5.12.2009

Disruptions in Democratic Totalities


The prioritization of traffic and speed in society has transcended to the corporal; to the displacement of the body from its primary medium of urban exchange, public space. The data produced from the observation of homeless presence in relation to commuters in Penn Station New York illustrates this contemporary condition. Within this heterotopia itself the figure of the homeless is the reminder of a democracy that is fabricated and sense of utopia that is false; a system based on its linear logic unable to handle exceptions and disturbances. The commuter here proceeds aware/unaware of the disturbance, a desensitization produced by noise filters of the social, spatial and time diasporas for the sake of normalcy and stability. The scar here only occurs in the diagram and psyche, its materiality vanishes from the architectural surface leaving no residue.















5.11.2009

New York City Subway: public space

New York City Subway: public space which is not only means of transportation, they're also a concert hall, art galleries, stage for performers & giving subway nodes a broader culture.

Busking is an art form of its own. They are as good a musician as to audition for any stage gig but in addition to that they have to relate to the audience and be a real people’s person.

I have tried to look at busking as the subway music art on macro & micro level analysis, on the macro level subway logos becomes an instrument identity of the busker located at specific subway station & gives whole new abstract vision to the New York City subway map. For micro level analysis i found 42 street station interesting as this is major junction.




Gowanus


Like many industrial neighborhoods in Brooklyn, Gowanus has suffered as industry has declined over the past few decades. Unlike other areas that have given way to gentrification and have been “rediscovered” and adapted for residential and commercial uses, it has been a victim of urban neglect and left to decay. The neighborhood contains a series of contiguous vacant lots and deteriorating building stock where industry once thrived. The canal itself remains a highly contaminated and neglected wetland that is no longer in use as an industrial linkage, though several light industrial businesses still remain and occupy most of the properties along the waterfront.

The Gowanus Canal presents a number of problems in terms of inhabitability. The levels of toxic waste found in the sediment is measured in parts per hundred, whereas toxicity levels are often measured in parts per million. The Gowanus watershed includes many adjacent sites that have been contaminated with toxic pollutants, through which stormwater passes on its way into the water of the canal. It is also sprinkled with CSOs (combined sewage outfalls) and receives raw sewage during heavy rains. Furthermore, after more than 100 years as an industrial tract, the ground that abuts the canal is filled with known carcinogens, heavy metals, coal tar and other hazardous chemicals. Therefore, the Gowanus Canal can be seen as a hostile environment.




The Gowanus Canal, though unique in its potential for new urban public space, is part of a larger network of former industrial zones throughout New York City that have fallen victim to the post industrial decline, such as Long Island City, the South Bronx, Manhattan’s West Side. Williamsburg, English Kills, etc., though at a different stage in its evolution and inevitable revitalization. While some of these other sites have evolved and are completely unrecognizable as former neglected districts, Gowanus has only recently been reconsidered and has not undergone any transformations. The site exists in its present state due to the relocation and decline of industrial production in the second half of the 20th century. These factors have contributed to the neglect and abandonment by the former users of the site and have allowed fragmentation of the urban fabric to occur, resulting in the creation of urban remnant spaces that have been and are currently being reconditioned and adapted by a new set of users.



The Gowanus, for the most part, has resisted development pressures, though large scale residential and commercial projects have been proposed in the past few years and have been stalled or have failed for various environmental and economic reasons. For now, it has been able to maintain it’s character defining industrial context and small pockets of “found urban space” in the form of vacant or underused lots and abandoned access points to the canal’s edge. The canal and its adjacent lots form a series of pockets and remnants of urban, former industrial space and abandoned infrastructure that are in the process of being reclaimed and reactivated for a multitude of new adaptive uses by various constituencies. It is at once, a blighted and contaminated brownfield site with remnants of an industrial past, and an urban hub that is currently supporting craft based industries, a thriving underground art scene, community gardens, open air performance space and active aquatic recreation.



Various constituencies have a stake in the future direction of the neighborhood. Each of these constituencies have vested interests in the community, sometimes at odds or in conflict with the the interests of other parties involved. Outside development interests are an important set of actors that do not maintain a physical presence at the site, but their interests affect the aims and ability of the current users of the site to continue to operate. The remaining industrial entities are increasingly at risk of being eradicated due to the pressures of development and the lack of adequate remaining industrial space.

The local artist community, perhaps viewed as enabling gentrification and commercial interests by the industrial entities, interact within the remnant spaces and have reclaimed abandoned lots and neglected industrial buildings. These users have become stewards of an urban landscape that has been discarded by their predecessors. They have begun to reactivate the neighborhood with new craft based industries and have formed a community based on shared interests and In appropriating the remaining urban fabric for their purposes, they have adapted vacated sites as open space for performance art, community gardens, urban agriculture and open studios.

The area has become somewhat of an incubator for the production of art through artist residencies, open studios, galleries and artisan workshops. Local artists have created a destination where the creation and display of art happens simultaneously. These activities have brought an increased presence to an area that has been desolate for many years. This current use of the site is in contrast to the goals of the outside development interests, who would primrily preplace this production model with one of pure consumption.

Other users see the canal primarily as a resource for active recreation and have benefited from the reclaimed remnant spaces that provide access to the canal’s edge. Access to the canal for these users is currenlty limited due to the amount of private space at the majority of the canal’s banks.





















Decoding the Rock: An Outsider's Guide to Bouldering

I was interested in the decoding and encoding of rock climbing, especially as it pertains to the physicality of climbing and the community that surrounds it. Language is a very important aspect, both in a physical vocabulary and a specialized lingo. To understand the climbing community, one must understand the language used. One can only become a member of the community once he or she has mastered both the verbal and baseline technical phrasings. Climbing is tied to what is climbable, so thus centers around specific public and semi-public locations (boulders, climbing gyms), making for a potentially tight-knit community – especially in a dense urban environment with limited climbing opportunity such as New York City. This study was more of the community of climbers than any specific location, though studies were made at Rat Rock in Central Park and Manhattan Plaza Health Club’s climbing gym.




5.10.2009

public space via Facebook!

Social exchanges take place in this abstraction of public space. It allows for a new type of “meeting” where the physical aspect of interaction is abandoned. The idea of divorcing the old school methodologies for social interaction has been twisted and catered to a world of convenience. A means of befriending, meeting and networking with people has transformed. The space was originally structured for social networking but has grown into a complex animal. People [friends] are able to participate in multiple modes of dialogue in this virtual public space. The opportunities for these dialogues are ultimately decided by the user dependent upon how much information he/she is willing to share. These dialogues are means of communicating through different mediums provided: updating status, editing personal information, uploading pictures, blogging, etc. Many of these dialogues are not directed towards one particular person but more towards the whole network.

This site does not comply with the typical public space, but over the years I believe that it has slowly replaced the conventional ideas of social interaction and opened up doors for new means of connectivity. The space allows for modern ways of accidentally bumping into someone, loitering, people watching, and meeting new people much like how one would in a public park. How exactly are these traditional actions translated into this new age?

Because these modern translations are so easily accessible by the user, the line of privacy within this somewhat public space is very blurry and always questioned. Traditionally we are usually aware of these types of instances, but today, the modern act of loitering and people watching often gets carried away and categorized into something negative. Is this movement of modernizing the way we interact healthy? There are consistent means of flow with constant moments of transfer and exchange between actors. Facebook has transformed into a node of exchange where opportunities for the modern social interaction is finally challenging us to participate in the idea of non-physical public space. Some may not be aware of this new phenomenon but are giving us something tangible to explore by habitually logging on and abandoning the physicality of interaction. Another layer to add to the richness and complexity of this public atmosphere is the fact that actors participate in all types of locales. Some are active in what I would say an immobile state [visiting site from home] while others are extreme with their mobility [synced in with smart phone]. Actors are given freedom to saunter through when and where they please without any form of a time cap. Because of this convenience and flexibility actors are able to continuously keep dialogues [transfers and exchanges] afloat, which keeps this node relentlessly flooded with activity.

[click HERE to view case study analysis]

5.09.2009










Williamsburg, Brooklyn
Bedford Avenue and N. 7th Street


The Bedford Avenue stop along the L-line and the surrounding neighborhood can be thought of as a bridge or hinge that acts as connective tissue between Manhattan and Brooklyn. It is a culturally rich, has many sets of actors, and has a diverse architectural fabric. Because of this richness, is serves as an ideal location for advertisements and events that are mostly specific to the area.

The goal for this study is to:

1.Understand the surrounding neighborhood through legal and illegally posted advertisements (who is paying/ posting the ads, are they local business, corporations...)
2.Attempt to track the flow of capital through posted advertisements
3.Attempt to reproduce the diverse “ecology” of the site through graphics and mapping

4.08.2009

Spectacle of Public art







Recent developments in public art now demonstrate an appeal to a friendlier notion of the public in the form of "community" art. Artists accept the many contexts brought to public art by its diverse audience, along with their own standing as members of the communities they address. They design pieces that generally curb avant-garde tendencies in favour of work that celebrates shared experiences. This approach validates the concerns of most public arts administrators and granting agencies. The approach encourages community involvement and critique of art works in the planning stages.

One such example is cube designed by Isamu Noguchi. The bright red painted steel of Isamu Noguchi's Red Cube stands out in strong contrast to the blacks, browns, and whites of the buildings and sidewalks around the sculpture. Located to one side of a small plaza in front of the BROTHERS HARRIMAN (previously HSBC) building on Broadway, Red Cube is surrounded on three sides by skyscrapers, the height of which draw a viewer's eye upwards. The sculpture itself adds to this upward pull, as it balances on one corner, the opposite corner reaching towards the sky. Despite its title, the sculpture is not actually a cube, but instead seems as though it has been stretched along its vertical axis.

Following is the mapping done to show how the cube influence the urban actors.

Visual Cacophony in SoHo [part 2]





































Collaborative Conflicts and Conflicting Collaborations in Public Parks :

I was interested in investigating public parks as a cultural space of exchanges, continuously redefined by its users. And how various collaborations and conflicts between its users can start informing the nature/ program of public parks vis a vis the conventional notion of the parks as 'escape from Urban environment' as perceived by the Parks and Recreation department. A fictional storyboard unfolds on a real site, to understand various interests, conflicts and desires that start shaping newer partnerships for newer definitions of public parks.



4.01.2009

Socio-economic interactions in the different landscapes of Second Life




















Description

In order to study the variety of behaviors and interactions between avatars (3D representation of a person in SL), I have chosen a set of environments in Second Life, to see how people (through their avatars) experience and make use of the different urban landscapes created or recreated.   These are the environments:

 

1. Retail stores and exhibition areas (shopping center or commercial street)

2. Non real (based on fantasy) public spaces like the Luskwood community.

3. Parks and open spaces (including the design process of them in SL-Queens case)

4. Dublin as an example of City Replication 


 

As these places are designed and created by the users, I intend to show based on my observations, what are the similarities and differences between real urban landscapes and the ones created in second life.

Through a classification of the different environments, I have been able to explore how the urban fabric constraints or not the behavior of an avatar. Wandering in these replicated cities, where there are streets, sidewalks, parks, buildings, shopping centers, educational institutions and all the components of a real city, made me question why do real people want to copy this urban models in Second Life, instead of taking advantage of Second Life’s infinite possibilities.

In Second life, you don’t need streets simply because you don’t need cars to transport.   One can choose between walking, flying or teleporting. There are some avatars of course that design cars, but they are not useful in SL.  There is no real sense of urban planning or understanding of ‘where places are in relation to others’.  People can simply teleport from one place to another by just a click.
  The ability to teleport in and out of locations together with your ability to fly greatly defines the urban organization of Second Life: It’s messy.  Roads exist merely as decoration, a reference to the real world, and no one uses them.”

Second Life is a new medium to experience public space, but it doesn’t have to replace real public space, in the same way that the Internet hasn’t replaced the television or the radio.  All of them contribute together to the urban life.

 Methodology:

 I will develop a series of drawings to show a sequence of the events and interactions experienced by me through my avatar (Mona Mosely).   I will focus on behavior of the different avatars in the different environments that I have selected.  I will classify these urban landscapes and mention some similarities and differences between real life public spaces and second life virtual spaces.  This will be presented as a storytelling sequence of images and texts, showing my perceptions of the interactions between avatars in this particular set of environments.