Your Say

Intro:I thought I had nothing to say, both in memory and experience. It turns out, it doesn’t matter what I say, as long as I start something. We, as characters in anonymous stories, are continu-ally segregated into single entities through our designed spaces.

This influence, governs our ability to observe, listen and acknowledge the experiences of others by sharing in collective expression with them. I will challenge what I per-ceive these conventions to be.

Chris Herman S3156578

Contents. More Human Than Human (“The Mutant Body of Architecture” Georges Teyssot)

. Residual & Rebirth (Architecture from the Outside: Essays on Virtual and Real Space. Kim Armitage and Paul Dash)

. Material For Interpretation (Site-Writing; The Architecture of Art Criticism –Jane Rendell)

. Interaction 2.0 (Moments of seperation: Gender, (not so remote) relationships, and the cell phone. Lockley,E & Yates, S.)

. (Hi)StoryOf Relationships (On How Relationships develop via web blogs: a co-constructed narrative. Efimova, L & Lassoued, A)

Does this mean that someday the Conquest of the body will be won? Or has this al-ready been achieved with the realisation of our inherent affinity with objects and place?The essay proposes a future scenario in which identities can be projected robot bodies in distant dan-gerous places, in effect creating synthetic senses that let allow experiences that would generally be invisible to us as individuals, but will this still stand as embodied space? Furthermore, do these memo-ries and stories constitute as real ones or are they simply another vicarious fantasy in the virtual realm?Technology as harm is introduced and briefly explored; the distinction that Teyssot makes is perhaps the perceived link between primitive and civilized. While the word processer and flight simulator allow process streamlining and safety for the ‘betterment of mankind’ the boundaries are blurred in terms of displace-ment of experience and intrinsic, tangible memory. I leave this article by questioning the value of stories and memories in a realm that could quite possibly become more human than human, and how this vicari-ous experience impacts our real life social anxieties and adds weight to the everyday mundane routine.

MORE HUMAN THAN HUMAN

“Space is open to how people live in it. Space is the

ongoing possibility of a different inhabitation.”

The text discusses the common appropriation of existing spaces for a new life a queer spaces and the effects that converting a design that originally functioned for a very differ-ent purpose (residual spaces) to one that is now meant to have a re-birth in relevance. The concept that space or the “closet” within the gay community extends far and wide into the community, the closet is perhaps the community itself both in physi-cal land mass (the author refers to these areas as ‘ghettos’) and cultural belief system.Why is this some of the most intense pleasure that some people experience (both pleas-ure of consumption and interaction) conscious or not? Again this is a pleasure of cy-berspace, allowing the possibility of disturbing the users regular everyday identity.

RESIDUAL & REBIRTH

YOU

AR

E THE C

OLLEC

TIVE, WH

AT DO

YOU

SEE?

We explore the idea that the interpreter can never be disinterested or neutral and that in fact will forev-er be caught up with the “entanglement in inter subjective spaces of desire, projection and identification”In depth Rendell explores the space and relationships between object and subject. Schreyach is quoted in the text as arguing that self-reflective criticism is accepted as norm and acknowledged as the standard ‘frame’ in which all critique should be written. On the other hand critical analysis of something as subjec-tive as art or experience is missing the entire point of the artistic and creative process by simply boiling it all down to evidence based assumptions and facts. My individual occupations have been removed from my physical person. I have yet to be present when the viewer experiences the writing or space I have cre-ated. Similar to Freud’ s spatial positions for the analytic setting, my dis-embodiment has allowed for the space and therefore the interpretation to not be tainted by transference and freeing up any prior immedi-ate associations. At this point, I move away from the remoteness as the driver for further occupations and I move into the realm of creating embodied spaces that are intrinsically linked to myself, in the aim that my presence will provoke what Freud painstakingly avoided, giving the patient ‘material for interpretation”.

MATERIAL FOR INTERPRETATION

DR

AW

THE FLESH

Although not a new concept, we address the “actual” spatial remoteness of people who are physi-cally, socially and culturally very close. Lockley & Yates refer to studies undertaken by Katz & Aarkhus to frame the motivation of “perpetual contact”, the use of mobile phones as integral to the management of the users social networks and peers. They also mention the emergence of a new social conduct and guidelines in which these networks and media forms can be utilised and what is acceptable on them.“One of the consistent themes In this research has been the assertion that the mobile phone brings with it “perpetual contact” (Katz & Aakhus,2002). This is the claim that the person with a mobile phone is consistently open to interaction-much as face-to-face interaction. But in this case the users are open to a remote interaction via telecommunications medium………..the re-moteness is therefore one of not being in the same physical space at that specific moment”The text goes further to analyse studies undertaken of the content of male to male specific tex-ting, female to female and mixed gender interactions by classifying the use of sarcasm, emoti-cons, support, affection and swearing (naming merely a few) to classify base archetypal refer-ence points. As such, using the phone to maintain a remote relationship, or at least an occasional spatial remoteness, “will have impacts on the ongoing local relationship that will need to be managed.”

INTERACTION 2.0

Blogs often are referred to as quick think-ing spaces, the authors argue that they are infact slow thinking spaces within which there lies an opportunity to learn, go away and process the information and return (perhaps even respond) in ones own time

WHERE AM I?

In this text Efimova and Lassoued attempt to map and establish a co-constructed narrative between their ini-tial contact online to further peer to peer learning that they employed later via advancing cyber technologiesBlogs often are referred to as quick thinking spaces, the authors argue that they are in fact slow thinking spaces within which there lies an opportunity to learn, go away and-process the information and return (perhaps even respond) in ones own time.By drawing on their own experience, the authors emphasize the concept and benefits of peer-to-peer learn-ing and the collaboration that can be automatically created as comments and feedback are encouraged. This is indeed the nature of the blogging and cyber environment; “When you blog nobody knows you are novice”. The authors further discuss this idea in terms of the “micro-celebrity effect” caused by the removal of the immediate ‘facial’ conversation means within a public virtual realm, they term the phrase “familiar strangers (Milgram,1977)” . I found the phrase “asymmetrical relationships formed via blogging” very striking as I hadn’t visualized this kind of virtual relationship mapping before. In some depth the text discusses how a “network of linked blogs, whom to speak with” can impact the traffic and perceived importance of one blog over the other, in a sea of intellectual free written offerings. Further empowering the “micro celebrity” previously noted.

(Hi)STORY OF RELATIONSHIPS

The residue of my virtual occupations &experiences are kept on hand until the user creates new experi-ences or comments of their own, which in turn will be discarded as new interactions are formed around the banality of my subject matter. I propose that my embodiment of that virtual space grows strong-er after the original posts are erased. The interactions initiated prolific and enthusiastic argument and so through these continuing reactionary posts I am still vicariously existing within that cyberspace.Random phone calls were made and recorded to share with strangers the happenings of my day and question their individual experiences. This is as response to question the social norms that we would normally associate with the telephone as a communication tool. The assumption is generally that we know the person on the other end of the line, at least to the extent that an assumption can be made for the reason of the call, I ask what hap-pens when it is used as a tool for connecting strangers. Through voice recording I will acknowledge my thoughts and interactions with strangers in space so as those surrounding me are aware that I am narrating a story as it happens. It will be my story as I encounter the city and as I experience it and others. By responding to my sur-rounds as they occur I am allowing others to be participants and partially dictate my experience. The aim is to comment on Leders expression of vicarious experience through cyborg extensions of the body. The physical

SUMMARY (WHAT I KNOW)

SUMMARYextension between the individual and the experience is my person as the fluidity affords immediate interaction.After a successful mapping experience of urban storytelling on my own I realized that perhaps it was not the story that I was reading that was important but the existence of stories and ‘fairytales’ around me that could be the point of interest. Post Wismar I visited the Guggenheim Berlin’s current video art display. Cao Fei documents the existence of and scratches beneath the surface in the lives of factory workers at the Osram production factory in Guangzhou China. Immediately the mechanization, the beauty of blown glass, the preci-sion of the metallic sounds and the creation of light is the story, but as the film continues we come to see that in fact the tales of the lives that exist within the those walls hold the body of the stories the film is concerned about and it is the people within and their experiences everyday that are the rich subject matter. The urban space and design brings us together for collective experiences while at the same time continually segre-gating us into single bodies, this shapes our own urban stories and memories both singly and collectively.Later tests revolved around direct contact with the participant and attempted to form a narrative through interaction and play.

How can you influencethe experience of others?