed out. For starters, clearly, buildings are truly not humans. The sensations of pain or emotions are not appropriate to the comparison. The issue of movement and coming into contact with the same species need not apply. One portrait that provides this a visual basis for discussion point is Raphael Soyer’s Office Girls.
Raphael Soyer’s Office Girls 1936 (oil on canvas)
From the museum’s plaque:
An astute observer of Depression-era New York, Raphael Soyer evoked the inner lives of anonymous city dwellers. His paintings frequently depict the new generation of female workers he encountered in his Union Square neighborhood. Leaving the home for secretarial and clerical jobs, these “office girls” achieved an independence that was unprecedented for the women of the period, even while unemployment remained high among men. While his artist colleagues usually portrayed these young women in optimistic terms, Soyer’s composition strikes a more ambivalent one. Squeezed between a throng of rushing female workers and a glowering man, the central woman looks out at the viewer with a gaze that is at once weary and unflinching.
Buildings are literally born with “a gaze that is at once weary and unflinching.” Once a building is complete, it begins to weather and at a certain point will become visually “weary.” As for “unflinching,” a building hardly can flinch. it can deflect under wind load, but not under glowering stares.
BET THOSE OTHER PEOPLE DON’T HAVE THIS.
Leidy Churchman’s Tallest Residential Tower in the Western Hemisphere 2015 (Oil on linen)
From the museum plaque:
This painting depicts the view from 432 Park Avenue, a 1,396-foot-high luxury condominium completed in 2015. While the tower has been heralded as a marvel of contemporary engineering, it has also sparked an outcry over its impact on New York’s skyline and the stratospheric cost of its apartments. Leidy Churchman based his canvas on a rendering he found on the developer’s website that juxtaposed a luxurious bathroom interior with the sprawling mass of lower Manhattan beyond. Churchman’s dizzying composition is at once inviting and disconcerting, hinting at the building’s controversial status as a symbol of the glaring divide between the ultra-rich and ordinary New Yorkers.
The presence of this work in an exhibition centering on portraiture further defends the comparison of architecture and people. This image defines an identity. Better or worse, if a person has this, it becomes part of their identity, in the same way that possessions can define a person’s identity if they allow it. In turn, it changes how they move through society. The skyline below dwarfs in the background due to perspective and vantage point from the bathtub. It creates a juxtaposition that a singular bathtub is above the skyline. A rather petty bathroom fixture can hardly be greater than the marvels of city planning and architecture. However, it can be the perspective or vantage point through the lens created by the wealthy elite and their unattainable architecture.
This discussion also brings to light consumerism and materialism. As people, we enter and leave the world the same way, naked and without anything. Our bodies are all made of the same building blocks - cells. Each building at the end of the day generally literally have the same building blocks - concrete, steel, aluminum, glass, clay, etc. So does this materialism do anything for us during the time we are here? It is a status symbol that we cannot take with us.
WELL MAYBE I’M JUST LIKE EVERYONE ELSE. HA. MAYBE.
Philip-Lorca deCorcia’s Igor 1987 (Chromogenic print)
From the museum's plaque:
On first glance, Philip-Lorca diCorcia’s Igor recalls the documentary tradition of Walker Evan’s famous subway portraits (also on view in this gallery), which were shot with a hidden camera. Yet certain details of the composition – especially its gleaming, almost cinematic lighting and preternatural stillness – undermine its candid appearance. Indeed, as he often did for his photographs from this period, diCorcia carefully staged this scene and used a friend as his model, creating a fusion of realism and artifice that questions photography’s traditional role as a truth-telling medium.
The “truth-telling medium” of photography is further turned on its head in the context. Here the portrait imitates life. The same could apply to buildings; with more cost efficient materials becoming available, the easier it is to create a coveted aesthetic without using traditional costly materials.
At the end of the day or the end of an era, the death of a building or a person the first time can be kept at bay with reinvention and maintenance.
The following quotation is attributed to the artist Bansky: “I mean you die twice. One time when you stop breathing and a second time, a bit later on, when somebody says your name for the last time.”
Perhaps the materialism we explored earlier helps extend the second time. Because the first death is the great equalizer; it returns the cells and building blocks. The second death is counted by the lasting legacy or reputation.
Presidential legacies, the creation of and the reverence for, are on a lot of people’s minds. Simply look at Franklin D. Roosevelt’s legacy. There are still books published often and frequently on his life and times, such as His Final Battle: The Last Months of Franklin Roosevelt by Joseph Lelyveld, which was reviewed in the most recent issue of New York Review of Books, dated September 29, 2016, Volume LXIII, Number 14. Not only are there still comparisons and examinations of his life and times, like many influential historical individuals, there are monuments and infrastructure dedicated to his memory, such as the FDR Drive.
For architecture, let’s take a look at the original Pennsylvania Station. It is still revered to this day and the textbook example of the importance of landmark and architectural preservation. An absolute architectural and engineering marvel, the station was prematurely torn down to make way for the Madison Square Garden entertainment arena and a completely underground Pennsylvania Station.
By creating an identity first and then a legacy second, both inhabitants and architecture can fight the threat of competition and of time.
next: part ii
