Euthanized City: Death and Rebirth of the Natural Artifact

Eut ha n i ze d C it y Death and Rebirth of Natural Artifacts

thesis by Hao Zheng

Primary Advisor: Elizabeth Kamell Advisors: Sekou Cooke Timothy Stenson

Undergraduate Thesis 2020

Syracuse University School of Architecture

table of contents_

00_statement_

1-2

01_contention_

3-22

02_precedent_

23-33

03_site_

33-42

04_project_

43-70

05_bibliography_

70-74

00_statement_

“Of things that exist, some exist by nature, some from other cause. By nature the animals and their parts exist, and the plants and the simple bodies...For each of them has within itself a principle of motion and of stationariness. On the other hand, a bed and a coat and anything else of the sort.. have no innate impulse to change.�

Aristotle Physics, Book 2 Chapter 1

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Thesis 2020

Contesting the antiquated division between what we perceive as the artificial and natural, this thesis argues for the design of death in artifacts and cities that mirror natural transitions. Situated in Osaka, Japan challenged by a growing elderly population and rising sea levels, this project argues for the killing of potentially murderous infrastructure and construction of natural artifacts which “has with itself a principle of motion� towards decay and rebirth.

While the artificial is often considered opposing and contradictory to the natural, the distinction between the two terminologies are ambiguous and ultimately arbitrary in the Age of Athropocene. In its self-constructed autonomy, artifacts are designed with a single purpose and lack of response to exisiting natural processes, opting for obsolescence rather than purposful decay. Under the guise of being unnatural, humans have sindicated responsibility of obsolete artifacts resulting in landfills, climate change, and murderous cities.

The project, a proposal for a crematorium, is a provocation for the breaking down of an antiquated philosophy and hopes to blur the artificial and natural. The project serves as a reminder to acknowledge and accept human death and death in our designs.

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01_contention_

Autonomy of the artificial from the natural

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Thesis 2020

In the age of Antiquity, Pluto and Aristotle philosophized a unique distinction between what we understand as the natural and the artificial.

Aristotle argued that while things by nature had a principle of motion and stationariness, artifacts have no innate impulse to change. This separation, ultimately, would come into contention and continue to influence our position and relationship to nature. Pluto complimented that the natural, which he termed physis, has a constant form found in nature, while the arts, techne, has a form imposed by man.

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Age of Antiquity 5

Plato

429-347 B.C.E.

Arguing for the separation of the natural and the artificial, Plato believed that the natural, physis, is a constant form found in the natural world, the artificial, techne, is a form imposed on a natural object by man.

Thesis 2020

Aristotle

384-322 B.C.E.

Aristotle believed that while nature is constant and consistent, humans have varying qualities and needs that often opposes the constant forces of nature. To act against nature, humans use art and devices which alters and manipulate the forces of nature

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Age of Enlightenment 7

This position was accepted and has shaped man’s position outside the natural world until the Age of Enlightenment. As scientific understanding of natural systems expanded, philosophers like Descartes and Rousseau saw a blurring between the two dichotomies. Descartes posits that nature was mechanical, governed by set laws, while Rousseau contested that the state of nature itself was constructed by man. Previously accepted anthropocentric views of the universe were being challenged. Man was no longer special and no longer held its placed center in the universe.

Thesis 2020

Descarte

1595-1650 A.D.

Rene Descartes disagreed with previous notions that machines were contrary to nature, instead he argued that nature itself was mechanical in its operations and can be dissected and understood like a mechanical watch.

Rousseau

1712-1778 A.D.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau argued that the state of nature was an intellectual construction by man as a foundation for political order.

While there is no great separation between nature and art, he argues for people to only accept gradual degrees of distinction.

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While scientific understanding of the two states has expanded, often western societal connotations of the natural and artificial still call for its separation.

The artificial is characterized as fake, fabricated, and antonymous to the natural, stemming still from our antique philosophy. This perception of the constructed states, however, is dangerous as we continue to perceive ourselves as autonomous from nature.

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Thesis 2020

Artificial

(adj.)

1: “Humanly contrived often on a natural mode, man-made” 2:

“Lacking in natural or spontaneous qualities”

3:

“Based on differential morphological characters not necessarily indicative of natural relationships”

Unreal

Contrived

Simulated

Bogus

Factitious

Substitute

Fabricated

Fake

Synthetic

Manufactured

Feigned

Refined

Phony

Mechanical

Pretended

False

Mock

Pseudo

Natural

(adj.)

1: “Being in accordance with or determined by nature” 2:

“Having or constituting a classification based on features existing in nature”

3: “Occurring in conformity with the ordinary

course of nature : not marvelous or supernatural” Legitimate

Inherent

Raw

Unpolished

Native

Whole

Universal

Crude

Wild

Common

Unprocessed

Normal

Innate

Unfiltered

Untreated

Pure

Hardwired

Instinctive

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Artifacts are consequently designed autonomously with a single purpose and without consideration of its obsolescence, resulting in tangible consequences like sprawling landfills to intangible consequences like climate change and sea-level rise. While artifacts operate in a linear lifespan from fabrication to obsolescence, we perceive natural systems to operate in cyclical life spans where decay is accepted and death is no longer an end but a transition.

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Thesis 2020

As a result of the perceived distinction between the “artificial” and the “natural,” artifacts are identified as autonomous from the natural process. Ultimately, in its concocted autonomy, man-made and designed objects have little to no agency in consideration for environment, context, and lifespan.

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In the modern age of the Anthropocene, the blurring of man and nature has never been so ubiquitous as it was in antiquity. Our advancement in technology and influence has ultimately impacted nearly every inch of the planet’s surface. Entire swaths of land are terraformed, domesticated foods have been artificially selected and undomesticated animals have adapted to conform to human activity on the earth. We have advanced so far as to impact weather, climate, and even rotation of the earth. Still, our design of artifacts barrel towards obsolescence rather than purposeful decay and transitional death.

We relinquish the consequences of our impacts by the guise of being unnatural. If there was a distinction between man and nature, that separation is now arbitrary. To surrender an antiquated anthropocentric view of the world where the artificial operates autonomously from natural systems, we have to begin to accept death as an innate “principle of motion� within artifacts and design for decay.

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Thesis 2020

Landscapes Circle Farms in Saudi Arabia.

Desert landscapes are transformed into farms through irrigation.

Coal Mine #1, North Rhine, Westphalia, Germany. Entire landscapes are carved effectively through the use of large scale bucket-wheel excavators.

Bower bird’s nest using blue plastics to attract mates. Natural birds use artificial plastics to construct artificial/natural nest.

Plastic islands in the Pacific.

Plastic waste wash up and collect into large single masses which float in the Pacific.

NASA cloud making machine.

Technology has advanced to an extent where weather can be controlled.

Three Gorge Dam, largest in the world. The dam is so large that it has altered ecosystems and towns which surround it and slowed the rotation of the planet.

Objects

Environment

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Obsolesence of Objects

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Thesis 2020

Life of Artifacts

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Obsolesence in Architecture While architects have taken into consideration how buildings can be altered to conform, these programmable typology require capital and have failed to become pragmatic and viable. There has been little precedent to no precedents in which building are designed to be programmable in its decay.

Methods of Deterioration

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Programmable

Arson: Sutro Baths

Demolition: Pruitt Igoe

War: Hiroshima

Economy: Detorit

Outdated: Gunkanjima

Obsolete: Highline

Abandoned: Villa Savoye

Fulfilled: Maunsell Forts

Demolition: Glasgow Towers

Fire: Notre Dame

Natural Disaster: Chiba

Thesis 2020

Neglect: Capsule Towers

Unfulfilled: Habitat 67

“In showing Soan’s Bank of England in ruins, Gandy acknowledges both its right to stand in time and the likelihood that it will succumb to time...In this image there is as much hope for architecture’s ongoing creative agency and durability as there is for it to succumb to nature’s return.”

Buildings Must Die. 173

Rebirth Active

Tabula Rasa: Rudolph Expy

Build-on: Thinkbelt

Reuse: Horse Stable

Redesign: Highline

Renovate: Museum

Build-in: Parthenon

Passive

Designed for Decay

Destination: Sutro Ruin

Ruin Design: Gandy’s Bank

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Through the lenses of architecture, a city that operates as this natural artifact not only grows and expands to the needs of the city but also fully aware of its decay. It accepts and designs for the death and decay of the city and for its transition as a purposeful ruin with new life.

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Thesis 2020

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Thesis 2020

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02_precedent_

“The garden not only offers specific scenes of known places and general scenes of nature, but it represents the cosmos, affording an understanding of man’s place in the universe.”

Mira Locher Traditional Japanese Architecture: An Exploration of Elements and Forms.

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Thesis 2020

While the separation of human from nature has largely been accepted in the west, Eastern philosophies have emphasized and reiterated through their traditions man’s position within the natural. Eastern gardens are composed as a representation of the cosmos and its views are set so that visitors would ponder on their place within the natural world. These views are set up through compositions and juxtapositions of objects and natural elements such as water, ground, and vegetation.

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Typologies

Elements

meditation garden

stroll garden

tea garden

tsuboniwa

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Thesis 2020

Recognizing man’s place in the universe, the Japanese garden is populated with artifacts which interplay with more “natural� elements like earth, water, and vegetation. While still highly curated and composed by man, the garden encourages the visitor to reflect upon their relationship to surrounding and environment.

Hide-Seek and Mitate

Shakkei- borrowing from nature

Composition and Juxposition

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Aware of the power and inevitability of nature through their experience with tsunamis, earthquakes, and typhoons, Japan saw the rise of religions like Zen Buddhism and Shinto which further encouraged symbiotic relationships with nature. Traditional Japanese architecture like the Shinto Ise Grand Shrine accepts decay as an inherent process. Every twenty years, the shrine is broken down and reconstructed out of respect for the gods.

Sampo-gumi-shikuchi

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Dodai-sumi-mejiire-shikuchi

Thesis 2020

Yose-ari-hozoshikuchi

Situated in Ise, Mie Prefecture of Japan, the inner shrines within the larger complex are rebuilt every 20 years. Dedicated to the sun goddess in the Shinto religion, followers acknowledges the ephemerality of materials and the built structure and reconstructs the inner shrine exactly as the previous one decays. The rebuilding process help to pass down traditional Japanese woodworking and construction techniques. Although each reconstruction totals about $250 million, the community acknowledges the lifespan of the physical shrine and works alongside inevitable qualities of nature rather than prolonging the lifespan of decaying structures.

Image: Kyo Tours Japan

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A similar approach towards architecture can be seen in post-war Japan as the Metabolist movement.

While the advancement of technology could have been interpreted as a devastating force having the capacity to raze entire cities, the Metabolist saw the advancement as an opportunity to reimagine technology and its relationship to nature.

Metabolist architects like Kenzo Tange imagined the construction of a city modeled after the growth of an organism in a parts to whole relationship. In which case, the city has an established hierarchy and expanded to the needs of the residents. While metabolist structures like the Capsule tower saw to replicate this growth, it failed to acknowledge decay as apart of its transitions resulting in failing infrastructure and obsolete unpurposed rooms.

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Thesis 2020

Cell

Transient components

Transient Components i

ii

Tissue

Hierarchy of roads

Hierarchy of Roads

Organ

Nervous System

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This thesis additionally, takes influence from Isozaki Arata’s writing of City Demolition Inc. In his work, Arata considers the terrorization and demolition of a neglected city. SIN, Arata’s alter ego in his writing, works as a hired assassin, and takes pleasure in the art of killing. Over time, SIN becomes frustrated as the city’s broken infrastructure kills its residents indiscriminately, at a lower cost, and without skill.

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Thesis 2020

“He felt that in order to create an age in which the killing profession would again be an art, and in which this human act could be performed with pleasure, there was nothing more urgent than to destroy these inhuman cities...Tokyo, for him, … was like a building whose foundations had decayed, walls collapsing and water pipes getting thinner, structures barely standing, braced by numerous struts and supported by a jungle of props and buttresses, patches and stains from the leaks in the roof. Its original elegance had vanished.

Imagine such a deserted house—decorated gaudily on the surface, it goes on killing people, goes on emitting a vigorous energy. A gigantic monster on the brink of extinction; a pig roasted whole; the ultimate evil of unintentional, inevitable mass massacre . . . He said that such a city must be destroyed as soon as possible.”

Isozaki Arata City Demolition Inc.

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03_site_

This project speculates on the future of cities as effects of climate change and decay transform once habitable cities into obsolete, potentially murderous, artifacts.

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Thesis 2020

The project looks to Osaka as a highly vulnerable site to sea level rise and rapid population decline. The effects of coastal sea level rise are worsened by Osaka’s susceptibility to frequent typhoons and tsunamis. While the current estimate of $216 billion of assets and 10 percent of the current population are vulnerable to coastal flooding in 2005, the estimate nearly quadruples to $1 trillion by 2070. A rise in temperatures of 2 degrees C would increase sea levels to an estimated 5.1 meters and impact 26% of the total population in Osaka. While a series of sea walls, levees, and dikes work to mitigate damage from storms and protect large areas of Osaka, already under median sea level, its effectiveness comes into question as storms like Typhoon Hagibis and Jebi and tsunami become more frequent and powerful. In districts like Konohama, flooding from storm surges and tsunamis already reaches over 5 meters.

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Thesis 2020

Image: City of Osaka General, Flood Hazard Map

Situated between the Rokkenya and Aji River, the site focuses on a neighborhood in the Konohana Ward.

Protected by sea walls which hold back daily tides, the neighborhood is currently under sea level with flooding waters reaching over 5 meters if the walls were breached. The neighborhood is mostly residential with school and sports facilities around the area.

Home to a mix of elderly and young demographic, the neighborhood allows us to consider the lifespan and ephemerality of the site.

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Already vulnerable to sea level rise as a result of climate change, Osaka is additionally challenged by typhoons and tsunamis common in the area. Recently devastated by Typhoon Jebi and a magnitude 6.1 earthquake in 2018, Osaka’s vulnerability increases as climate change continue to worsen the effects of future natural disasters.

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Thesis 2020

Since 1972 the yearly population growth rate of Japan has been in decline reaching to -0.27% in 2019. If the rate continues, it is estimated that the population of Japan will decline by 40 million.

Given the average life expectancy of the population and percentage of the population over 25 years old, it’s estimated that over the next 50 years, by 2070, the dead population would have risen by 1.6 million in Osaka, averaging 90 deaths per day.

Yearly Population Growth Rate (Japan)

1972 (+1.46%)

2010 (0%) 2019 (-0.27%) 1960

1970

1980

1990

2000

2010

Actual Population (Japan)

130m 120m 110m

Projected Population 100m

Projected Decline of >40 Million in Population over 100 years

90m 80m

1980

2000

2020

2040

2060

2080

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Elderly Population Density Overlayed with Flood/ Elevation Map

Konohana

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Thesis 2020

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Thesis 2020

As Osaka becomes threatened by population decline and sea-level rise, the project proposes an expanding crematorium and cemetery which grows to take over the city. As 99% of the population opts for cremation for post-mortem processing. The crematorium would rapidly expand taking over and breaking down vulnerable parts of the city and transforming the site post-mortem to a natural garden given back to nature.

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04_project_

Situated in a largely residential district vulnerable to rapid population decline and coastal flooding, the crematorium operates like a virus fueled by human death ultimately bringing about rapid infrastructural decay. The crematorium reframes artificial death, not as an end but a transition, bodies of the dead are repurposed as nutrition for life that comes after it and the city is repurposed as a wandering garden, monument to decay, and given back to nature.

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Phase 1 45

Phas Thesis 2020

se 2

Phase 3 Euthanized City

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In the death ritual, the bodies are received through both land, and river and ceremonies are held for the deceased within the facility.

The bodies are prepared for cremation as attendees make offerings and pay their respects in the wake.

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As the spirits make their journey through the Sanzu river to the after life, similarly ,the physical body is processed through liquid cremation. Attendees and family members watch as the deceased is lowered into the alkaline pool and water descends down from the oculus.

While the spirit bears the burden of their offenses from their time alive, the body is lifted of its flesh leaving behind the pure white bone. With only the bones remaining, the body is lifted from the waters and transported to the inurnment room while the remaining liquid solution is drained and processed.

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Through the processing, fluid is separated from solids. The liquid that remains are treated and reused for cremation while the solids are repurposed, mixed with soil and formed into burial pods.

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Before receiving the body, family members wander and select their burial pod or leave to prepare their existing family pods. Upon receiving the bones in the inurnment room, select family members take turns placing the bones into an urn. Traditionally, two family members, using chopsticks, picks up and places the bones piece by piece.

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After the inurnment process, the procession follows tradition in circling around the structure to confuse any remaining spirits from returning home.

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Wandering through the garden matrix and arriving at their burial pod, the family digs up and prepares the pod for the burial. Making sure to place the feet first and the head last, so that the body would be upright in death, funeral attendees say their final goodbyes.

Proportioned after traditional tatami mats, the cemetery modules expand to its needs, ultimately killing and repurposing the existing city. Formed with the cremated bodies, the pods are fertilized with calcium within the buried bones giving life to new vegetation and an expanding garden.

Perceived as a revitalizing force in Japanese death rituals, water is celebrated as the equalizer that brings about death and transition in man and his artifacts. The body finally becomes bone and the city finally becomes ruin and given new purpose in decay.

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Starting as a seed within the city, the crematorium expands covering the allotted plot of the initial site. As deaths rise, the garden expands further into the city taking up vacant lots and open parks.

At its capacity, the new matrix juxtaposes with abandoned and existing infrastructure eating up everything in its path as it tries to find new plots. Finally, the crematorium is quieted as rising waters overtake the powerless sea wall and cremate the site.

Residents would have already evacuated and moved inland as market value is driven down by the growth of the crematorium. What remains are posts, beams, rubble that support new life and vegetation, and a single wandering garden path leading through the garden for introspection and respect to what was.

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Although the project is situated in Osaka, Japan, the construction of the crematorium is a provocation for the breaking down of an antiquated philosophy hoping to blur the artificial and natural. The project serves as a reminder to acknowledge and accept human death and death in our artifacts.

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05_bibliography_

Literature and References

Arata, Isozaki. “City Demolition Industry, Inc.” South Atlantic Quarterly 106, no. 4 (October 1, 2007): 853–58.

Aristotle, and William Charlton. Aristotle’s Physics: Books 1 & 2. Clarendon Aristotle Series. Oxford: Clarendon P, 1970.

Bensaude-Vincent, Bernadette, and William R. Newman. The Artificial and the Natural: An Evolving Polarity. MIT Press, 2007.

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Cairns, Stephen, Jane M. Jacobs, and Jane Margaret Jacobs. Buildings Must Die: A Perverse View of Architecture. MIT Press, 2014.

Kim, Hyunchul. “The Purification Process of Death: Mortuary Rites in a Japanese Rural Town.”

Asian Ethnology 71, no. 2 (2012): 225-57.

Koolhaas, Rem, Hans-Ulrich Obrist, Kayoko Ota, and James Westcott. Project Japan. Ediz. Inglese.

Taschen, 2011.

Locher, Mira, and Ben Simmons. Traditional Japanese Architecture: An Exploration of Elements and Forms. Tokyo: Tuttle Publishing, 2010.

Mostafavi, Mohsen, and David Leatherbarrow.

On Weathering: The Life of Buildings in Time. MIT Press, 1993.

Nyilas, Agnes. Beyond Utopia: Japanese Metabolism Architecture and the Birth of Mythopia. New York, NY: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 2018.

Strauss, Benjamin H., Scott Kulp, and Anders Levrmann. “Mapping Choices: Carbon, Climate, and Rising Seas — Our Global Legacy.” Climate Central, November 2015.

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Additional References

Arata, Isozaki. “City Demolition Industry, Inc.” South Atlantic Quarterly 106, no. 4 (October 1, 2007): 853–58.

“ArcGIS.” “Elderly Population Density.” Accessed January 10, 2020.

Aristotle, and William Charlton. Aristotle’s Physics: Books 1 & 2.

Clarendon Aristotle Series. Oxford: Clarendon P, 1970.

“Atlas of Urban Expansion - Osaka.” Accessed January 10, 2020.

Australian Embassy. “When Someone Dies in Japan.” Accessed January 10, 2020.

Bensaude-Vincent, Bernadette, and William R. Newman. The Artificial and the Natural: An Evolving Polarity. MIT Press, 2007.

Cairns, Stephen, Jane M. Jacobs, and Jane Margaret Jacobs. Buildings Must Die: A Perverse View of Architecture. MIT Press, 2014.

City of Osaka. “Flood hazard map (Fukushima ward).” Accessed January 10, 2020.

Climate Central. “Surging Seas: Risk Zone Map.” Accessed January 10, 2020.

Google Earth. Accessed January 10, 2020.

Holder, Josh, Niko Kommenda, Jonathan Watts, Josh Holder, Niko Kommenda, and Jonathan Watts. “The Three-Degree World: The Cities That Will Be Drowned by Global Warming.” The Guardian, November 3, 2017.

“Japanese Funeral | TraditionsCustoms.com.” Accessed January 10, 2020.

“Japan’s Population Problem Is Straining Its Economy. The World Is Watching for a Solution.” Bloomberg.com. Accessed January 10, 2020.

Kim, Hyunchul. “The Purification Process of Death: Mortuary Rites in a Japanese Rural Town.” Asian Ethnology 71, no. 2 (2012): 22557. Accessed January 10, 2020.

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Koolhaas, Rem, Hans-Ulrich Obrist, Kayoko Ota, and James Westcott. Project Japan. Ediz. Inglese. Taschen, 2011.

Locher, Mira, and Ben Simmons. Traditional Japanese Architecture: An Exploration of Elements and Forms. Tokyo: Tuttle Publishing, 2010.

McKirdy, Euan, and Chie Kobayashi. “Typhoon Jebi Leaves Trail of Death and Destruction in Japan” CNN, September 5, 2018.

Minkjan, Mark. “The Poetry of Decay.” Failed Architecture. Accessed January 10, 2020.

Mostafavi, Mohsen, and David Leatherbarrow. On Weathering: The Life of Buildings in Time. MIT Press, 1993.

Nicholls, R. J., S. Hanson, Celine Herweijer, Nicola Patmore, Stéphane Hallegatte, Jan Corfee-Morlot, Jean Château, and Robert Muir-Wood. “Ranking Port Cities with High Exposure and Vulnerability to Climate Extremes: Exposure Estimates,” November 19, 2008.

Nyilas, Agnes. Beyond Utopia: Japanese Metabolism Architecture and the Birth of Mythopia. New York, NY: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 2018.

“Osaka, A Town Lower Than the Sea.” Accessed January 10,2020.

“Overlapping Hazard Maps.” The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism, Japan. Accessed January 10, 2020.

Pulvers, Roger. “Dealing with Death the Japanese Ways.” The Japan Times, November 26, 2006.

Strauss, Benjamin H., Scott Kulp, and Anders Levrmann. “Mapping Choices: Carbon, Climate, and Rising Seas — Our Global Legacy.”

Climate Central, November 2015.

Think.iafor.org. “Buddhism & Burial: Attitudes to Death in Ancient Japan,” March 24, 2016.

University of Southern California: Shinso Ito Center. “Ise: Patterns of Japanese Culture.” Accessed January 11, 2020.

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a thesis by Hao Zheng Syracuse University 2020 School of Architecture

Contesting the antiquated division between what we perceive as the artificial and natural, this thesis argues for the design of death in artifacts and cities that mirror natural transitions.