November 2011 Archives

THE ROOM

Understanding the room only as a way to reflect or collect a wider world, the stage set of a cinema studio appears as a highly potential condense universe. By definition a stage set is a simulation of reality, a fake truth inhabited as if it was part of our world. But a zoom out from the scene being shot directly reveals an hyper controlled situation, where only what the lens sees is rendered, the rest is built in the audience's imagination. Very much in the same way the Barcelona Pavilion's rare photographs give us a fragmented History, the stage set creates a fake truth that will eventually be accepted by an audience. 

Furthermore, the stage set is an architecturally constructed space which is made of both real and fake elements, the chair and the city have the same objective but are physically different. Therefore this ambiguous architectural plan is never experienced as a whole, it's only perceived through the lens of the camera and as a lived space, implying the possibility of a constant manipulation of the perceived world versus the actual space. 

So, if the Barcelona pavilion is the room within the movie, it should never exist as a finished and total piece of architecture, the pavilion is only the collection of fragments which, because we all have it as a commonly accepted image in our mind, only has to create the idea of the pavilion, imagination will do the rest.

The stage set is therefore both the container of selected fragments of the pavilion, truthful architectural modules, and the process through which it's rendered in the movie: the director, actors, camera man, editor, writer, etc...

THE UNIVERSE

Reality to Fiction:

The past is a constant juxtaposition of events from which Historians's Subjectivity creates our perceived Objective History. The reality of human life and actions is rendered in a collection of fragments arranged in a certain way to create our past, the Editing of our ancestor's action defines our new past, real facts have become fictional truths.

Fiction to Fiction:

If the room is the stage set it's implied that the film maker is not shooting a movie of the entire History, he was selective in the framing of his story and movie. Therefore Historical facts were edited, implying that in the endless lava of information from the past only a serie of small fragments were collected and arranged in order to make the movie. Through this editing process the director is able to conduct a team of actors and technicians who will shoot a "new reality". This process has brought the fictional truths we live in into a constructed reality printed on a pellicule. 

Fiction to Reality:

Very much in the same way the two first editing process have been selective the movie Editor will have to navigate, cut, paste and inverse all the scene shot by the director in order to create a coherent story that will be  presented to a audience. Once again this editing process will defined a new story or History, a new commonly accepted History which brings back the fictional world into the real universe of the theatre and the city.

Untitled from antoine vaxelaire on Vimeo.

Jurors

Maria's propositions/questions of developing a non-architectural project based on Mis-Information + the possible investigation of the "place" major figures (Mies/Corb) have in the academic field, how to question and critique it? And finally questioning if the issue is "architectural", in terms of it's physicality, and wether the figures (Mies) could be used to ground the debate? 

Javier questioning if Mies ever had a sort of Manifesto arguing Beauty is a objective criteria for architecture? He also emphasised the idea of Mis-read History with the story of a fictional text that became a "Truth", thus arising the major issue Fiction VS Truth!

Ann-Sofi started with the very difficult question WHY? I was doing this. And also opened the discussion on the role of Media in the architectural discourse, which is a great one! And it started Charles and his suggestion that fiction should be the beginning of the argument/project. Which means the movie (director, characters, producer, etc...) is the tools with which I could interrogate the Mis-reading issue, implying that Fiction is not any more a representational tool but rather a research one. That implies a much more refined understanding of the Media/Format used to present the idea/project. Suggesting the counter point of historical layers with fictional layers.

Natasha pointed out the division of three Truths: the TRIAL truth, where the situation implies there is such a thing as the Absolute Truth. The MOVIE truth, opening the trial to the Media World and the debate of MEDIA/the need of an audience, as well as fictional realities.

And finally ANTOINE's truth...

Defendant

Far from being a truth but I would like to move forwards with three words/tools:  

Mis-Reading / Fiction / Truth.

These tools would be used to critique/question the historical understanding of architecture, what are the next steps of Bonta's proposition of filters? Arguing that we've reach a point where mis-readings are as valuable as "reality", implying Fiction and Truth become the same thing (?). Taking the idea of Mis-read history to start a fictional story (a movie?) that would insert a fake Truth into the world, using Media as the main tool (magazines). The Media as a way to transmit the argument would question its role but more importantly the audience it touches, and it's need for a criminal/hero? (As Ann-Sofi suggested with Michael Jackson's Trial!)