A Wake: I am in the Interzone

a wake: I am in the Interzone

Daniel Lomholt-Welch & Lewis Murray

Tangier Zones, Semester 2

epigraph

“Let the setting be Tangier. But of course not the city of Tangier that you know. This is another that merely resembles it. A Tangier parallel to the one you consider real. But, mind you, being parallel doesn’t mean it is fictitious.

Let us agree from the outset that the binary of reality and fiction depends entirely on where you’re looking from.”

Said Hjiouij, Kafka in Tangier

Mohammed

Perceiving Tangier through an investigation of William Burroughs’ dreamlike writing and Brion Gysin’s technique of cut-ups, the city manifests itself as a parallel, as an other. This thronging sea of relations between, across, and through the urban fabric become permutations of Tangier’s material reality; a pin-cushion of imperial flags, camouflaged and flecked with the wear of its fluctuating history. The undertones of colonialism reverberate in its streets, in its language, in its law.

The opressive policies of Mohamed VI, the king of Morocco, perpetuate this reverberation. The foreign colonial powers have been replaced by a nativeone,concentratingpowerintothesingular. The actions of the government encroach on societal freedoms, create severe environmental issues, and beset the population of modern-day Morocco with trenchant corruption.

Tangier’s siting at a confluence of narratives is exemplified in the Petit Socco, a tightly bound square which played host to a multitude of international institutions during the mid-20th century. Western nation’s legations, post offices and hotels rose high above the street, before crumblinginthewakeoftheInternationalZone’s collapse in 1956. The Petit Socco exemplifies the technique of the cut up, the rapid shuttling of one to another.

A manipulated legal framework provides an opportunity to reclaim territory in a move against the zeitgeist. This series of chance operations becomes a form of cut-ups that projects back onto itself simultaneously. Opportunistic architectural interventions cloak themselves in the historic narratives present in the Petit Socco, addressing a wide range of issues that affect modern society in Morocco.

Hidden in plain sight, the architectures play with their histories, revealing and concealing certain aspects via a series of exposed seams. Collectively, they form the Interzone.

Host and guest switch roles with increasing acceleration, the parasitic visitor corrupting the former only then to be corrupted themselves.

The architectures operate in the intersections, folds, convolutions. Occupying buildings within tightly controlled incisions, they blend with the existing function below while gaining the horizon above. The historic seeping of parasite into host generates a novel architecture by way of palimpsest. It draws in, extracts, and imitates its architectural setting.

Bolstered by their endemic presence across the city, the parasites begin to embed themselves in aural,visualandtextualformsofrepresentation. The liminal threshold of entity and relation buckles. Using representation as a conduit to creation, the parasites embed themselves in the urban fabric of their conception – Chambers Street. The fleeting encounters across it instigate further proliferation, taking root both in the studio and in public space.

note on the exhibition

due to the nature of the work produced, it has been presented in multiple sites across the ESALA campus.

the main body of work is exhibited in the Tangier Zones studio on the third floor of 7/8 Chambers Street, while the remainder is being displayed in the Gap Gallery at Minto House.

this portfolio documents the entire body of work which is being submitted.

as a document of crossing, it can be read from front to back, and from back to front.

acknowledgements

Firstly, we would like to thank Dr. Ana Bonet Miro and Samer Wanan for their guidance with the project. It has been a pleasure to work with them in the studio, and we value their input greatly.

Secondly, we would like to thank our peers for creating a strong studio-culture, which has been fantastic to be a part of.

Finally, we would like to thank our families for their support throughout our architectural education.

We could not have done it without you.

Ia wake: I am in the Interzone

celestial arabesques rain upon the cobbles and thrones pelt, a skin masquerading dominion, the greed grins snarls berates its litter awash the streets melt into another, swept into the sky all and none spoke cried softly the word that has betrayed again, plurality reigns, it is true

a wake: I am in the Interzone

Tangier’s visceral history of contestation has resulted in the fracturing of the city’s genus loci from a singular entity into plural spectres of spirit. By investigating these narrative strands, opportunities to create a counternarrative begin to form, seeking to reconvene these spectres.

The relations of these agents to one another shift in a constant state of flux, informing a reading of the city and its urban spaces. This fluidity of mask and veil is present in the architecture and its relations.

Petit Socco

The Petit Socco, 1970s, showing an increased prominence of the native language, Arabic, compared to the 1940s

nerve centre

shudders the frame, shackles the heart, respite denied with brutal consideration. masks slip and veils flutter above paternal ornament secretes scarlet whispers, change revolution mutiny they assert to what they know, another is yet, to be once more

nerve centre

A series of programmes take cover behind the storied facades of the four buildings that once played host to Western legations running along the Petit Socco; those of Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Great Britain.

Utilising the site’s genus loci, each of these legations forms a catalyst for an architectural response to the issues which transcend the temporal gap between the conflicted era of the International Zone and that of Mohamed VI’s severe policies.

These programmes, operating between past and present, public and private, and ground and sky, collectively form the Interzone.

insolvency and the vault

debts wracked against the wall surge like shoots through cracks, whip the back cleaving one from self, over the boundary into the embrace tender is the flight, reborn liquid again dear life sold another conspires, profit nicks the heels stumbles the never, makes worthy the lie of the land

insolvency and the vault

The grand facade of the Italian legation [now the Hotel Fuentes], once masked the nefarious deeds of Michael Mochi, the viceconsul during the Second World War. He was forced to flee after having gambled vast sums of the Italian state’s money away, as well as being in league with the Nazis.

In the 21st century trenchant corruption within the Moroccan government undermines the lives of the population, with a recent report by Transparency International claiming that bribery had become institutionalised. The majority of these bribes are in cash, as it is harder to trace than digital methods.

A digital stock market is suspended within the partially hollowed hotel, allowing both to function simultaneously. An anechoic chamber shrouds the activities of the operation from the government’s surveillance, while the rooftop occupies the horizon in an escape from the corruption below.

“I need a vault, corruption is rife outside Interzone”

cypher provocateur

proclamations sway in the breeze carried across the bay, weak tired broken, they crash against the sky falling to earth smouldering in their wake the funeral begins, to speak cry mourn the tower shall not permit blessing yesterday or tomorrow, now the voice commands

cypher provocateur

In 1943 the Spanish consul in the International Zone accused the Tangier Gazette, an independent newspaper, of peddling anti-Francoist ideals, and petitioned for its closure.

Today, press freedom is once again under threat from state power, with Mohamed VI’s government clamping down on independent media.

A free-press publishing house is shrouded inside the former Spanish legation building, a series of mashrabiyas inhabited by various elements of the editorial team. A broadcasting tower rises above the horizon to allow for the continual transmission of a free, independent media source.

acid reign

clouds gather in the square words blur promises torn, from the tower and wall on which they were emblazoned. friends in high places spit runs black over the parapet, treachery poisons streaming like veins the maze carries its cursed gift straight to the temple or worse

acid reign

Exacerbated by the Moroccan government’s nepotistic permission of phosphate extraction across the country’s south, local water sources are polluted, clouds of acid rain drifting across the whole region.

Concealed within the walls of the former legation for the Portuguese Empire, which was a major extractor of toxic materials in countries around the globe, the programme fights against an environmental hazard which threatens Morocco.

A hydrological laboratory filters rainwater through a series of channels and basins, providing a public drinking source whilst conducting research into the toxicity of rainwater in the region.

copper’s nark

blink the swarm feeds, ringing the bells above. awake asleep and none previous to utter centuries untold rumour and kin. sweat beads torn run through palms lies seethe from lips the dust of truths blackens the glittering Rock the agony it cannot exalt it cannot prevail

copper’s nark

The British government, bolstered by its presence in Gibraltar, operated an extensive intelligence network in the International Zone until its collapse. Personal freedoms held little opposition to this, and agents would routinely arrest native Moroccans to extort information at any cost.

Recent actions by the Moroccan government have once again encroached upon individual freedoms in the country, with serious state investment into surveillance and monitoring systems.

A telecommunications hub is stashed behind the facade of the former British legation, opening to the sky in order to ensure freedom of communication for individuals in the Interzone.

a moment’s rest

over the night drift the heartbeats of an eternal memory. through a cross over under worlds and within one, blanket the earth tempered to be finite. come forth the murmur the cry, the look. pale white it is encircled in her arms.

extraterritorial horizons

darkness fills the void the ascent has left right down below, pearls bleed over the iris grasping visions now and for the being it is no more. spectres flicker pass shudder they weep, sailing through endless skies, the crimson has kissed clouds, vapour mists around ankles chained no longer

extraterritorial horizons

Having provided liberty for the occupants of the Interzone, the architectures take flight in a nod to their parasitic past. They infiltrate architectures beyond the horizons they used to occupy, taking root in the consciousness of a movement that inhabits the skies.

shapes beyond form

ink-black trails across the landscape, the rover takes his shelter in its nooks, wells sustain blood thickens coagulates seeps upon land and sea flickering back to the forth master over worlds and men, the meddling hand wreaks carnage upon that beneath, that other eternal in its form

shapes beyond form

The traversal of the crossing between Edinburgh and Tangier has not been a linear one. Various currents, swells, and tides have been encountered, bringing orientation towards a multitude of horizons. These transformations are held within the process and its architecture.

“Cut

up this page you are reading and see what happens. See what I say as well as hear it.”

dream: I am in the Interzone

Descending from the skies, the architectures of the Interzone take root across the field of their conception, Edinburgh. Accelerated by their proliferation across the urban fabric of Chambers Street, they lodge themselves in facades, eaves and nooks.

dream: I am in the Interzone

in dreams of mercury the star glints an eye, the rope slips a grasp tears stream from the stars falling upon us, falling down never to reclaim it is gone, bound and loosed, not of one but of all, the haze drifts lazily on, for all.