Bianchetti_Bodies.-Between-Space-and-Desi_9783868599497

THE LOSS OF
THE BODY
42
THE LOSS OF THE BODY
For there is no ghost, there is
never any becoming- spectre
of the spirit without at least
an appearance of flesh …
For there to be a ghost,
there must be a return to
the body, but to a body that
is more abstract than ever.
Derrida, 1994 1
Frankfurt 1929, Amsterdam 1931
How many ways are there to lose the body? It can be lost in form, structure,
and measurement. There have been numerous attempts at standardisation
in which the body remains the implicit premise, frozen in its repetitive,
standardised movements. Reduced to a silhouette, weightless, unable to
act if not automatically and predictably. Reduced to nothing, to a sign, a
number, a stamp, a mugshot. The nineteenth century used judicial anthropometry
as a tool. The twentieth century continued to seek to standardise
the body in other ways. As long as we think in terms of numbers, measurements,
and standards, we still think, like it or not, in terms of incorporeal
substance.
Frankfurt 1929—the concept of the “minimum modus vivendi” 2 or “Existenzminimum”.
3 In the field of architecture, 1929 is remembered for the
repertoire of Existenzminimum plans presented in Frankfurt 4 by modernist
architects concerned with rebuilding urban space from its foundations up;
they designed images of a city in which myths were revived. Every move,
every element, reflected a “strict discipline” and “moral rule”. 5 Different
from previous efforts, this project concerning inhabited space was to be