alpbacher architekturgespräche 2003 - ATP

the alpbach lecture 2003 >
scapes, which may appear beautiful but are also terrifying.The beauty has a
certain darkness which is called the sublime - a concept that came about in
the nineteenth century when the language of the absolute truth of beauty was
questioned.There was no longer an absolute truth to beauty as there is now
no longer an absolute truth to language. Perhaps one is no longer even able
to express the sublime or to capture the edge experience of Friedrich.
And, if what we have done is to suggest a continuity from today back to Casper
David Friedrich, there is another continuity that is at work. It is the story of
Ulysses and the sirens.This is a story of beauty luring something to tragedy.The
sirens sing a beautiful song in an attempt to seduce Ulysses and pull him to his
death on the rocks - just as they had done with countless sailors before. But
Ulysses as a human being tricks the sirens and remains alive. Ulysses was not
passive allowing the song to draw him to his death.Today media is the siren
song. Media induces the passivity that brings us to nullity.What Ulysses did was
to act - he used his own ingenuity to trick the sirens.The monument should
be seen as another example of the possibility of us acting and not remaining
passive to the song of media. For media has not just created a world in which
we are passive but also made passivity a priority. In the USA,Arnold Schwarzenegger
is running for Governor but although he is merely a product of media
he is the favorite to win precisely because of his high media profile.When the
media covers another candidate (who may have something to say) there are
three cameras but when Schwarzenegger is there playing basketball with some
kids there are 500.Terminator 2, 3 and 4 are examples of passivity.We do not
have to do anything, just sit there. How many Terminators do we have to see
before we are ourselves terminated? Because of its weak sign system, the
Memorial requires the activity again of mind and body - it reintegrates those
things that the media has disabled. But if the media has disabled our bodies
and turned us into mere seeing heads, the aim of the Memorial is to reintegrate
the seeing, the thinking, and the body and cause some sort of active
response. Just as the psychoanalyst, who is the opposite of the media, becomes
passive and makes the patient active, we architects are psychoanalysts of body
and mind. Unlike the media but like the psychoanalyst we can produce an
activity of mind, body, and eye. And this means that architecture is one of the
most important disciplines in today’s world. It also explains why many philosophers,
social scientists, and others are fascinated by architecture. Everywhere
I go there are people who are interested in architecture.There never has been
more media attention as that which covered the World Trade Center competition
with which we were involved.Architecture may always have appeared in
newspapers and on television in Germany, Italy, and Spain, but it has now even
reached our "primitive” culture, appearing in the pages of the New York Times.
I believe that architecture will again become a media which causes activity. I say
to teachers and architects and most of all, to students that there has been a
revolution and a discontinuity and that you are all the beneficiaries of this. My
generation and even the generation after me are not capable of understanding
this, but you are the Computer Generation, the Media Generation, the
DNA Generation.You understand. Just as you cannot play football when you
are fifty and cannot play great music by taking up the piano at fifty, you have to
start young. I was born again at fifty, but even I have not got it because I do not
know the rhythms of the music you dance to or of the computers that you
play on. I cannot work a computer or send an email. My son runs instant
messaging and looks at me as if I’m a troglodyte. I am the message from Mr.
Continuity. I represent the past so you do not have to worry about me. My
message is the siren song to activate you not to become passive. I represent
the old passivity because nothing that my colleagues or I will ever do will
resonate today.What is important is what you do.
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