yesterday saw the conclusion of the aa asian forum organised by ken yeang, the chief proponent of an asian face in the aa. i had mixed reactions to the whole event but admit that i was stirred to thought by the things said, the manner of the presentation, the slides picked and shown, the language used, the people involved, the attitudes they brought with them and the limits of the world they defined for themselves in their practice and/or the limits of the society that they come from.
i'm sure my thoughts will become clearer as i bounce it around a little more and let it simmer. for now, for the record:
1. asian discussion revolves around criticality and identity and ethics. it is alien from the prevalent 'western' discourse of quantitative and qualitative performance, of criteria and of techniques. highlights blindspots of both concerns - can performative criteria differentiate? can it localise and get to issues of identity and types? can the performative project not find overlaps with the critical project?
2. the need for transport, physical proximity and face-to-face contact is decreasing in the general lives of people, with the increasing means of communication, business transaction and forms of entertainment and leisure. the former factors were the key components of the economic machine and this was the chief driver of the city and its making. with this becoming less important (never obsolete, just another splinter, another proliferation), the city is increasingly being driven by issues of culture.
3. the excitement of asia is its freedom from the crippling burdens to imagine new beginnings.
4. is the city an organism or a system?
5. if former, what are the changes at system level that affects the organism that is the city?
6. in cities where the structures of power allow its own transgression, it is manifested in space and it becomes the city. e.g. thailand.
7. i read that gone are the days of the retrospective manifesto. the hongkong presentation was 2/3 retrospective manifesto without a clue as to how it changes practice. the third speaker never went into that territory but spoke from his own almost impassioned experience of designing airports (well). but already, it seems that hongkong casts their architectural concerns much wider than their own little financial spreadsheet and year3 type of middleclass thought-patterns/frequency.
i'm sure my thoughts will become clearer as i bounce it around a little more and let it simmer. for now, for the record:
1. asian discussion revolves around criticality and identity and ethics. it is alien from the prevalent 'western' discourse of quantitative and qualitative performance, of criteria and of techniques. highlights blindspots of both concerns - can performative criteria differentiate? can it localise and get to issues of identity and types? can the performative project not find overlaps with the critical project?
2. the need for transport, physical proximity and face-to-face contact is decreasing in the general lives of people, with the increasing means of communication, business transaction and forms of entertainment and leisure. the former factors were the key components of the economic machine and this was the chief driver of the city and its making. with this becoming less important (never obsolete, just another splinter, another proliferation), the city is increasingly being driven by issues of culture.
3. the excitement of asia is its freedom from the crippling burdens to imagine new beginnings.
4. is the city an organism or a system?
5. if former, what are the changes at system level that affects the organism that is the city?
6. in cities where the structures of power allow its own transgression, it is manifested in space and it becomes the city. e.g. thailand.
7. i read that gone are the days of the retrospective manifesto. the hongkong presentation was 2/3 retrospective manifesto without a clue as to how it changes practice. the third speaker never went into that territory but spoke from his own almost impassioned experience of designing airports (well). but already, it seems that hongkong casts their architectural concerns much wider than their own little financial spreadsheet and year3 type of middleclass thought-patterns/frequency.
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