I’m thinking about the rumor or the myth that surrounds people who step outside the norm and spaces that would seem unhabitable, yet are made so. is there some way to play with this? or to collect these stories? i say this even as i know i’ve promised myself to not do any more story recording projects since i’m so bad at the follow up of working with the material… but maybe they’re not sound recordings? maybe there’s some other way to deal with this?

just a thought…

they better not throw stones!

so, I’m loving where this is going!

it’s so hard to wrap my head around the shaft space and the hallway/staircase, etc… even with photos and descriptions to go along. maybe an nyc visit is in order some time soon…

in the meantime, the ant farm idea and the image of the children’s museum climbing gym go to the same place my imagination went when looking at carolyn’s long shot of the hallway and stairs. there’s so much height to work with… what can be done!? would be really great to create an experience of visitors really moving through and relating to the space in a different way…

yes, I totally agree, carolyn, about engaging visitors more than just through documentation on the walls. I think my initial proposal is a step toward figuring out – how does the work of creating spaces out in our respective cities translate to the museum? i’m thinking that making the museum one experiment among many will bring the museum down a notch in a way. and help establish a context in which an immediate experience in the museum will help viewers identify more closely with our experiences out in the city. perhaps there are a variety of spaces created vertically that people can enter and in each there is a video of documentation from one of our out-in-the-city actions?

ally was right on with my thinking about the “unnoticed/unquestioned” thing. for me, if i’m actually thinking about creating a living space, how does that become a feasible situation? there has to be a level of personal security. one way to acheive a certain sense of security is to know you’re sort of invisible. another is to know that popular sentiment will support and protect what you’ve created. I do appreciate questioning of these assumptions though. it’s similar to a conversation we had among the howling mob about how much attention we wanted to bring to the signs we put up. bringing attention to them would garner a broader audience for the information and ideas we were trying to promote through the signs, but at the same time, it could endanger them with the increased likelihood of their removal.

in this case, if we want to bring attention to opportunities to live in different ways and relate to space in different ways, going stealth might not serve that purpose. however, my initial thought was that the museum is a space in which to contextualize action and open conversation around it. we can think about the spaces inwhich we work as having different skill sets in a way—each type of space has something different that it’s good at. so we can be selective about how we use each type of space and where we obscure our actions vs. where we open them up to share and discuss.

upon second thought though, i don’t know that this point about going unnoticed or unquestioned is a terribly important one to make as a basic principle for our proposed actions. perhaps these are just tools/approaches for us to keep in mind as we design and build, one approach or the other might be appropriate for any given circumstance.

as for the list of potential uses, they were just things that came off the top of my head – possible examples of “needs and desires” in relation to spaces we inhabit or pass through on a daily basis. they could change, become more specific, etc. i wanted to keep it open to the possibility of thinking about and creating structures for different purposes. though i’m sort of focused on a living space, you guys might not be. john mentioned to me the other week that he’d been thinking about ways of parasitically syphoning business off of some larger entity by setting up a miniture version in immediate proximity that offers similar services for less, or something along those lines…

by the way – i’ve talked with both john and sara, who are psyched to be involved but have a deadline in January that is consuming their brain space, so they’ve both said they’d like to jump in after that. I think they’re both available to meet up in January, somewhere in or around or just after the retreat though, so we can all talk then. i’m hoping they will chime in here to update directly about this scheduling consideration (nudge, nudge if you’re reading!!). But i think it makes sense for us to keep the ideas rolling and let them jump on board in whatever way makes sense when they free up.

so let’s see.. i really like where this is going, as i said. one thing i’m wondering about and i’d love to get confirmation or thoughts on from you guys… how are you feeling about the basic premise of multiple “experiments” in our respective cities that can be undertaken independently and then a more unified collaboration in the new museum space? in my mind the new museum installation contextualizes the others and allows entry points to think about/experience them. so, are you guys interested in doing independent site-based work over the spring/summer? are you interested in then developing a collaborative installation at the new museum?

it seems like there is still a lot of openness and possibility to that framework, but it would feel good to me to know if you guys are in agreement about a basic structure, or are we still at a stage where we need to hash that out?

what i’ve been thinking about a lot is using this as the impetus to actually take the leap and construct a dwelling for myself upon return to chicago in the spring. it feels pretty daunting to think about at the moment, largely because i don’t know chicago as well as i do pittsburgh and don’t quite know where to start her, as i might there. but i like the idea of a museum opportunity being the nudge i need to act in the world outside the museum, art being the context inwhich i develop a practice for living…

oh, and that reminds me of the question about “experimentation” vs action, etc. i think it’s largely a matter of wording, and could shift, but words do have force and are chosen for particular reasons, so… experiment to me means it’s not a final or definitive gesture. i imagine there’s lots of potential for failure in these initial efforts. and short of failure – we’ll probably learn a lot of things that we’ll want to do differently in the future, or each structure will inform the next if we undertake multiple. or our urban space interventions will inform our new museum installation. basically, it’s a matter of thinking about all of this as “practice” in a really encompusing way. we’re working at something, but in a way we don’t even know what the desired outcome is exactly. we can experiment and see where it leads us…

oh, another thought i had in relation to being visible/invisible, noticed/unnoticed, etc. and in relation to experimentation and research – an initial idea i’d had was to do research into building code, zoning, ect. so one way to do that would be to slog through offical documents or visit some city office or the library, etc. but an other way is just to go out and start doing things and see what kind of resistance is put up against these actions. if the police come and tell me to take down the thing i’m building, i can ask them what law or code it’s violating and go research it. a much more direct and experiential form of research i think…

ok, sorry this is a bit all over the place. it’s very flow of consciousness. that is what i have for now. thanks for all the posts so far carolyn and ally! i’m excited about where this is going and about sitting in a room together (just a month from now!) to talk in person. we should plan a time to meet about this during your visits for the retreat. have you made travel plans yet? is there any flexibility afterward for you? Ally, i know you can’t be here before, right? The retreat proper ends with lunch on Sunday, so maybe sunday evening if sticking around for an extra day doesn’t work??

ok, more soon…

Very exciting to see the convergent ideas and language being tossed out.

Robin I am a fan of your paragraph:

“As the economy tanks and assurances of continual growth become less and less convincing, change seems imminent. Many people are coming to terms with the prospect of a marked decline in our collective ability to consume and the imperative to make do with what we have. What better moment to rethink the basics of how and where we live, what exactly defines our quality of life and what resources we draw on to sustain ourselves? In anticipation of a future in which individuals and communities play a much more active role in defining our living conditions, we hope to begin a conversation and share the possibilities explored through our experimentation.”

and carolyn I am excited by your milton friedman quote:

“only a crisis, actual or perceived, produces real change. And when the crisis occurs, the change depends on the ideas that are lying around.” And then he goes on to say, “That, I believe, is our basic function: to keep the ideas ready until the politically impossible becomes politically inevitable.” So I think it’s really important for people to look at the ideas that are lying around.”

Carolyn your images and description of experiencing the space really brings this conversation into reality:
the reality of having a space, having a chance to reach a bunch of people and guide them through the space or in this case- help them through the space?

I really liked robin’s suggestion of thinking of a way to expand the use of the shaft space, or at least propose to expand physically or conceptually. Maybe it was the images of the tenement and sweat shops. Or maybe it is the images and info from the links I’m about to describe but I am feeling very strongly about making things that are functional structures that expand and utilize extra space or resources in regards to architecture, both in the New Museum and in our own cities.

Here’s a structure I like in the Pittsburgh Children’s Museum for quick reference:

Kids crawl up 30 ft high space that’s about 2.5 ft. wide, literally scaling a space the size of most walls. There are enough shelves of different heights in this structure that you see kids climb up and hang out in some of the less heavily trafficked spaces.

After hearing Carolyn’s description of the difficulty of moving through the shaft space, I find myself wanting to solve that problem. can there be different bridges that lead up and over some crowds, offering different views, or pathways to those places we are describing making in other cities: nap spaces, work spaces, etc.

I keep thinking of ant farms too- the shaft space is like a human ant farm.

Carolyn- you asked of robin- why these activities?( re: sleeping, napping, working, etc.) I like the breadth of these activities because they range from important to minor. That is what’s wanted out of a space a person owns or has claimed- freedom to do both important and unimportant things. I think these activities also read as a list which implies there’s more out there that isn’t listed.

Here are several articles of interest. Right now is a really good time to be reading BLDGBLOG in compliment to thinking about architectural space. It’s where I’m pulling these links from. The author is poetic and insightful and he’s writing about the architecture of decline that’s facing many urban spaces. ( BTW enjoyed the pits article very much).

These articles are about:

A man living a parasitic lifestyle: he lives and works in a crane atop the new world’s tallest building being constructed in Dubai. People say he never comes down. He is somewhat of a John Henry character-
his work is his life, is his home.

http://bldgblog.blogspot.com/2008/12/infrastructural-domesticity.html

A story of a man and friends who had made a home in  drawbridge. The room shifted upright without warning, changing the man’s living space around without notice. This happened in Chicago.

http://archidose.blogspot.com/2004/12/file-under-amazing.html

A link to a clip from an Australian paper suggesting that empty pools be converted into “granny flats”, sunken houses that are very energy efficient and low visual impact to landscapes.

http://bldgblog.blogspot.com/2008/12/down-under.html

and beautiful images from Belgian photographer Filip Dujardin who makes images of unexpected buildings – that is, he “combines photographs of parts of buildings into new, fictional, architectonic structures,”. These buldings seem of no time and everytime. Their entrances are hidden. They fit in and…umm…they don’t?

http://bldgblog.blogspot.com/2008/11/resampled-space.html

Last response is to the suggestion that structures “go unnoticed” or “unquestioned”.  I really like that you keyed in on this as a “but why?”, Carolyn. I think this came out of conversation Robin and I were having about what long-lasting architecture achieves.  In our case, and in the case of people who are struggling in all sorts of situations there is a reason why we struggle in the first place: we lack resources others have them. We have some opportunities to tap them, while other things are unattainable. The greater the disparity between the person and the resource the greater the effort or complexity of the method acquired to attain it.  There are without a doubt places that we could never justify our presence in- we could not rent or buy or “art project” our way into some territories. In these places we sneak and disguise ourselves to get in. Sneaking and hiding are behavior for spaces we aren’t allowed in for one reason or another.

Th other option “going unquestioned” as opposed to “unnoticed” is what I think much of what cities are made up of. Most architecture is so monolithic is belittles the idea of ever being influenced by us. In this way architecture can impose.That might be the part of “going unquestioned” that I have a problem with. I think we want to use it in the “going unquestioned b/c it’s so darn useful or right for this place” kind of way.

Depending on what an artist wants to get out of going unquestioned he/she could be creating  a useful business, making something beautiful that is welcomed into a space where it is, or making something fun that people want around. I’ve been thinking of making a hideout that’s either really undercover, or really well known. it will get torn down when someone finds it and is mad a secret place made it past their awareness, OR so many people will love it that it will be protected by them, or become so legitimate that it’s welcomed to stay as a happy addition to the list of fun things to do in some park.

Keep the ideas flowin’

The current exhibit, “Color. Location. Ultimate. Experience” which did not appeal to me on the website is quite compelling and kind of goofy.  This is just to say that a lot of people were interested in checking it out.

http://picasaweb.google.com/stefans.bcn.birthday/NewMuseum# 

Images 1,2, & 3. These two images are taken inside the shaft space.  They used the space to put 11 monitors each showing different videos of the two performers dancing/moving in different environments. There was music that was playing in this room and it was subtly drifting out into the hallway. I can’t emphasize how small this space feels. I tried to pull the camera as far into the corner with each of these photos. The 3rd one with flash shows all our feet. With all those monitors and benches, only 4 of us could fit plus one person looking in from the hallway/stairway. 

Images 4,5,6 & 7 These are all images of the long hallway with a lot of people in it- as they were all trying to get a look at the videos.

Images 8,9, & 10 These are images standing looking out the window space (part 2 of the shaft space) at a video projection that bounces off the adjacent building. It was raining. Often there were 7 people (see 7) trying to squeeze in this little space b/c the video was good and It was pretty cool to be looking at it through the rain and see it projected into and on this urban non-museum space.  One of the people who works there told me it is also visible from Prince and Bowery, but I forgot to check this out b/c it was pouring so much (and someone stole our umbrella from the coat-check area.)

In the picture of David and I (8) you can see (to the left of David) some headphones. There was one set on either side. This was kind of a problem b/c not everybody could hear the sound, b/c there were never just two people there, (except during this picture but that’s only because the projector had overheated and David had just switched it back on) but I didn’t feel the sound was a critical part of the video, either.  

I can’t emphasize how compelling this outdoor projection was to people. They were willing to stand REALLY close to each other to watch it for a WHILE. They were NOT crowding around the Payton’s with the same enthusiasm. However, clearly this would only work at night. I really recommend we try to use this window/outdoor space somehow. 

CLUE (color, location etc.) tied together a bunch of clothes like a rope and draped this down one side of the staircase.  Seems like the New Museum would be open to a use of the stairway and that wall-space along the staircase if we found that useful as well.

Unfortunately visitors are not allowed to take their own photos so I am going to post some in here from their flickr site (which I’m not sure they know is open to the public).  

The word tenement comes from the latin “tenere” meaning “to hold,” our tour guide informed us. It meant officially that 3 unrelated families live in the same building.  The term apartment was borrowed from the french while trying to sell upscale single building units, starting with The Dakota, on the upper west side.

He said the that in the 1890′s 12 people were legally allowed to “dwell” in each apartment, which had one bedroom, one small kitchen and one small living room, altogether about 350 to 400 square feet. But anecdotal evidence presents that sometimes there were 17 or 18 living in one. 

We went on the Sweat Shop tour. A sweat shop was a legal defined as a small factory in someone’s apartment. In the living room of above mentioned dwelling (which in this case was a family of 7). The husband/father had been a tailor in Europe so ran of these businesses in the LES, which was very common in 1897, about half of the apartments also housed these sweat shops. In this particular place, the guy legally employed 3 people, but probably employed 5. And they worked, 10 hours in the day by the gas lights. See picture below for recreation of this room.  Many people in these Tenements and Sweat Shops were from Eastern Europe and Germany. German was the most common language at the time and there was even a LES German newspaper. These two following images are the kitchen and living room/work space of the tenement/apartment/sweat shop.

Instead of coming up with a revision tho, my response is a series of questions that I hope can start some discussion about what is our vision, what kind of experiment or intervention do we want to create outside the museum space (and in 3 cities??) and what kind of experience do we want to create for visitors inside the museum. Robin has generously made some suggestions, that I think are really relevant to the aim of perhaps ALL (at least some) of the socially engaged practices we all have. Particularly, I’m referring to her last paragraph, where she kind of sums up what she hopes this project might accomplish.

So here’s some of my questions in response to this proposal in particular. Please note- these questions are for ALL of us, not just Robin so… feel free to respond to my response… <black is Robin’s writing, and Milton Friedman below>

1. or adaptating existing spaces to suit our purposes. We might create spaces for living, napping, reading, selling goods, meeting friends, watching movies, etc. <why these activities in particular? Are these activities “the best” the most important, the easiest to manifest of the possible changes we could make occur in a short space of time? How are these activities an experiment rather than an intervention or “action”? Are we trying to prove a theory? Or might we build something later based on how the experiment goes?

2. Our interventions will attempt to either blend chameleon-like into their environment (so as to go unnoticed) or integrate themselves by providing a needed resource or service (so as to go unquestioned). <why do we want to go unnoticed and unquestioned?>

3.Some possibilities for intervention include an “audio tour desk,” a “coat-check room,” etc. Alternately (or additionally), we could create a modular living system that would adapt the small footprint of the shaft to function as a domicile by night. The modular unit would store away in the upper portion of the shaft by day, becoming invisible to patrons. The final concept for the New Museum inhabitation will be determined through our collaborative process and in response to the needs and givens of the museum space. <why would we want the domicile to be invisible to patrons?  Again, why created something that is unnoticed by museum visitors?   . <are we trying to make people think of the museum as an experiment or the shaft space as an experiment? Are we trying people to get see their whole world as an experiment? Thereby- changeable, malleable by themselves? That sounds cool to me, but another option is equally interesting.

That is:  Museums are highly trafficed areas where (a certain demographic) of people are (hopefully) interested in ideas. Ideally museums can be places to inspire, to reflect, to experience something, often within a kind of sterile environment.  Now, I would propose that  that isn’t where the five of us, are primarily drawn to working and that is also maybe not the primary audience we’re interested in working with, but I keep thinking of this quote by Naomi Klien in relation to this museum request for proposal :”Ideas have consequences.”

She also says this about ideas, here quoting Milton Friedman, of whom she is a great critic, but she likes this quote of his:

“only a crisis, actual or perceived, produces real change. And when the crisis occurs, the change depends on the ideas that are lying around.” And then he goes on to say, “That, I believe, is our basic function: to keep the ideas ready until the politically impossible becomes politically inevitable.” So I think it’s really important for people to look at the ideas that are lying around. http://www.democracynow.org/2008/9/24/naomi_klein_now_is_the_time

So, we happen to (maybe) have this opportunity within a space of reflection, communicating to a particular demographic of audience, at a time of perceived crisis. I like the Pits editorial from the New Yorker because it asks us to imagine things in a New Way. I think would like to address the audiece more directly with the shaft space, than perhaps just documentation (although not exclusive of it)

I’m not yet ready to write my own proposal- and basically,  i am behind the direction that Robin’s proposal is going in. In my next entry, maybe I’ll respond to the questions I have posed for the group and also respond more throughly to Sarah and Ally’s postings.

Collaborators Robin Hewlett, Sara Black, John Prues, Carolyn Lambert and Ally Reeves will undertake a series of experiments, unofficially occupying ambiguous spaces in our respective cities (Chicago, IL; New York, NY; Pittsburgh, PA). We will seek out gaps and cracks in otherwise well regimented systems of spatial control. Taking these spaces as opportunities for intervention and subversion, we will inhabit them by building small-scale structures or adapting existing spaces to suit our purposes.

As the economy tanks and assurances of continual growth become less and less convincing, change seems imminent. Many people are coming to terms with the prospect of a marked decline in our collective ability to consume and the imperative to make do with what we have. What better moment to rethink the basics of how and where we live, what exactly defines our quality of life and what resources we draw on to sustain ourselves? In anticipation of a future in which individuals and communities play a much more active role in defining our living conditions, we hope to begin a conversation and share the possibilities explored through our experimentation.

We will respond to the givens of our urban environments and utilize available resources to meet our immediate needs and desires—creating spaces for living, napping, reading, selling goods, providing services, meeting friends, watching movies, etc. We anticipate these spatial opportunities will be found on abandoned lots, in the spaces between other buildings, parasitically attached to other buildings, in trees, under bridges, etc. Our interventions will attempt to either blend chameleon-like into their environment (so as to go unnoticed) or integrate themselves by providing a needed resource or service (so as to go unquestioned).

We will identify project sites and conduct experiments with alternative approaches to inhabiting cities during the spring and summer of 2009. We will document these actions using video and still photography.

New Museum Installation

In late summer 2009, we will create an installation in the Shaft Space at the New Museum that mimics our urban space inhabitations. We will “inhabit” the shaft in a way that could very well go unnoticed by museum visitors. One possibility for intervention is an impostor audio tour desk. Seemingly administered by the museum, the audio tour would reveal itself, upon listening, to be an extension of our project.  Another possibility is an ad-hoc coat-check room. Alternately (or additionally), we could create a modular living system that would adapt the small footprint of the shaft to function as a domicile by night. The modular unit would store away in the upper portion of the shaft by day, becoming invisible to patrons. (note: We do not actually intend to reside in the museum. Rather the living space would essentially become a set piece for the creation of the documentation video)

The exact details of New Museum inhabitation will be determined through our collaborative process and in response to the needs and givens of the museum space. Documentation will also be taken of the Shaft Space intervention during the construction phase and while in use.

Video and/or photographic documentation of each intervention, including the experiment within the museum, will be on display immediately adjacent to the Shaft Space. The documentation of the Shaft Space intervention will make viewers do a double take and reassess the space around them. Presenting the museum as one experiment in relation to others diverse in their geography, purpose and scope, will start to raise questions about how we perceive and respond to the everyday spaces we encounter. Viewers will be challenged to reassess what they’ve seen and process the revelation that something is amiss in the museum. We hope this perceptual shift will create a productive confusion, allowing a more considered reading of the other documentation on display and a rethinking of the possibilities for inhabiting cities generally.

carolyn, I really like this article! makes me think of many additions to make to the draft proposal… i was most focused on simply articulating the components of the project, but there are many ways to contextualize the activities described as being really relevent to the current economic situation and the necessity to think differently about “development” and shift expectations about what our living situations might be like in the future…

i’m still very interested to hear responses to the proposal i emailed, even without compelling embelishments. i’m interested to know if you all find it interesting as something you’d like to engage with and if it feels like a reasonable way to imagine a collaboration across our spacio-temporal locations…

looking forward to hearing more from you!

“What will it look like?” is a question of the hour, as people try to visualize the ways in which life will change in New York as a result of the financial and economic crisis. In the mind’s eye, we tend to populate our recessionary streets with squad cars painted green, cat’s-eyed ambulances, and other anachronisms—“Fort Apache, the Bronx: The Remake.” But, really, the city will probably just look the way it does now. After an extraordinary era of construction and renovation, demolition and replacement, there will almost certainly come a long period in which little to nothing gets built. Putting aside the long-discussed public projects that are endangered or doomed (the Second Avenue Subway, the West Side Railyards, Brooklyn Bridge Park, Moynihan Station, etc.), dozens of private undertakings have stalled or died. The calls go out to the architects: pencils down. We have inherited, from the good years, a glut of housing, almost all of it of the unaffordable kind—condos galore—and an increase in office space amid a sudden, steep decrease in the need for it. Throw in the high cost, or total unavailability, of capital, owing to the credit freeze, and you have a New York that may be frozen in time. The skyline, which has been very dynamic recently, like a stereo’s equalizer display, should sit still for a while. The clothes in our closets today will be the ones we’re wearing when we’re old.

Pitt Illustration

Keep an eye on the construction pits that developers dug to make way for the foundations of new buildings. The town is pocked with them. The real-estate boom fostered grand schemes, which, though they are in many cases now stillborn, began with holes in the ground. The expiration, earlier this year, of a tax-abatement law, 421-a, encouraged residential builders to dig quickly, to achieve grandfather status and thus better financing. Hence a sudden spate of new pits, some that builders may have had no intention of filling soon anyway. In some cases, if a developer hasn’t already paid for the steel, he will be inclined, or forced, to walk away. Buildings that are halfway built tend to get finished, although they may wind up being what are called “see-throughs.”

What will become of the pits? Can we turn them into half-wild swimming holes, like the granite quarries of New England? Ring them with barbed wire and convert them into debtors’ prisons or internment camps for the culprits who structured synthetic C.D.O.s? They’d make excellent ha-has, for livery horses or livestock. Corn mazes. Extreme-cockfighting arenas. Or perhaps they could serve, over time, as urban tar pits, entrapping and preserving in garbage and white brick dust the occasional unlucky passerby for the scientific edification of future generations, if there turn out to be any. Or they could become parking lots.

Vacant space tends to remain vacant, in anticipation of an upswing. Tax policy, inertia, and the eternal belief that things will get better (profitable) again usually trump civic dreams of pocket parks or stickball fields. Whoever ends up owning it all, after the foreclosures and the workouts are done, holds out for the big payday. The greatest pit of them all is at Ground Zero, where the squabbling among constituents and stakeholders, as well as the usual big-city incompetence, even before the financial meltdown, has kept the hole a hole for years. Now it’s hard to imagine a way out of it. ♦

(so my plan is to post as I can over the next two days– responding to your thoughtful posts and proposal and adding some images/ideas/inspirations of my own– cool? )