Vaclav's Prague_ 1936-2011

Frank Gehry's Fred and Ginger Building 1997, Prague, Czech Republic

A revolution led by written word (and architecture). 

The late Czech leader and galvanizing visionary, Vaclav Havel led the peaceful uprising Prague spring and 'Velvet Revolution' of 1989. Mr. Havel, with wit and poetics of word, stirred discontent through the foundations of Charter 77, a human rights watch group that brought attention to the abuses of perverse power, corruption and other atrocities under communist oppression. His imprisonments fed his frustrations further and inspired revolutionary ideas and words which would propel a people to freedom in 1989 and into the early 90's as he was elected Czechoslovakia's first democratic leader. 

It was during his time as President of the newly formed Czech Republic (after the split with Slovakia) that Prague emerged in the eyes of the world as a city unparalleled in a well preserved, cross-section of historical identity through time. The rebirth of ideology (and the city itself) was perhaps exemplified in a new architectural project to be situated adjacent an apartment building designed by Mr. Vaclav's grandfather in 1907- and a place Mr. Havel once lived. Having secured the rising star in Frank Gehry back in the early 1990's, the design of the 'Fred and Ginger Building', on this prominent river front site, represented a fresh start for the fledgling democratic country. If there ever was an architecture embodying political change it is here along the Vltava River in Prague, instigated by none other than Mr. Havel himself. 

Mr. Havel can be credited with with both preservation and progress in Prague and in the Czech Republic. Absolved of militarism, with pen in hand, creatively writing social change. 

He will be remembered.

condenCITY_86 commute

About three years ago, I posted sequential images and descriptive words relating to my daily commute in San Francisco. In actuality, I had 5 years prior to that, done the same thing in Seoul back in 2001, tracing my daily route to work on cold winter mornings. Now, almost ten years ago to the day, I reflect upon my daily commutes that I made from Anguk-dong to Yeoksam-dong in Seoul. The original commute images were shot in 35 mm slide film that has since been scanned to digital format as you see here now. Even in 2001, Seoul in its tattered youth and engineered front, appears design-less; awkward in adolescence as a growing and changing city. In that respect, not much has changed to this day.

'Commute' has always had significance in my daily routines. On foot or via public transit, my routes have shifted by mood or of necessary expediency. Always varying, even in the slightest of deviation or shifts in step. Our awareness is heightened in tactile contact. Ground against foot, Feet on moving platforms; the camera at one's side, as a mechanism for recording time and distance.  

Eyes open and mind wandering, wondering.

condenCITY_85

Visions of Nakwon

The belly of a city, turned upside-down in the darkness of day.
Where some explore, others remain cautiously aside;
outside.
Both road and structure conceived simultaneously;
a partnership of economics and an expedient double time.
My memory is vague but bold as I look back through my forlorn window.



  

condenCITY_84 above and below

Faux-fotos capturing real "insta"-moments. I have begun to photograph Seoul above and below ground in a series of images, quickly capturing the reflected half of the city; a metro system, experienced daily by thousands and yet receiving little attention as a place of destination- or perhaps even consideration as active public space. The Seoul metro is a place of passage where most commuters rarely take pause. The series can be seen here at an instagram platform for viewing and sharing photo's, captured on handheld, mobile devices and networks.

condenCITY_83 cities in-between

The Kaesong Industrial park in North Korea is located 16 kilometers north of the DMZ and South Korean borders. Kaesong, having opened in 2004 as a joint project between the north and south, now operates as a conditional industrial 'experiment' with productions of low-quality garments and commercial products owned by South Korean companies and with labor supplied at the hands of North Korean workers. Currently more than 40,000 workers populate the park with plans for more than double that over the next decade.

The industrial city is directly connected by train and bus to and from Seoul, making it the only active civilian link, between the two countries along the heavily fortified DMZ- although for the moment, visits by the general public have been halted due to rising political tensions. It is a place of transient existence, with a workforce shipped in for operations and then out when the factories close. It remains caught in-between, somewhere as typical industrial area, and yet suppressed by the decades old cold war stalemate still gripping the peninsula. 

But could Kaesong be a staging ground for more? 

Kaesong presents the possibility of industrialization as a uniting force of disparate ideologies; bridging lapses and filling decades of void. It has become a delicate dance of divergent economics- precariously positioned as a model for unity in the oddest of ways. 

condenCITY_82 city depths

The depths of a city can be measured in anticipation; what may or may not eventually happen as a result of environmental oversight. In the case of Seoul, the engineered Han River, is a subtle measure of the city's depth. The negative elevations of which, have been excavated away, as a precautionary stance ensuring the safety of its citizens and investments. As contingency this city is intentionally deep.

Un-condensed rural 2.0

'nightwall'

With day turned to night- all that remains is wall, casting shadows and projecting light in the cool autumn air of rural Korea. The earthen walls, 'tom', are labors of division (and inclusion); containing spaces of outside to be included inside. These are outside rooms to be certain.  The rise of autumn brings silence in night and in day. Contained within earthen walls- nightwalls.

Jon Jost

Image courtesy, Jon Jost

I sat down recently in Seoul with American filmaker and artist, Jon Jost. We met on the campus where I teach, at a small cafe for an exchanging introduction. He was both engaging and accessible in conversation that lasted seamlessly for two hours. His stories of life seemed opposite his films in some ways, and then again, his work as a direct projection of his own divergent 'lives' rendered the man and places behind the camera even more real- in details captured deliberately in time. Jost has made more than 60 independent films dating back to the late 1960's. 


Perhaps, known best for,  All The Vermeers in New York, his films are as much a reflection of places he has lived and experienced, as they are in deeply personal views and an obsessive craft in making. His films have been both widely celebrated around the world for their cinematic attention and perhaps equally criticized for a cadence, some find hard to follow. They are cerebral and deliberately constructed; or film as "architecture," as Jost describes. 


Jon Jost will lecture on November 25th at 1:30 pm in the department of Architecture at Konkuk University.  His lecture is titled_  Cinematic architectural space: an exploration

condenCITY_81 Seoul from above 1.3

The horizon is lost and then found in Seoul. It's serrated edge pitched against a hazy, late summer sky. For many city dwellers it is an elusive experience to be found in moments of brief visits above the 10th floor. At street level we tend to forget that vision can be free of limit. 

condenCITY_80 Seoul from above 1.2

From above Seoul is mixed. 

Architecture is at once road, programmed space, bridge, public node, parking lot, to name just a few; collective as a multi-functional device in the city. Bound indistinguishably on its sides, concealed and then revealed. Architecture, by determined will (and absolute limits), as it was constructed in double-time, producing road, market and modern apartment block in one economic effort. Simultaneously they rose, as we see it today from above; the confluence of Nagwon.

condenCITY_79 Seoul from above 1.1

The Seoul Metropolitan area is 605 square kilometers (or 233 sq. miles). It's population of 10,464,051 estimated in 2010, is concentrated in an area of 17,288 people per square kilometer (44,770 per square mile); in comparison New York City's density of approximately (27,500 people per square mile) is clear indication of just how dense Seoul is in terms of population per area. From above at night, in this NASA satellite image, we too are reminded of Seoul's defining topographic boundaries and limits, viewed here in its thinly delicate and fragile form (quite opposite the constructed reality at ground level). The cities overflowing edges have been pushed outward and forced through narrowing geographies, north and south, east and west, visible high in the night sky.

condenCITY_78 1912 Se-ul From Above 1.0

Image courtesy nationmaster.com

Seoul has a history of being fictitious when it comes to mapping and representations of the city on paper. Through centuries either locally or by the hand of visiting foreigners (as viewed in the map above) it has been laid out and mapped according to personal perceptions, a kind of visual feeling, rather than by any exactness of measure or precision. It is a representation that permeates even the city today; in its constructed imprecise form.

condenCITY_77 60's seoul Nakwon Sanga

Fall 2011; preservation or preservative? 

condenCITY_76 mullae shadow

Tinged air washed away along rust stained streets. 

open windows accepting what the city has to offer; tempered for a moment by rains torrent.

a lights line connects odd bedfellows in programmatic disharmony. 

casting a final evening glance, I cut through another eves pale twilight of wet grey 

Lost in shadow.

condenCITY_75

Seoul Adaptations

condenCITY_74 From roads to rivers

Image courtesy open source for public use: daum.net

As the rain continues to fall this day, July 28, 2011 the deluge of the last two days has left my home district of Seocho-gu underwater literally. What has officially been classified as a 100 year flooding event on the south side of the city is still unfolding in terms of an urban disaster. Homes washed out as mountainsides have eroded and motorists stranded on the roofs of their vehicles in 1.5m+ deep water, the rains caught many by surprise in the early morning hours on the 27th. With downpours falling in amounts as much as 2.3 inches (6 cm)/ hour it is no surprise that Seoul's drainage systems have been helpless against the torrential summer monsoon.

  

Cy Twombly [April 25, 1928 – July 5, 2011] making histories

Coincidentally, it was last week I was posting a note regarding the memory of a great painter I once studied with.  In fact we had great discussions about the man I write of here now. About the same time on July 5th 2011, although I did not know it then, another American painter had just passed away. Cy Twombly wasn't just another painter. I was introduced to his work about 12 years ago as a student. At the time I was challenged by a suggested reference to his work and my budding interests. After some time in 2004, I wrote an article for Loudpaper Zine attempting to draw connections between the fragmented city of Seoul (in its palimpsestial formation) and Twombly's paintings of historical reflectance. 

Today, it is clearer to me as I have contemplated time and again, Twombly's work and the creative processes one ventures into as artist, architect, designer, or creator at will. It has been said that Cy Twombly would paint and draw in light subdued spaces to achieve the loose 'freehand' he was so recognized and known for. It was his "experience" as he once described, when it came to making art that appears form and idea consuming. We are in effect left with the process and depth of making and the significant exposure in that. 

Experience of making above all else, perhaps.  

With each passing, a history is made. Cy Twombly was a master, even during his life, of making histories.

Sussman remembered

'invisible'- e.reeder 2001

"I always use the analogy of a pool that has frozen over," in the words of Wendy Sussman "The finished painting is like that. So, in the pool at the lower depth might be a rock, and then there might be a little leaf that is frozen closer to the surface, and above that maybe a candy wrapper. It's all frozen in the pool, and then on the very top somebody comes and skates. The surface has this history, and that is time, the time of the painting."

More on Sussman here, in her words. 

condenCITY_73 heavy Seoul

My Seoul is heavy. Weighted with materials that connect to earth, the surfaces of the city, and bend precariously to the sky reaching. The architectural forms of Seoul are one with the ground, by the very nature of gravity that pulls at dense material compositions common in many structures throughout the city. There is ambiguity between ground and vertical surface. Where one begins and the other ends is at times unclear. 

condenCITY_72 material Seoul

The Leeum Museum revisited. 

Eclectic Seoul emerges in my return visit (after 4 years) to the Samsung Leeum Museum. Seoul as a city recognizable in its fragmented condition, in refined contrast, the Leeum Museum balances the art of its 'architectures' (designed by Jean Nouvel, Rem Koolhaas, and Mario Botta) and the traditional to contemporary arts contained within. The tightly arranged "campus" of buildings is tucked away in the upscale Hannam-dong residential neighborhood, buried within Seoul's north of the river district. It's material (and formal) presence is precisely Seoul, divergent and un-coreographed yet, somehow for its ambitions, remains contextual within the equally ambitious neighboring villas. 

condenCITY_71 mobile streets

Seoul streets rumble under my feet. 

The hum and buzz of motion; metal to metal, propelled through blackened tunnels where walls remain obscure and only glass reflections reveal an internalized compartment, stern faces. Starting and stopping requires loose legs, allowing for a kind of dampened reaction to the jerky motion of pinned cars. This is a street to be sure with beggars and paddlers daily. The actors remain silent, although I know they too are there, seated quietly waiting in turn for their moments to shine. Gawkers sit on the side-lines watching and chatting quietly. Personal space in these streets is non-existent. I remain flexible to the possibility and definition of 'street', my morning street, deep in the city. 

condenCITY_70 city of shadows 2.0

What scale is your life?

Defined by walls that bound your routines of passage and pause. The marks, textures and distances revealing 'scales' here today for a moments notice.

Mullae citydouble doublecity

condenCITY_69 floating seoul

Aerial plan illustration courtesy of exinteriordesign.com

It appears the city of Seoul has long had a fascination with "floating" structures along and in the Han River, as the opening of a photo exhibition last week suggests. The newly completed 'floating-islands' project is home to an exhibition, and the 'floating architecture' itself, a long anticipated addition to the cities waterfront in Banpo-dong. Floating or not, upon visiting on the second day of opening, I couldn't help but feel how oddly out of place the buoyed structures appeared- scaled more for the urban eclecticism of Seoul's urban fabric. But even there, the 'architecture' would appear pompous in a display of formalism; over-structured and under self-critical in what was architecturally designed. 

Looking back to the 1950's, the waterfront at that time was also doted with floating structures attracting visitors for leisure activities. Then, the yet-to-be tamed Han river was still in it's un-engineered state. With edges soft in vegetation and earth, unlike today's dredged and concrete lined artificial corridor. Yet, the floating structures in the black and white exhibition photos appear reflective of the small boat crafts of the river then- simple wooden fabrications for temporary, seasonal occupations. Perhaps as a reminder of the way river and city co-existed at that time. Today, city dominates river, as the new 'floating island' suggest, regardless of how much the local government wants to claim Han River 'Renaissance'.

  

condenCITY_68 end of a life

Dressed in time with splintering cracks, the aging low-rise apartments of guro-gu have outlived expectations. Today, more than 30 years old, the apartments slated for redevelopment now await termination. Lives of yesterday have moved on to the cities newer residential areas, leaving behind the foundations of Seoul; as a city of beige bedrooms.

condenCITY_67 urban monolith

In the summer of 1995 I made my way daily past Strahov Stadion going to school. It was a seemingly long walk to the bus stop to catch the only option for public transportation, located at the far side of the stadium from my dorm room. What I didn't know at the time was Strahov is the largest stadium in the world. (How I could not have known that simple fact then, is beyond me to this day). But for me Strahov wasn't a stadium from the outside and it seemed not even of 'architectural' classification. It's daunting presence, as a building, was more of a curiously strange neighborhood, uninviting but alluring at the same time. Back then at street level along its east facing perimeter were restaurants and pubs, as well as a few small specialty shops and markets. 

To this day it stands testament to mass appeal. The crowds which it has drawn through the decades may have changed in spectacle event but its form remains as urban monolith, a ghostly, vacant city in its own right.

Time in Words

condenCITY_66 concrete city

Ai Wei Wei “Love the Future” (爱未来)

Image courtesy from the web BBC

The detaining of artist and activist Ai Weiwei by the Chinese government earlier this week has sparked nations and citizens from around the world to demand his release. Outspoken in his views of the Chinese government, Ai's work has come to represent a national conscious, stoking awareness of human rights. The son of one of China's most revered poets, Ai himself has in his 30 year career gained a cult like notoriety with installations and works spanning media and continents.  He is well remembered for his collaboration on the Beijing Olympic stadium with Architects Herzog and de Meuron but perhaps more importantly his efforts to expose the recklessness of a government against its people upon the completion of the project. 

His recent disappearance is sure to solidify his persona and one might speculate his personal agenda in awakening the suppressed spirit of a nation. This could be his biggest work to date. 

condenCITY_65 urban green space

Green space is redefined in Seoul, with all of the environmentally conscience advantages to go with it. Packed in tight lots throughout the city are multi-story driving ranges, free from the burdens and labors landscape care and excessive water use. These diaphanous green giants, boasting lightweight space frames and strikingly green nets, are second home to thousands of golf fanatics who stand on its platform edges both day and night, gazing out into the urban-wilderness.


Seoul green space.

Lost Cities (to be rediscovered in time)

In the wake of the massive 8.9 quake and ensuing tsunami that struck Japan on Friday the 11th of March is certainly cause for contemplation. Being within a stones throw from Japan here in Korea, of one of the more seismically active regions on the planet. The incomprehensible carnage left by the trembler and tsunami, caused the north eastern Japanese coastline to be displaced by an estimated 8 feet (2.4m) and vast areas of towns and cities leveled. 

Earthquake and tsunami preparations in Japan are amongst the most stringent in the world. Tokyo's ability to survive largely in tact in the aftermath, might be testament to this. With substantial damages to be sure, the mega-city of Tokyo, considering what might have been with out such rigorous seismic standards, would have been much more serious comparatively in other parts of the world. It is stammering, for example, to think about such a quake in California and in retrospect of Japan's tragic experience, should provoke an awakening of response in other parts of the world with similar earthquake potential. 

We may look to Japan, as we have in decades past, for innovations in Architecture and perhaps the thoughtful approaches to 'details' in modern life. I consider now the future of a design profession and the creative responses to be seen in coming years, as a country rebuilds and again, as it has had to in the past, critically rediscovers and shapes the future of cities worldwide.

 

condenCITY_64 city of shadows 1.0

Yesterday I left Seoul and entered the city of shadow. Constructed entirely of its history as it was and as it remains. Bound in starkly banal newness this city stands apart. Defined by neighbors of contrast working side by side. The narrow streets recede in shadow to depths at times unknown and unseen. Light penetrates only so far to stir our imaginations. By invitation we enter and bypass the ground level activity. Blue sky gives way to encrusted corridor and each door with its cast of characters remaining as mysterious as the street below.

Roche: generations + works

Knights of Columbus Building, New Haven, Connecticut, image courtesy wiki commons

I was reminded yesterday of a conversation I had years back when reading a non-related New York Times  article featuring the achievements of modernist Architect, Kevin Roche. The divisive conversation took place in an informal design review at a former office of mine, with an ensuing discussion regarding relevant parking garages as precedent for a design commission in San Francisco, California. My colleagues at the time were flippant at the idea of considering the importance of the New Haven Veterans Memorial Coliseum and the attached parking structure, which to me represented a critical example of the tectonic and monumental (as in architecture) combined in a manner relevant even today. For my colleagues the parking structures non-glamorous, 'ugly image' was of a flatly knee-jerk response. Frankly, their non-critical "general public" position was a hollow argument (shocking to me being in a 'design' office) and enough for me to let a dead-end conversation lie flat... in any event...

The attraction of the firms 60's and 70's works, during the heyday of Roche Dinkeloo Architects, was an evident desire to extend architecture beyond site; engaging a number of their projects in urban reference both literally, perhaps in the surreal spectacle in the forms they created and clearly too, in methods embracing delicate cultural and functional identities of the time, revealed through 'details' in their work.

Mr. Roche was once quoted as saying in an interview,  a "highway scale" was influential in a number of their projects and evidently so in the New Haven Coliseum. It was an innovative project that overcame a high water table site constraint by relocating the parking program to the emblematic elevated position for which the Architecture became known for.  (Which, by the way, was unfortunately demolished in 2007. Limited public funding had let the building deteriorate to the point of New Havens refusal to sufficiently fund and refurbish the aging structure). More can be read about the work of Kevin Roche and John Dinkeloo in a Kevin Roche interview on Archinect.       

I have never known Mr. Roche in person although, I feel as though I do, having befriended his daughter Alice in graduate school at Berkeley. Testament (and compliments) to thought filled generations and visions at polar opposites at a spectrum of scales.

condenCITY_63 Urban Factories

A new exhibition in New York at the Skyscraper Museum titled 'Vertical Urban Factory' recently peaked my interest as I examine similar conditions here in Seoul with regards to shifting industrial zones in the city (and what is ultimately left behind as industry relocates to the urban periphery). There is a good article at the Architects Newspaper that reviews the NYC exhibition and brings to light conditions today and more pointedly through the twentieth century of factories in the urban center.  

Not surprisingly is the differences between factories and districts of industry in Seoul in contrast to the western equivalent which has revealed more integral forms in aging city-scapes. In Seoul, the integration is more complex perhaps and regarded with less long term value and questionable overall contributions to the urban fabric. The social components of such conditions are still undeniable as workers and supporting  businesses shape the city in ways unique to industrial process. 

With the displacement of industry anywhere and factories that remain, choices persist as these places rest idle. 

condenCITY_62 double seoul

Calvino's Seoul

"Cities, like dreams, are made of desires and fears, even if the thread of their discourse is secret, their rules are absurd, their perspectives deceitful, and everything conceals something else."


-Italo Calvino, Invisible Cities

condenCITY_61 city-double : double-city

Mullae dong in Seoul has become an artists enclave over the past decade. To begin THIS decade we examine two communities in Mullae, having become a double entity, side-by-side;  the industry and artist communities of Seoul.

Mullae-dong in Yeongdongpo-gu is one of the few remaining industrial areas within the center of the city.  At the first half of the 20th century, industry took root in Seoul with modernization and production needs (during the Colonial period) and population induced, extended city limits. Today, industry has been pushed to outer city limits with speculative rezoning, leaving vacancies and voids in the industrial city-scape. By 1999, displaced artists of the Hongik area began to take over the vacant spaces of Mullae-dong, occupying the upper levels of what were once industrial offices and work spaces within non-descript, concrete slab structures. A loosely formed community began to emerge and what has now been collectively realized as Mullae Artists Village. 


Now, with the last remaining metal and machine shops at street level, both artists and artisans have established a mutually beneficial common ground. A blossoming 'double' which may even overcome short sided speculations to redevelop this culturally significant area.