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.