Anthony Gill

This final week of the lecture series, Anthony Gill, of Anthony Gill Architects spoke to us about his practice as a designer, about some of his projects including restraints Berta, Vine and his home in Sydney. This lecture was particular interesting because it discussed ideas that are not brought in other aspects of the course, such as working with real money, time and council restrictions that can affect the design.

The first project he talked about was a restaurant in the city called Berta. The location of this project was on the bottom level of a re-developed warehouse and is on a quite, abandon laneway in Elizabeth Street and Liverpool Street. The client had more money than the above project and wanted to create an open feel for the restaurant and incorporate the laneway witch was previously not engaged with and the city of Sydney recognized it needed to be rejuvenated. One of the challenges was that with this space was it had a 15-meter narrow entranceway witch made it an awkward space for function – which a restaurant so heavily relies on.  However this was used as a transition space between inside and outside.

Anthony Gill used strategic shelving that was used as a divider between the kitchen and dining area but also used for storage for wine and other objects that needed to be displayed but also stored. This allowed for them to be accessed from both sides, by waiters in the dining areas and my chefs in the kitchen. These shelves allowed transparency to be created throughout the space, but still create separate spaces, and its allows for people to see through the separated areas. This was an important aspect in the design as it allowed customers to be aware of the kitchen and that there food being freshly prepared. And creates a theatre in the ritual of dining. Another element of transparency that was created was that wire mesh was used as a way of separating and dividing the space into usable areas and created a ‘working wall’.

The building creates a series of unforseen changes through the rear windows that open the building up to look at the dilapidated view of the street frames by the windows. The council restrictions came into the design, as originally Anthony wanted to open up the restaurant into the street as outdoor seating, however the council would not allow this (although he told us the council had reviewed the site and was inconsideration to be open for the restaurants use). By the addition of the two oversized windows he felt bright as much of the outside, inside as possible.

The final project he talked about was his own home in the Harry Sidler building in Pots Point, Sydney. This design came about when he and his wife decided they needed more space, yet wanted to keep there apartment. His apartment was a small space, yet through using design well he was able to create enough space for his family. The space he created was through joinery, similar to Berta. Essentially what we wanted to create for the space was more privacy, more light and more storage.

Through the use of book shelves he was able to divide the apartment into different areas, such as the kitchen and living room – yet the light would still be able to come through, and the book shelves were open cubes, again with the idea of the working wall that could be accessed from both sides. The bookshelves could run along a wall and turn from storing book, to plates and then into a pantry without allowing maximum use form the space with out separate bookshelves, which would create empty unusable spaces in-between. Budget was a factor in redesigning this space as the family were not interested in living her long term, but only saw they had a few more years in the apartment. Plywood was used because it was strong, cheap and also gave warmth in the wood texture, which broke up the geometric cubes of the bookshelves. Plywood allowed Anthony to do much of the construction himself as well and he beloved the designs needs were more important than the surface – space before surface. Another space saving section of the design was by the addition of the bed in the living room, which could be rolled into the wall under the stairs when they family were entertaining. His daughter’s bedroom upstairs also used these space saving principals. His daughters bed was build from a plywood construction which had the option of adding another plywood board into it to create a standard height desk turning to bedroom into a study for when they came to sell the apartment.

Anthony Gills designs where thought provoking and made be think how simplistic and functional design were a successful resolution for the problems that make people redesign in the first place. The lecture made be think about budget, faction and the real problems that can be solved. By thinking about materials I can think of ways that storage and simple elements can become part of the buildings construction and allow the users to make the most of a small space.

Dust Reversals - Teresa Stoppani

In this weeks lecture, Teresa Stoppani gave a talk about Dust as a medium. Her lecture was titled, ‘Dust Reversals – dusting, vacuum cleaners, (war) machines and the disappearance of the interior.’

First she began to talk about dust as literal, in that it was a previously intact object that has now been broken into fragments and disassembled into what are now small particles of dust. But also the metaphorical concept of dust.  Dust can be a way of defining the interior and exterior of a building and has a surprising way of reflecting society.

The Greek mythology of Diana portrayed her as a passive women standing in the room, but process the dust in a revolutionary way. Sophocles always depicted Diana in interiors and caves, where she has been imprisoned by her father because he beloved that he would be killed by his own grandchildren, so tried to prevent that happening.  As the myth goes, Diana is then showered in a cloud of golden dust and became pregnant. Eventually her children kill her father, and Diana later became pregnant again and was locked up again and remains a passive and exasperated and the interior domestic space becomes her prison. Diana was a symbol of chastity and the golden cloud of dust, was in fact sperm.

There were many depictions of Diana, which were painted over time. In 1530 she was depicted in a similar way and the gold dust hung above her ready to fall into her lap and pregnant her. Titian painted two versions of Diana. In the first the gold dust is beginning to fall onto Diana and cupid is present in the image, dodging the dust as it falls onto Diana. In the second painting he cupid was replaced by a maid – possibly to show the first time she was lock up in a cave and the second was in a domestic situation hence the maid. In 1621, Artemisia Gentileschi painted a version as well continuing in a similar fashion.

In 1908 the depiction of Diana began to change. She changed from an icon of chastity, into a luxury prostitute and the dust changed from sperm, into a currency of exchange – reflecting the modern 20^th centenary and what has happening socially.

Attitudes towards dust changed over time during the early 20^th century in Paris. Europeans denoted the familiar and comphetable and suffocating interior and makes it obvious there the obsolete and forgotten spaces are. Dust as it settles and measures history, preserving and suggesting the duration of objects in society. Therefore when dust is removed there is a lot at risk that go well beyond the notions of cleaning. The idea of undoing something defies order and control, disturbance in order and reminder of the perusable nature threatening logistic and control.

Women became in charge of making dust disappear and the vacuum became a physical extension of the body. Dusting becomes more recognized and removed from the body. As we get rid of the dirt, and eventually the body, cleaned up dust can becomes visible again and displayed if controlled and leading to the exhibition of the removed dust.

In 1956 a British artist said ‘just what is it that makes a home today different and appealing’ a collage of a 1950’s living room depicting the lady of the house naked and seductive in the corner of the room offering herself to the almost nude man while he is not interested. The disconnected couple are each living their own lives, while there is a small woman in red, plugged into a vacuumed cleaner at the top of the engulfing staircase, which is too big for her, the domestic interior disused dust. The women of the house is also fragmented in way similar to dust itself, portrayed as herself, but also in the poster on the wall and TV – each showing a different female stereo type.

In 1980 Jeff Koons created an artwork with was old vacuumed cleaners in glass cabinets. Vacuumed cleaners are now the objects collecting dust, a poster for modern ideas.

In 1993 Dyson after 50 years of research James Dyson released a vacuumed that was “the first vacuum not using suction” and does not collect and hide. It no longer used a bag to collect the dust, but after it has collected it, the vacuumed would display the dust in a clear cylinder, and a range of powerful models followed.

Durand the 1970’s though to the 1990’s dust became fashionable again. In the 1998 series of photos it showed children living in undesirable environments that were dirty and dusty.

Ecology of Occupation – Michael Trudgen

In this weeks lecture, Michael Trudgen gave a lecture on the topic of the ‘Ecology of Occupation’ and the concept that form is a verb. The lecture discussed the beginning of purpose design and user centred design and how it filtered through to modern times and where it has gone today. The Paris Design school, Ecol de Bosar in the 19^th century had very strict and traditional design rules about how buildings where designed and in very traditional ways. In 1873, ‘History of a house’ was written – which gave its readers the first insight into user centred design. It was the first time that the user had been though of first and what they want in a building – designing from the inside out (design had previously been all about the buildings façade), which reflected the French interest into social relationships.

Previously in France the ideas about architectural design were reflected well in the chateaus in the 13^th – 16^th century. With highly detailed facades yet on the inside, hardly any rooms, perhaps one instead multiple living rooms – despite the huge space they had at their disposal. These buildings had no concept of program but simply only on the look of the building.

The Italian designers at the time where interested in mathematical proportions and believed that buildings were to be seen and admired at a distance, in a way the buildings became to figure ground for the whole image. But meanwhile in the French renaissance they thought, what if the space was the figure ground and the building was the background? They began to put space first and think about what was taking place in the building – it was now an active space and no longer static. An example of this idea being explored was the development of hotels.

Hotels became a system of rooms, lodging – showing space as the foreground. The French began to cluster together their rooms in larger houses – being the birth of the apartment. The apartment was a series of programs, which could be stacked together inside on large program. These apartments were again part of the French social engagement and developments in the art of convocation.

Private houses celebrated the French idea of social interaction, and status. For example, the bed would not be for sleeping but a status symbol. The French had a habit of naming all small spaces, for example the space between the bed and wall called the Reuel – a luxury and status symbol and assigning a program to the small space.

A social revolution was happening lead by the women, becoming the hostess of the society and the dinner party began to grow and the home became the setting on where the private lives took place and space became a medium for experimentation. A new design of hotels began, a city chateau, build around a courtyard these were places where used as stabilizes, sometimes these spaces were not all obvious but little pockets and alcoves that were all different in shape and size. These alcoves lent them selves to the new idea that there was an experience to be had as one walked through the space. A series of connected rooms creating a spatial drama, making you one moment in command and feel big in the space, and small and in awe of the space.

The idea of occupation began to grow and an interest in residential spaces took off. The residential spaces created a boarder between public and private boarder – meaning space was the defining figure and showed the art of distribution and organization.  The French façade began to explain to the outside what the spaces where like on the inside, it was believed they has Italian detail, and gothic facades – and for example the large windows showed the outside that the inside was light and more enjoyable to live in.

In the 20^th century the Domino plan was discovered as a way to link the French design thinking to modernism thanks to Le Corbusier. This meant that concrete plates were stacked and then I was decided what to put on these levels, which were then wrapped, essentially wrapping the activity and holding up the interior.

During the 19^th to 21^st century the public space began to collapse. Charles Booth created one of the first socio-geographical maps of London, mapping where the poverty and disease where in the city and the results basically showed these were higher in higher populated areas. This lead to the beginning of suburbia. The idea of suburbia was to separate people and isolating them into houses with large gardens so they would have less contact as when they were in the city. This began to spread and people began to move around – metastasis. Convention that people can take on a space is important to how the spaces are modified, and the buildings again became an organism.

There a few examples of how program has been re introduced into design are from the World Expo shows. The 1970 Osaka Pavilion was a radical design, constructed by texture and designed to be a building that people could go into the building and design his or her own experience, an active space.  The Roden Crater by James Turrell is another example of ecology of space was cosmic the concept of the design was centred on the idea that your thoughts and ideas could inhabit space with you, where you where to see yourself observing eternity. 

The 2002 World Expo in Switzerland showed off ‘Blur’ a structure, which was created through water mist. The whole space took minutes to create and then disappear again after the vapour fell. And once more, form was a verb.

Akasegawa Genpei

In this weeks lecture the artist Akasegawa Genpei and his contribution of Tomosons. Akasegawa, was bourn in 1937 in Yokohama, Japan. His early work during the 1950’s and 1960’s was involved in the Neo-Dada movement, which was an audio and visual art similar to previous Dada work stemming from Pop art. He printed a 1000 Yen note as an artwork however this broke laws of  money laundering and was sentenced to gaol. When he was released from gaol he then did a follow up artwork – finding a loophole in the law and printed a zero Yen note.

A few years later he noticed a staircase leading up the side of a wall, along, and down again – leading nowhere. After passing it several times he noticed that the banister had been replaced. Akasegawa noticed that someone had been looking after and maintaining this pointless staircase with no purpose.

Again, years later he saw a prefect Japanese gateway that had been covered up in perfect stucco techniques. The story behind this was that the entrance was designed and made specifically for a wealthy man who after years of living in his home asked a servant what the door was for as it was being covered up. The servant’s response to this was that it was made specifically for his to enter through and since he had never been though and now he was dying it was no longer needed and being covered up.

After seeing the examples for the staircase and the doorway Akasegawa Genpei created his own type of art – it was what looked like conceptual art however not artist had made it, it had become a spontaneous and serendipitous. After seeing the American major league baseball player Gary Thomasson who played for the Japanese baseball team the Yomiuri Giants he though of him as a human version of this art. Thomasson looked like a beautiful player, but that was all – he would swing beautifully but not play well. Simply, he did nothing – beautifully. Yet Thomasson was treated with respect in Japan and would most likely be taken as a joke in America. From this Thomasson became the term for these examples of hyper-art.

While teaching Akasegawa Genpei send his student to take photos of some Thomassons they would find. One student took an image on top of a tall chimney of one of the last remaining traditional bath houses in Tokyo . Akasegawa Genpei described this student as ‘slightly retarded’ for taking ridiculous and dangerous length to get the photograph, so much so that he asked the student to prove he went, to climb back and taking a rubbing of the top of the chimney – which he did.

To Akasegawa Genpei, objects would fall into two categories, a Thomason’s  and a non-Thomasson. An example was a staircase with a section of the stairs cordoned off for no particular or obvious reason, believed to be a pointless ‘half-arsed compromise’.

Another example of this was the image of two phone booths, one phone booth had been removed leaving a scar on the wall where it had sat for years, and its partner sat unused next to it. It became a portrait of the space and what it was subjected to such as underneath the booth with still remains, a dark patch of the floor is there showing that it has been protected from the elements more that the other one.

There is also great debate about whether thing are Thomassons or non-Thomassons. One image, which was rejected as a Thomasson was a tree stump protected by a guard – the idea that there was a guard protecting nothing. However Thomasson enthusiasts were arguing that this was not a Thomasson because they believed that at one stage there would have been a tree growing that would have been cut down while still young.

Thomassons are being found all over the world and being protected and maintained by the public.

The Century of the Self – Episode One: Happiness Machines.

In this weeks lecture, we watched a documentary by Adam Curtis, The century of the Self, and episode one – ‘Happiness Machine.’ This documentary focused on Edward Bernays, the nephew of Sigmund Fraud and his importance in the founding of the idea of public relations and advertising. He believed that a crowd could be controlled the crown in an age of mass democracy.  He was the first person to take Freauds ideas about human beings and use them to manipulate the masses, showing large corporations how to sell products to peoples self conscious making them happy and in turn making them a dossal controllable crowd.

Freaud believed crowds were a potentially dangerous and believed World War I was an example of this each human has a dangerous and instinctive side deep inside them. Meanwhile in America Bernays was working in New York managing  opera singer, and was employed to promote America’s aims of bringing democracy to all of Europe both at home in America and abroad. Propaganda made people believe they were now free – which lead Bernays to think if you can control people in wartime, you could do so in peacetime and propaganda turned into public relations.

He looked at the work of his uncle to manage the new crowds and the possibility to make money to manipulate the minds of the individuals by playing to irrational feelings. He started an experiment to try and get women to smoke, which at the time was taboo. The president of the American Tobacco Cooperation, George Hill wanted this taboo broken too. He first employed A.A. Brill, a psychoanalyst who found women thought of cigarettes as a symbol of male sexual power – and believed that if they could find a way to challenge this idea. Bernays persuaded Debutants to smoke in a large public parade calling them ‘torches of freedom.’ As a result he had made women smoking socially acceptable and making her more powerful and sales began to rise. He realised that by linking products to emotional desires and feelings could make people act irrationally. This fascinated American cooperation’s.

Cooperation’s were beginning to fear that after the war there was such a large amount of products available that soon people would have bought enough products as products at this time were sold on a basis of need. For millions of working class American were sold as necessities sold for practicality nothing more. The cooperation’s knew they had to change the way the consumer though about products switching from needs, to desires society.

Bernays was at the centre of this change of the consumer society. In the early 1920’s banks funded the operning of large department stores, which would be the outlet for the sales, and Bernays’ role was to create the new customer. He first was employed to promote a new range of women’s magazines and used techniques to linking  products to famous film stars who were also his clients and began product placement in film and at film premieres and events dressed the stars in products he represented- and also told car manufactures to advertise cars as symbols of male sexuality, as well as fake ‘independent’ studies, fashion shows in department stores. People bought things not just for need, but to show what others would think about them.

In 1927 the consumers had created a stock market boom, convincing people to buy new shirts and using the money bought from other banks he represented. He began to tell people, ordinary people, that they should also buy stocks. In 1924 the President Coolidge had become a national joke and needed an image lift. He persuaded celebrities to come and visit the White House – and essentially did the same for the president as he did for products. 

mean while in Vienna there was a financial crisis and Freud needed help and asked Bernays for help in which he published his book and received money from America. After dismissing the idea suggested by Bernays of writing an article for Cosmopolitan (another magazine Bernays promoted) he retreated to the Alps and began writing about the ferrous animal that humans were in groups. The publishing of his works had a large reaction from American journalist believing the fear of the crowd to over turn the government. Walter Lipmann saw this and believed that the human behaviour of making irrational thoughts meant they could not be trusted with democracy and needed stronger control. Bernays saw this as a chance to promote himself.

Bernays began to write a series of books that claimed he knew the techniques to put into action the ideas Walter Lipmann called for.  In 1928, President Hoover agreed with Bernays that consumerism had become the central motor of American life. He told taken over the job of creating desire and transformed people into happiness machines that would become to key to economic progress – a new idea to run mass democracy, a happy and docile, steady state.

Bernays became wealthy and held many party’s where the mayors, political leaders, journalist, senators would all want to come and know Bernays because he made things happen.

At the 50^th anniversary of the light blub in 1929, Bernays were given word that the New York stock exchange was falling dramatically. 29^th October 1929 – the market collapsed. Millions of American stopped buying products they didn’t need and couldn’t afford and public relations fell out of favour. Violence began in Europe and fraud retreated to the Alps again. He was writing a book that civilization was just to control the animal like behaviour of humans and that individual freedom was impossible and must always be controlled.

Adolf Hitler began with similar thoughts as Freauds that democracy was dangerous and humans were too selfish, and were elected in 1933. The aggressive actions came out on those who opposed – Freaud saw this as a warning. American too was at treat of the angry mob, and took out there angry on the co-operations who had appeared to cause the stock market crash.

With a president  Roosevelt was elected in 1932 and was going to use the power of the state to strengthen democracy’s by developing a new way on dealing with the crowds. This was the start of the ‘new deal.’ New industrial projects began to better the nation. Unlike the Nazis he believed that humans could make rational decisions and would explain policies to them.  He was forging a new connection between the crowed and positions and was sensible citizens.  This what Bernays chance for a come back of Public Relations. – which flourished during the General Motors show.

While Bernays is relatively unknown today, almost everyone has come across his techniques of Public Relation in some form almost every day.