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“The past can be seized only as an image which flashes up at the instant when it can be recognized and is never seen again.�

Walter Benjamin, On the Concept of History

GRASPING AT A LIMINAL

CONCIOUSNESS If the topic on which I hope to speak is artifact, I find myself naturally drawn to the fragmented way in which we experience and remember our lives. We do not remember most of the information, both temporal and spiritual, that we must process on any given day. In order to avoid overstimulation, we simply discard much of that stimuli as soon as it has been interpreted.

More interesting to me however, is the way in which the information that remains is handled. How does the brain parse how long certain information will stay relevant? Why do the discrete memories of space that stick with us always seem so arbitrary? In myself I often find that these memories intersect with incongruous environmental conditions. A small moment in a context that is in and of itself an artifact of some idiosyncrasy in either design or construction. It is the very peculiarity of these spaces and environments that makes them emotionally significant. We spend most of our days discarding information, especially spacial information for the very fact that it makes sense.

We are familiar

with most types of space by the time we are adults and the spaces we inhabit regularly are intuitively understood and can be navigated without conscious thought.

Conversely, I believe the very reason we remember the bizarre is because they defy the framework in which we categorize and understand space. We are forced to pay special attention to navigate in the moment and that extra attention results in us noticing the subtle beauty that constantly surrounds us. This glint of discovery, a purely private and personal experience, in turn adds an emotional intensity to those moments. Poetic, and beautiful because they exist at the boundaries, and because their impact cannot be communicated, their spatiality cannot be shared, the only way to experience them is through the process of individual discovery. That too, that ephemeral quality, dependent

on consciousness, time, place and emotion belies their power.

Because there is no tangible object or idea to impart these memories exist outside of the space we can rationalize. In this way, they are artifacts. Artifacts of experience, memory, space and most importantly, of an unquantifiable, irreproducible conscious state.

In the same way that memory serves as artifact of emotion, light poles and other public message boards serve as stores of information. At any given moment only a small slice of the total informational wealth present at these sites is accessible, the rest being delineated by time to an unrecoverable space.

Interestingly, in this case, we are aware of the exact volume of information that has been lost. Nails, tacks and staples are the physical

remainders of information that was and no longer is. Importantly, the way we experience these sites differs significantly from the way we compartmentalize memory. Where memory is composed of small, discrete images that are only connected by the thread of our conscious experience, the artifact information of public posting sites is effectively constant. The information available to read is different at any given moment but the core value of said information is always the same.

Furthermore, because the remnants allude to meaning and do not hold any meaning in and of themselves, the accumulation of fasteners hold a net constant value of information. If memory reveals itself as an object largely unlocated in an expanse, then information sites are vast fields containing the barest traces of tangible material.

predilection towards art and our fascination with the poetic. Maybe as a way of communicating the emotional ‘meat’ of our experience as shorthand for the true depth: maybe as a way to contextualize our own experience. Whatever the case, I can feel within myself, threads connecting these ideas elsewhere. With luck, further experience will lead back to this work, hopefully with a deeper insight.

photo: ari bible

Regardless of the specific ways these phenomena manifest themselves, they both speak to the contemporary nature of information, both emotional and environmental. In any given instant we may have access to the full, specific truths of that moment, but as soon as we are removed from that experience, that ability is lost.

I worry that this exploration has become obtuse, to the point that I may not even fully understand it. I do, however, believe that this inherent inability to accurately retain and convey information, speaks, at least in part to our human

until then.

“We do not dislike everything that shines, but we do prefer a pensive luster to a shallow brilliance, a murky light that, whether in a stone or an artifact, bespeaks a sheen of antiquity. . . the words denoting this glow describe a polish that comes from being touched over and over again, a sheen produced by the oils that naturally permeate an object over long years of handling -which is to say grime”

Jun’ichiro Tanizaki, In Praise of Shadows

Pictographs barely differentiate themselves from the lichen with whom they share rock.

Almost imperceptible. But it’s not really articulation or legibility that matters here, because the proof of human life is communicated nonetheless.

Seen hundreds of years later, we still know it marks some kind of significance. Trivial or sacred we don’t know, but we do understand the presence of human life.

Rather than a transfer of knowledge, communication has found greater truth in its near-ultimate reduction.

An exchange of what makes - and always has made us human.

“There is something basically internal about warmth, probably because we associate it with the warmth generated within our own bodies.

Warmth is what’s alive at the very core of things. A fire and the sun also generate heat inside of themselves.

We feel their heat not so much warming our skin as penetrating into the very center of our being�

Lisa Heschong, Thermal Delight in Architecture

I LOVE SOME MATERIALS AND NOT OTHERS

To enclose a volume, to open up a space you need, well, something.

Materials stand up, + fall down.

They’re heavy, they break, they’re beautiful, ugly, comforting, toxic, familiar, powerful. And being human, we come to attach certain thoughts to corresponding materials. We trust certain pieces of the world to enter (even define) our homes. There’s a strong sense of history, emotion, and of value in our encounters with the makeup of our built world.

However distant, we remember the stone ruins of ancient Greece and thus still find monumentality in a modern building of the same material. We’ve seen and heard of the humble + warm wood cottages of Central Europe, or perhaps of quiet Japanese constructions this is enough to perpetuate the prevalence of wood in our homes today.

photo: andreas feininger

Our encounters with the world are our encounters with materials. We cannot avoid touching them or smelling them or breathing in the air they contain. There’s not much more of a chance at escape for our minds; even if less immediately obvious, it can’t be denied that the stuff we surround ourselves with will affect our minds and emotions.

Throughout architectural history is the story of technological advancements, which stemmed material advancements. Building technologies evolved to reach larger spans with less intensive labor and more efficiency in cost.

The history of architecture could be read as one of learning to enclose more and more space with less and less material. As much as this would seem to paint a forward-minded picture, our attention has never been taken off what we’re leaving behind. The Greeks glorified + eternalized their vernacular wood constructions in stone temples: now-obsolete triglyphs recall a functionally-essential ancestor in wood post-and-beam structures.

And thus, as material technologies have evolved, representations of materials have become increasingly removed from the

originals. For instance, the streets of Copenhagen are lined with 19th century apartments built of brick and covered with plaster to best imitate Roman buildings themselves an attempt in stone to look like the vernacular wood construction of ancient Greece.

Materials representing materials representing materials. Today, we bypass this sort of complex layering: we might now simply force the texture of wood into a piece of injection-molded plastic.

photo: andreas feininger

Especially in its modern occurrences, it’s easy to see this sort of representation as false or anti-truth. And ultimately, things like brick veneer try their very hardest to convince us that they are solid brick. Seams are hidden and corners take real bricks hostage in order to minimize the risk of being caught in their secret. Perhaps

it’s the secrecy that makes us think of brick veneer as “fake”, but lets ancient Greek builders get away with building stone temples to look like wooden ones. The Greeks never hid the fact that their temples were representational - in fact they highlighted it by adding color and intricate relief in the spaces between the “beams”. They still let us see the true structural system by which the building stands: columns are no longer made of singular long pieces but of several stones stacked, one upon the other. When a building has something to hide, it will blatantly lie to us. In the case of plastic-thatlooks-like-wood, there is an entire absence of truth. Plastic is forced to stand in for wood, to be anything other than itself. Wood is denied an existence at all, but it’s appeal is exploited. A cruel dynamic which leaves neither party with any advantage, in fact which actively diminishes the true nature of each.

Of course, we do artificially represent one material with another, and we practically always have. As much as the stand-ins can fall short, they will at least, in some way get us somewhere in our attempts to build the spaces we dream of. Beyond the lies, representation in material can also be a window into the builders, occupants, people who specify it, prefer it or wield it. The phenomenon of replicating one material

in another, strangely, gives additional legitimacy to the material represented, the material made obsolete by the nature of this process. This is because the process of mimicry forces us to ask “why?”. The search for an answer will inevitably lead us towards the socio-cultural significance of the absent material. What kind of shared cultural love for wood, or brick, or stone makes us want to hold on to these materials in anyway we can, even if only visually?

Is an exclusively visual presence enough? Is the love, the remembered sensory experience, the memory - greater than truth itself? If we can still have the ideas of these materials we hold so dear, does it matter if they become completely removed from our environment?

It is hard not to leave these thoughts with the question: “does it matter?”. Maybe there’s insight to be found in a study the physiological or neurological implications of real and synthetic architecture. Maybe the answer, much like material stand-ins, lies in a self-conscious inquiry into our values. Should we insist, as human beings, we value purity and truth over things like cost, ease, performance?

Or do we say that as long as a

building’s surface can convince us, why shouldn’t we enjoy the benefits of advancing architectural technologies? Does it matter?

photo: tegel i europa

Does it matter?

Is this just a sort of material-politics?

Doesn’t it matter?

“How we experience memory sometimes, it’s not linear. We’re not telling the stories to ourselves, we know the story, we’re just seeing it in flashes overlaid.”

Frank Ocean, to the New York Times.

Popularized in its 1890 appearance in Joseph Jacobs’ English Fairy Tales, the story of the Three Little Pigs has embedded itself as a classic in Western culture.

The story + the morals it seeks to impart are by nature architectural, based in material capacities + connotations. The bricklayer is able to resist laziness, he invests more time + money, he chooses his work over the wasteful entertainment that captures his brothers.

It is no surprise that we find this story emerge with industrialization + urbanization in England. Beyond championing the dedicated laborer, the story finds a place for the brick in cultural life - a necessary venture for a society leaving rural life and trying to find a home in the cramped, brick-lined streets of the industrial city.

What equivalent will arise in our age? What cultural motif will represent say, wood-textured vinyl?

Will this tale tell of an emerging hero, one who reflects evolving social + cultural values?

Or will it tell of a villain who, in hyperfunctionalist apathy, contently lies to the sensory human?

An aside: Uncertainty

photo: ari bible

It’s crucially important to remind oneself that it is acceptable to move and inhabit without full understanding.

In design specifically, caught between an art and a science, there is a temptation to see our work as quantifiable; something that can be studied, known and accurately applied.

This is not the case.

The re

The re

is no

there only exists is present and

is no

trut what real.

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trut

In many cases, both an argument and it’s counter are equally valid.

The re

is no

Don’t forget to leave space for uncertainty, meaningful attempt in spite of unknowables, and continued reevaluation of one’s beliefs.

h,

The re

is no

trut trut

h, h

BR_CKS zine is. . . the temporal zine

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