Uncanny Architecture by Danai Surasa

contents

Introduction Uncanny architecture in film modernity failure

Research

idea

Research

Uncanny architecture in film/Content

Methods Research 09 > moving and still > part > black & white and colour > doubling (reflection)

01 02

Reference

Structure and theme

Bibliography

Location > undoing London > city streets > car park > domestic interior

Filmography

Narrative > story planing

Technique > transition > camera movement > editing

Studio method > exploration phase one > exploration phase two

List of illustrations

Uncanny architecture in film/Content

Project

introduction

Questions The questions of my project are whether it is possible to capture the notion of ‘uncanny’, in moving image, and how one could possibly do so. Broadly speaking, the uncanny is considered obscure. It is hidden somewhere, here and there. It is present, but not visible. We maybe perceive and feel that it is uncanny, but it is almost always impossible to explain or illustrate its existence, form or shape. Perhaps there is no general agreement of what shape and form the uncanny is. My project is then not attempting to give a shape or form of that formless uncanny so much as to make a film project that provokes us to think of the subject of uncanny in our everyday lives. The aim of the project is to explore the dimension of 'uncanny' whether it represents in objects or in spaces, in landscape or architecture, in the interior or the exterior, and to demonstrate that ‘uncanny’ through medium of still images and films.

Method Due to its flexibility and adaptability, the primary tool used in this project to explore the 'uncanny' in architecture is a digital film. Moreover, it also provides new possibilities for architects to research in architectural spatial system in order to experience space and time of a particular subject. The usage of digital documentary is to investigate the spatial and momentary architecture through the eyes of occupants, thus representing individuals’ point of view and emotional states effected by their experience of the space and of time. The montage and jump cut editing techniques are used to construct the special structure of shifting of space and time, creating the blurred boundary between mental and material worlds. This project explores the meaning of uncanny space in both architecture and in everyday life by ways of making a series of moving images.

Uncanny architecture in film/Introduction

While this design project is intended to explore the idea of the uncanny dimension as possibly to be expressed through the techniques of narration and filming, the theme modernity’s failure is chosen to control the overall story of the project. The purpose is to explore the anxiety of peoples in modern society, and I choose what seems to be abandoned spaces in unban landscape in London as the locations of uncanny. The film shot attempts to reveal and represent the uncanny of which inhabitants have become conscious about their architecture and city. How do we film the hidden dimension that architecture and city affect the way in which inhabitants live their lives and cause them to feel uncanny?

04 The uncanny: previous studies Since the early nineteenth century onwards, there have been several attempts to identify what it is uncanny, but up to now the meaning of the uncanny has never conclusive. It is opportunity here, before I begin my project, to observe meanings and significances of the uncanny as discussed in various discourses, and to put them together here. The meanings of uncanny have been described from different various discourses including psychoanalysis, literature, art, film, and architecture. While different meaning from different point of views have been produced and discussed, it is generally agreed that the sense of uncanniness is almost always formless. Though we can perceive the uncanny in several places, its existence is latent. In other words, it is present but it is invisible, as Anthony Vidler states in his book, Architectural Uncanny: The Essay in the Modern Unhomely that The “uncanny” is not the property of the space itself nor can it be provoke by any particular spatial conformation; it is, in its aesthetic dimension, a representation of mental state of projection that precisely elides the boundary of the real and unreal in order to provoke a disturbing ambiguity, a slippage between waking and dreaming. (Vidler, 1992) According to Vilder, the uncanny is nothing to do with material facts, but rather it is something that is born in our consciousness. Without definite meanings and forms, the uncanny is more to do with anxiety, repetition (déjà vu), absence and presence, and mirroring (doubling and reflection), (figure 01). For its place and location, the uncanny is generally considered to be engaged with something that is very familiar, as, again, Anthony Vidler states that it is ‘a structure within which familiarity and extreme anxiety come together, where doubling comes to a crisis through reflections, encounters, and repetition, often where the passage of time is trouble’ (Vidler, 1992). Similar account was described earlier by Sigmund Freud, suggesting that the place of uncanny is in fact in the most familiar place: the house. He said, “the house is at its most mysterious when it is most familiar” (Curtis, 2008).

Uncanny architecture in film/Introduction

uncanny > definition

In his essay Dan Graham’s Kammerspiel, Jeff Wall, a Canadian photographer and art-historical writer, explains a sense of uncanniness by identifying the uncanny with modern life in general, and with that in high-rise buildings, in particular. For example, he identifies the cause of the uncanny as with the failure of modern life. He said, for example, the materiality of the high-rise, such as the hard and transparent of glass windows, the vastness in glass houses, and the orderliness of the grid system of glass towers caused peoples who lived in troubled and felt at the end of the day uncanny.

According, though Vidler and Freud suggest that the uncanny is most likely to be in our most familiar place such as our own house, our own cities – the places we lives our lives in, they never gave exactly where the uncanny is. Though the uncanny is present, it is invisible. In other words, its existence is in fact in our consciousness, rather than exists in reality. It is the uncanny occurring in the perception of observers towards the modern built environment in particular with which my project is concerned.

Uncanny architecture in film/Introduction

In the field of film, Barry Curtis referred to a haunted house in order to describe the uncanniness of domestic architectures. Moreover, Charlotte Brunsdon, a professor in the Department of film and Television Study at the University of Warwick, analyzed two films shot in London: The Seven Days to Noon and Twenty Eight Days Later as samples works exploring the uncanny. She observed that in both films landmarks of the city are used to evoke the image of the abandoned city London. She defined the city London as “uncanny London: Undoing the city”. Furthermore, she referred to the writing of Peter Hutching who wrote about the ‘uncanny landscape’ in British cinema (Brunsdon, 2007).

modernity’s failure In our modern era, living spaces – the familiar - have been built in various forms and scales - from a farmhouse in the field in the suburb to a high-rise building in the metropolis. While country houses can be identified with the idea of warm, homely, and welcomed space, of the high-rises built of transparency glass represents the idea of clarity, openness, cleanliness, and visibility as the product of technological process. The high-rises in modern cities have not been developed from the homeliness of the domestic architecture, but rather are come to terms with industrialization and technologisation. Numerous evidences refer the glass high-rise towers as a symbolic of power and authority. During the years of revolution, for example, especially in Berlin, the glass tower is a symbolic of wisdom’s retrieval of a fallen world. (Wall, 1991) Jeff Wall stated in his easy of Dan Graham’s Kammerspiel about the glass building that “It has become symbolic of the inversion of value suffered by the “modern movement”. The notion of openness and transfiguration has been changed through the implosion of revolutionary ideals into an architecture emblem of lose and falsified openness, of an openness which contains the specifically modern form of oppression, one which appears to have no secret or hidden core forbidden to sight in the ancient sense of holiness and law, but which is nevertheless paradoxically invisible in that it seems to flow logically and automatically from the rationality of technique and organization itself, and not from the will of any self-conscious authority” (Wall, 1991) Moreover, Dan graham criticises Mies’s and Phillip Johnson’s glass-house architectures, saying that the asymmetrical reflection of glass windows distorts the reality of space and subverts the meaning of the architectural openness and boundary. In another article “Homes for America”, Dan Graham identifies the failure of the American tract – the housing development after World Wall II – as the result of fake structure where building materials were limited, and that dries architecture and the city. In his Alteration project, Graham also regarded glass towers and glass houses ,

Uncanny architecture in film/Introduction

> definition

where the mirroric optics are apparently visible, as an expression of exalted visions of modern architecture. In the field of psychoanalysis, the failure of modernity causes senses of fear and anxiety of space. In The Architectural Uncanny, Anthony Vidler states that on the other side of the boundary, the anxious visions of fear, anxiety, and uncanny have been linked to the aesthetic of space in the modern period, lurking behind the productions of modern civilization. While such uncanny are present everywhere, they were refused by our perception.

My aim is to explore the relationship between the notion of uncanny and the failure of modernity. To explain the condition of modern estrangement as the peculiar feature of architecture and urbanism, it will also allow us to identify the uncanny that presents in the reality of our everyday life experience. From this point onwards, this paper is divided into three sections: Research, Project, and Conclusion.

Uncanny architecture in film/Introduction

However, the uncanny never fails to catch the attention of artists and architects. Contemporary artists and architects, nevertheless, try to work on the subject of the uncanny, for example, Daniel Libeskind in his bunker-like interior of Jewish Museum and Rachel Whiteread in her concrete cast sculptures of domestic interior space in Ghost (1990) and House projects (1993). Such works bear the family resemblance to the old phobias of modernity (Vidler, 2000).

“Research” The research has been divided into two parts, which are idea research and methods research explaining “What, Why” and “How” on making a decision in order to frame the issues of uncanny, modernity failure, and design methods. The research is constructed by theoretical context and evidences of experimental. It also explains the way to apply the theoretical context to the design methods, consequently depict the result of the process.

> definition

Research map : meaning Anthony Vidler Art and architecture Historian

This section interprets the uncanny in architecture and modernity’s failure. By using a synthesis of various points of view such as psychoanalyst, art, film, and architecture, I want to find key words for my own approach to the subject. (figure01)

Dark spaces and transparency in the context of psychological theories of doubling and identity/ repetition

“Architectural uncanny”

The “uncanny” is not the property of the space itself nor can it be provoke by any particular spatial conformation; it is, in its aesthetic dimension, a “Warped space” representation of mental state of projection that precisely elides the boundary of the real and unreal in order to provoke a disturbing ambiguity, a slippage between waking and dreaming. (Vidler, 1992)

Dark places and haunted; new raletionship between the sujectivity of the spectator and the virtual environments. /presence and absence/ familiar space/ disorientation in space and time/ repetition

Barry Curtis visual culture “dark places the haunted house in film”

psychoanalist

the theory of mirror stage might offer an entry point for the interpretation of the modernist transparency and its contemporary opaque or translucent variations

Pavel buchler

psychoanalist

ghost space absence/presence

exterior and interior

Glass tower, city streets, glass house. mirroric effect /intensity of light/day time, night time/ public and pricacy/ grid system exterior and interior. “The uncanniness of living high reflects the significant of separation from the life of others, and from nature”. sense of neglect, abandonment, loneliness, even damnation.

mirroic/asymetrical reflection

“This uncanny is in reality not thing new or alien, but something which is familiar and old – established in the mind and which has become alienated from the only through the process of repression…. The uncanny (is) something which ought to have remained hidden but has come to light”. (U64)

The feeling of the uncanny implies the return to that particular organization of space where everything is reduced to inside and outside and where the inside is also the outside.

“Dan Graham’s Kammerspiel”

Photography/ ghost space/ absence and presence/ innocent eyes

the subject of anxiety general concern with the uncanny effects of mirroring, shadowing, and loss of face. Sigman Freud

Jeff Wall photographer

Describe mainly on filmic language to generate the sense of haunted and uncanny in domestic scene (will be discuss further in methods research part)

“ghost story”

Jacques Lacan

Dan Graham artist, architect

this ideal relate to aspects of modernity failure

Charlotte Brunsdon film and television “London in Cinema”

Peter Hutching

Undoing city uncanny landscape

“Seven days to noon

”

Twenty eight days later ‘uncanny landscape’ in British cinema.

‘A landscape suffered with a sense of profound and sometime apocalyptic anxiety; it is also a landscape of a comprehensive dispossession and vacancy’. And also explore this landscape in relation to national identity suggesting, ‘This is not a landscape where we find ourselves as modern national subject’.

seven days to noon

“Public” and “private”/ glass window/ mirror image/ glass building/ video, television and architecture

Philip Johnson’s glass house twenty eight days later

Seagram building, New York city Mies van der Rohe, Philip Johnson, 1958

Key words : double identity, repetition (dejavu) reflection, abandoned landscape absence/presence, exterior/interior

figure 01

Uncanny architecture in film/Research

Idea research

Methods research

> defination what?

The methods research concerns on how to construct the sequence of uncanny architecture in the theme of modernity’s failure. The project uses three techniques of filming - moving and still images, part, black & white and colour and reflections; all are represented on the basis my interpretation of the uncanny.

Research Map : Methods Bridget Elliot and Jennifer Kennedy

Moving and still, live and death, architecture and fim, charactor and camera

Professor of Visual Arts at the University of Western Ontario.

Sergie Eisenstein

camera movement and imaginary part

filmmaker “Montage and Architecture”

Jeff Wall

Black & White and Colour

photographer

Dan Graham

Light intensity - confusion of occupation and observation interior-exterior Reflection, delay

artist, architect

public-private Richard Estes

double and refleaction

Photo realistic Artist

Anthony Vidler Art and architecture Historian

double and identity, retetition transparency

figure 14

Uncanny architecture in film/Research

“Black and white photographs”

figure 02

> defination what?

In terms of techniques, the moving and still images are used for different purposes. While the camera movement represents the point of view of the observer, the still images are used to emphasise the relationship between the observer and his built environment and architecture. In this project, the moving and still issue covered the aspects of camera movement, character movement, and images source.

> why?

In Bridget Elliot and Jennifer Kennedy’s essay of “Haunted the artist house: Sir John Soane’s museum and Isaac Julien’s Vagabodia”, moving and still are crucial for the play of movement and static, representing the ideas of life and death. While the moving and still are recurrent techniques for Soane to challenge the convention that defined architecture as static structures, for Julien they are used to explore film in terms of moving images. Both the architect and the filmmaker revel and blur the lines between inanimate object and living beings (Bridget Elliott and Jennifer Kennedy, 2006).

> how?

The uncanny, in this project, is constructed by both moving images and still images. The moving images play the role of a reality representation, used mainly in the exterior scene; the still images are used for generating an imaginary space, representing the senses of uncanny. The still images are also used to generate some dimensions of virtual spaces. This way of doing is derived from the ways in which Albrecht Altdorfer draws his paining ‘the Battle of Alexander at Issus’, (figure 02) depicting concealed features of space which are cannot be seen by ‘naked eye’. (bucgler, 2000) This technique also demonstrates an illusion of a continuous drawing like a “typical child drawing” (Eisenstein) which is drawn by the camera. It can also be diversified into various directions according to the speeds and positions of the part of the camera and its movement, as Healy suggests: “A spectator’s relate to the moving image especially in term of how he/she is positioned by those images.” (Healy, 2002) With the technique of moving and still, the invisible might possibly be seen. (Buchler, 2000)

Uncanny architecture in film/Research

moving and still...

11 This quality can be found in multi vanishing point photographs and paintings, they implied the meaningful concept of the scene from the minor part rather than the significant part, it is almost invisible but intimates somehow in the flame. The mystery of unseen, something can not be seen or sometimes the thing that the author do not want to show but pursue the audience to know. David Lynch states his attitude toward the truth and metaphysics in the mystery of Lost Highway that We’re not experiencing the ultimate reality: the ‘real’ is hiding all through life, but we don’t see it. We mistake it for all the other things. Fear is based on not seeing the whole thing and, if you could get there and see the whole thing, fear is out of the window. (Lynch, 1997)

The combination of moving images for real footage and from the virtual space is introduce an illusion of space like the time was stopped (in real footage), while the camera still keep moving along the exclusive part (in virtual space) to engage with the hidden world from the difference angle, same as when we look at a photograph, we have to focus on the ‘how’ rather than the ‘what’ we are looking at (Buchler, 2000), as Antonioni Michelangelo stated in his film ‘Blow up’ that “The enigma of what you see, what you do not see and what the camera sees.” (Michelangelo, 1966) Moving from one space to another space which is not make any sense in actual world in terms of “meaning” that hyper reality scene can be only constructed in film by using an editing technique or some kind of transition in the same way as

Uncanny architecture in film/Research

The ‘reality’ of space which hide from the naked eyes can be explored and experienced by the shifting in position from an object to an observer, from inside to the outside of the film, in order to observe an observation as God’s eye view, (Berger, 1972) and the using of three dimensional environment in virtual space which is generated from still image that can suggested an unsettle quality of space and boundary (Bachelard, 1969) of space inside the film and space between film and the audience.

12 David Fincher use a computer graphic generation to create the fluid movement through the house. All of them can be made a new experience of perception and uncanny architectural space. “It seems to be suggesting that “reality” is an appearance, a construction, one that is impenetrable beyond its surface.” (Healy, 2002)

the Part > defination what?

Comprehension of a virtual space in film is different from the way we perceive space in actual world. In his essay ‘Montage and architecture’, the Soviet’s film maker Sergie M. Eisenstein described about the traditional way to perceive space “In the past, however, the opposite was the case: The spectator moved between [a series of] carefully disposed phenomena that he absorbed sequentially with his visual sense”(Eisenstein, 1938) . While the movement of the camera constructs the internal dynamic in film, the film then leads both audience’s eyes and mind through a diversity of phenomena, space and time, collecting an important fragments and synthesis into one meaningful sense of place. (Eisenstein, 1938) Due to its capacity to crate the distortion and illusion of virtual space, in this project, part is then used for emphasizing the meaning of absence matter of places. The part plays important role to create the virtual three dimensional space in After Effect software. This way of designing the part is inspired by Albrecht Altdorfer’s the Battle of Alexander at Issus. Uncanny architecture in film/Research

> how?

black & white and colour > definition what?

The colour and monochrome are essential and important aspect in the world of design and art. It has distinct effect to both physical and mental perception between each colour, especially between colour and monochrome. This section aims to explain the different meaning between monochrome image (black and white) and colour image in the point of view of Jeff Wall and other artist, and how did I decide to use it in my project.

> why?

For monochrome, Jeff Well’s technique is particularly interesting.

Monochrome photographs, while appear as black and white, contain several il-luminosity caused by a variety of greys and tonal gradations. Wall also claims that time can be photographed only is black and white and it is this technique that he used for making documentary film. However, since the arrival of digital technology, colour has become favourite choice for many photographers, and the black and white represents the sense of the past.

Uncanny architecture in film/Research

The techniques that Jefff Wall using monochrome image and colour image are, for producing different meanings and causing different emotional perception. In Jeff Wall’s photographs Office Hallway, Spring Street, Lost Angeles, Jeff Wall made it Black and White simply ‘because it looks better’ and his answer might be applied to all of his black and white photographs. However, Jeff Wall had always been fascinated in black and white photograph because he believed that the black and white would help him explore what the meaning of documentary. For Jeff Wall, the monochrome photograph are more acutely real, it offers an objective, more philosophical representation of the world and provides a distinct metaphor to the dark spaces – the sense of unseen. As the monochrome work is emphasised by the absence of colour, it is more effective to be used to identify the formal qualities of the image. Jeff Wall stated that the structure and light values are equal to their representational force. (Jeff Wall, 2007)

Talking of colour, there are numerous ideas about the colour world representation. Everyday life experience proves that colours have a subjective, ephemeral quality; they make objects look differently in different times according to atmospheric conditions. For instance, the works of colourists such as the Venetians Titian and Bellini, or modernists Matisse and Bonnard, turn to soft blurs when they are reproduced in black and white. Cezanne also spoke of the joy of colour for colourâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s sake in Delaccroix as an intoxicating light, like drinking a glass of wine. Moreover, David Hume compared morality to the perception of colours. In both cases nothing is objectively real.

> how?

In my project, while the use of black and white is applied for scenes of waking life, the colours are used to emphasise a phantasmagorical scene. For example, on one hand, the beginning of the film tends to present a sense of documentary of everyday life routine of the character by the use of black and white scene. On the other hand, the uses of colour are employed in the dreaming part.

figure 04

Uncanny architecture in film/Research

Jeff Wallâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s coloured photographs

figure 06

light intensity

double and reflection > defination what?

The double and reflect are used in this project as a representation of both physical and mental aspects of a character and environment. Physically, the double is stand for the reflection of the character on the reflective material (glass window) and mentally the superimposing of his identities and the projection of his familiar experience.

21:55

The effect of reflection is an import aspect in both idea and methods in this project in order to redefine and depict the meaning of blurred border between interiority and exteriority. Similar to the ways that Jeff wall criticises the glass tower and the famous glass house of Mies Van der Rohe and Phillip Johnson, the effect of reflection is used here to show the effect of reflective boundary (glass windows) and to demonstrate how it blurs the meaning of physical and mental occupation in space.

figure 05

> how?

The way to apply the idea of double and reflection is inspired by the works of Richard Estes. In his shop window painting, he depicted the image of the city in a distinctive way through the reflection on glass window by using many of fragmentary images of the city. Some of them do not correspond to each other in the reality. This kind of technique gives the new meaning of the city’s image and also makes observers confused about their territories. In addition, this idea also relate to Wall’s writing in terms of intensity of light, which is the stimulating factor to indicate the important between two sides of the boundary in terms of occupation and observation.

Uncanny architecture in film/Research

Richard Estes’s Painting

22:20

â&#x20AC;&#x153;Projectâ&#x20AC;? This design project is of the notion of uncanny architecture. This project studies some methods that can possibly explore the sense of uncanny. The focus is on the mental effect of everyday life experience projection set to describe the mentally influent of architectural space of the occupants. This aspect represents as a transforming of modern landscape and architecture, interacting with the character in terms of doubling and identity in which confused the meaning of boundary of interior space and exterior space. The design is based on both architectural theory and filmic theory in terms of structure, theme and narrative. The purpose of this sequence is not to generate the physical transforming of architecture, but rather to examine and reveal the absence aspect of everyday life in architecture.

structure

technique

transition

structure Manuel Dries, 1999 Circular structure “Ethernal return”

studio methods

David Fincher Panic room, 2002

Lost Highway “Perpetual Mystery or Visual Philosophy”

Alfred Hitchcock Rope, 1954 camera movement Christ Cunningham Come to Daddy Afrika shox Michael Gondry Polaroid---resignation

narrative structure David Lynch Lost Highway, 1997 Mulholland drive, 2001

Uncanny architecture in film/Project

Daren Aronofsky Pi, 1998 Requiem for a dream, 2000

exploration phase one chronogram synthetic space andsythetic time

uncanny landscape

Project Map

work experience exploration phase two after disater reverse space uncanny architecture

David Fincher Panic room, 2002

story inhabitant city (landscape) exterior interior identity

Alexander Sokurov Russian Ark Russkiy kovcheg, 2002 editing Sergie Eisenstien (Montage) October, 1928 Jean-Luc Godard (Jump cut) Breathless, 1960

figure 07

Project

Structure and Theme > defination what?

Similar to that ways in which David Lynch did in his film ‘Lost Highway’, this project are constructed base on circular structure relate to the idea of ‘Eternal-return’ (Dries, 1999). The repetition of experiences is particularly disturbing and closely associated with that aspect of the ‘uncanny’ ,as Freud put it, that ‘recall the sense of helplessness experienced in some dream states’ and the compulsion to repeat associated with ‘certain daemonic’ state of mind. (Curtis, 2008) The beginning and the end of the film are related and corresponding to each other. While the beginning of the film is filmed in a simple place, operated by a routine activity, the last part of the film repeats that normal scene, but at the end of the film it emphasises more on some senses of curiosity and confusion. The familiar space, for example, the interior space of train, which is occupied by the character under the watchful and curious eyes of camera brings many senses of familiarity and anxiety together, while the ‘doubling’ (the mental projection image of himself) is brought into crisis through reflections, encounters and repetition. (Vidler, 1992) So from this structure, hopefully, it can bring some sense of infinity continuous developing narrative.

theme

For overall effect, this film aims to give some senses of anxiety, uncomfortable, and confuse about inside and outside by shifting positions of spectators. By the movements of the camera and fragmentary narrative, the film shows a feeling of curiosity of space, where, from times to times, the character and the audience appear present and absent. It deploys conflicts as if a dreamlike interior, generating spaces of what can be seen and what is hidden, what is inside the mind and what is happening in material space. (Curtis, 2008)

Uncanny architecture in film/Project

structure

> defination what?

This film locates in both interior and exterior of virtual and actual, waking and dream, and physical and mental in architecture and everyday life; all of these take place in three difference locations. Firstly, the film starts at Canary Wharf in order to discuss the aspect of modern landscape, city streets, transportation system, and the way it was transformed into an abandoned urban landscape. The sequence will be described in the eyes of the character (observer) through both normal and imaginary cityscapes. In the story, the city of glass is a place where peoples work and live in. It is the place that is controlled by networks of technology and mega-infra structure, providing possibilities and conveniences.

landscape

By the story, the city of glass is the place where people work and live in, it is the place where stands for a landscape of a modern national subject of power and authority. It is a city that is controlled by networks of technology and mega-infra structure which provide every possibility of life for everyone who works for the system. The shots in this location are, mainly shoot in city streets, plaza, and tube station in two different situations. Firstly, an everyday life situation, these shots will be represented the normal modern life in the city of glass such as working people in office building, crowded streets and station, and luxury life. Secondly, the scenes of empty city which are represent the uncanny landscape of abandoned city, in fact, the city is still occupied by people but they are invisible because the character is disconnected by the system.

exterior

The exterior aspect is discuss on the relation between architecture and the inhabitants in the way that it is not one way reaction but it is an interactive behavior. Moreover, it will be discuss on the relationship between building and building, and building and city.

interior

The interior space is used as a site for depict the mental projection of the character about his live in the past as a delayed image, and sometimes it is an image from the future. The scene will locate in an office in Notting Hill where I used to work, it is an architect office. I have two reasons to choose this location because of firstly, I can get an access, secondly, I want to make a question in this film that is actually the character is me.

Uncanny architecture in film/Project

Location

scene 05 : confusion

scene 06 : transforming

scene 07 : escape

scene 08 : predicament

real footage

virtual space

real footqge

green screen/ virtual space

real footage/ virtual space/ green screen

green screen/ virtual space

virtual space green screen real footage

real footage/ virtual space green screen

black & white

colour

black & white

colour

mixed colour and black &white

reality, routine, steriotype inhabitant.

strangely familiar. repetition (dejavu)

abandoned city uncanny landscape.

suspicious in the city. absence matter in space

confusion of identity between interior and exterior.

landscape transforming

fear and anxiety

predicament/ lost identity

character A travel to the city of glass

character A fall as sleep/ wake up at train station then walk from a train through the station to the city (dream space).

character A walk around the city/ the squence will be show some flash back scenes.

character A feel that there are somebody around him. staring at his own reflection on glass window.

character A saw his delayed images working in the office, on the other hand the inside one also saw the outside as well

in the same time, the land scape begin to transform to the real, which is derelict and abandoned.

character A and his mentally double try to get to the other side of the glass wall

character A wake up and found himself at the station, the same point as the scene 02 but the scene will show in Black and white

tube station platform in the tain

Canary Wharf station platform/ inside the train

city streets in Canary Wharf/ Euston station square area.

exterior of building in Canary Wharf/office intreiors in Notting Hill

city streets in Canary Wharf/ Euston station square area./office interior

buildings and city street in Canary Wharf.

office interiors

Canary Wharf station platform inside the tain

intellectual montage/ jump cut

tonal montage/ jump cut

metric and tonal montage/ jump cut

tonal montage jump cut

intellectual montage jump cut

intellectual and tonal montage jump cut

matric and tonal montage jump cut

intellectual montage jump cut

disolve white

disolve white/ Fincher’s transition

disolve white Fincher’s transition

disolve white Hitchcock’s transition

disolve white/ cross disolve Fincher’s transition

disolve white

disolve white Hitchcock’s transition

disolve white

source

scene 04 : the double

video transition

editing

location

narrative

Telling a film’s narrative in fragments-moments and episodes dealing with exteriority and interiority of architecture. While the exteriority scenes intended to make a question on the interiority, the interiority scenes will do the opposite way, and both of them will imply an answer for the question from the other side. The story is about a stereotype of a modern man who live and work in the city of glass (Canary Wharf), he spend almost of his life time as minor part of the capital system. He never knows what his life is for and never wants to know about it. He spends his time as a routine; wake up early, take train, greeting people, work and go back home. One day, everything was changed, the day that he want to know about his life and what is the system, then he fall as sleep in the train which is the thing that never happened with the glass city’s people. It like he break the rule of his life and he tries to hack into the system, so the system never thrust him anymore. It tries to take him out of the system. He was disconnected from the other occupants. He cannot see anyone anymore but he can feel them some how. He tries to find out what is happened. Sometimes he saw images of other occupants because there is leaking information from the system or there are delayed images from the past. He tries to find that people but finally what he found is nothing but him and he hoped that it is a dream.

scene 03 : empty city

technique

story

In this project the narrative can be describe into two ways which are the structure and the story. The structure was inspired by David Lynch’s Lost Highway and Muholland Drive which are telling a film’s narrative in fragments-moments and episodes in order to reconstruct the new understanding of space and time. Talking of the story, it was used as a structure to make the sequences flow and bring some sense of filmic emotion into the film. However, it is not the primary subject which I want to inform to the audiences, thus it will be weaken by the editing technique and act as a secondary subject in this project.

Uncanny architecture in film/Project

structure

scene 02 : the station

colourised

narrative > defination what?

scene 01 : life

represent

cross disolve

colour

cross disolve

figure 08

reference: Pi (Darren Aronofsky, 1998) and deception (2009)

three different scene show the nature of rush hour and encourage the emotion of isolation, loneliness, separation from the others

typical landscape of Canary Wharf view from train.

scene 01 : life...

0 07:45

Uncanny architecture in film/Project

flash back images from his memory introduce background of the character. use disolve white video transition, make it look like a flash light. To

announcement sound

0 dream space

08:00 character 1 fall as sleep: show mixed of real image and imaginary image, colour and monochrome

announcement sound

waking space

character 1 doing his routine travel on DLR to Canary Wharf use black and white to emphasise sense of documentary

announcement sound

combination of four sequences to depict the uncanny landscape of abandoned city which are situated in tube station and city street.

scene 02 : the station

gate

All sequences in this scene are from fist person eyes view, cannot see the character from direct view but he will be appeared on a shadow, reflection and sound.

escalator ticket booth

character 1 wake up at the station in the hallucinatoryworld. 07:45 it is empty and strange.

looks around the station and then go out to the city of glass which is empty.

00:45:00

colourised the scene to emphasise the illusion and the feeling of abandoned

reference camera movement: Christ Cunningham

scene 04 : the double (reflection) reference: Twenty eight days later, 2003

scene 03 : empty city(diconnected) link back to the idea of second term project of After disaster city in the term of empty city, ruin, and feeling of predicament

glass tower effect the inhabitants

Character walk around the city past the same route in scene 01 and look at the tower A.

01:45:00

when he turn back from tower A, his refrect still look at the tower then the tower’s surface start to vibrate

fragments scene in the waking space influence the dream space... tonal montage and jumpcut

camera 2 move right to see the other side of the tower...

tower A

flash back to memory image about the station

emphsise the confusion of waking and dreaming

intellectual montage and jumpcut

use Hitchcock’s transion : moving from exterior to interior

still can hear the sound of people talking which is the sound of the people in the tube

narrative > story planning

use Fincher’s transition to make a fluid movement from station to the city...

lighting in train, the blink of light, unstable of power supply and sparking.

intellectual montage and jumpcut

the character feel that he is not the only one in the city of glass any more, he can see somebody inside the building

02:30:00 camera 2 movement part to explore the city from God’s eye view

in the tube : talking sound, blink of lighting

use still image to generate virtual three dimensional space.

reference camera movement: Christ Cunningham (Afrika shox)

tonal montage and jumpcut

disolve white/cross disolve/Fincher’s transition

disolve white

example of the differnet ligh intensity images.

scene 06 : transforming

19 20

disolve white/ Hitchcock’s transition

reference camera movement : Pi (Darren Aronofsky, 1998) reference: Twenty eight days later, 2003

disolve white/cross disolve : to depict a flash back image and superimposing between waking and dreaming space

shoot in city streets and tube station.

reference: mirror, 2003

scene 05 : confusion the city landscape begin to transform and rearrange itself by mirror itself to the opposite side. the landscape also imply some senses of derelict and abandoned.

saw his delayed images working in the office, on the other hand the inside one also saw the outside.

scene 08 : predicament

character A and his mentally double try to get to the other side of the glass wall

character A wake up and found himself at the station, the same point as the scene 02 but the scene will show in Black and white.

03:00:00

combination of mixed reality and dream, monochrome and colour, interior space and exterior space.

03:45:00

reference: Dan Graham

This scene represent confusion of identity between interior and exterior in terms of occupation and observetion.

used sound of city streets as a backgroung sound mixed with a sound which recorded from the office. and insert some sound in the train inorder to emphasise the confusion between reality and dream.

05:15:00 create a virtual space by using the Vanishing point technique mixed with glass filter in After Effect insert the charactor which shoot in green screen.

silence

tonal montage and jumpcut

06:15:00

music represent a sense of machine and industrail...

intellectual and tonal montage jump cut

silence matric and tonal montage jump cut

mixed sound between sound from the train (reality) and sound in the city (dream)

intellectual montage/jump cut

figure 09

Uncanny architecture in film/Project

reference: En La Ciudad De Sylvia (José Luis Guerín, 2007)

scene 07 : escape

techniques > defination what?

Techniques in this project are based on filmic and architectural practice. In film, I focus on the aspects of video transition, camera movement, virtual threedimensional space and editing techniques, which I had done some researches in the first and the second terms, while at the same time, architectural techniques will be used to make a drawing.

video transition > defination what?

From my research on David Fincher’s Panic room (2000) and Alfred Hitchcock’s Rope (1948) the video transition plays the important role in both films in order to create a continuous fluid camera movement. However, the way both films constructed are different. Each film creates distinct affects suitable for its particular scenes.

camera movement

> defination what?

David Fincher (Panic Room, 2002) used computer-generated technology to create one long dramatic fluid motion travel through a house by denying the architectural meaning of boundary of floors, walls, and ceiling. While the shot that the camera moves through walls makes the solidity of the solid elements of the house disappear, the scene that character tries to penetrate between inside and outside of the house causes us uncertain about the interior and the exterior. Moreover, the impossible movement through a key hold and the handle of the coffee machine lead the spectator to have new experience of spaces. Such Fincher’s techniques destroy the conventional notion about architectural boundaries. The house therefore becomes an insecure place; the familiar becomes the anxious.

figure 10

Uncanny architecture in film/Project

David Fincher

Alfred Hitchcock Alfred Hitchcock used a particular movement of the camera to create a sense of continuous shooting in his film Rope (1948) by using closed up shots to create a series of transitions. At the beginning of the scene, camera moves through spaces, telling the story and introducing the sense of place. Then it moves to the back of the character. The scene becomes dark. For the next shots, Hitchcock always starts with the close up shots then he moves the camera upwards to take the whole picture of the space. Such Hitchcockâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s techniques can be used as a matrix montage technique to bring the observer from one place to another place in order to encourage sense of the unreality of space and time.

4 3

5 6

2 1 3

2 1

4 3

6 2 1

camera movement

character movement

figure 11

uncanny architecture in film/research

> defination what?

23 camera movement > defination what?

The use of the camera in this project can be categorised into two types by the purpose and meaning of the shot. Firstly is the real camera movement

Michael Gondry The Michael Gondry’s advertise film “Polaroid-resignation” is mainly shot in Hong Kong and Tokyo. He used the same technique as his previous music video of Rolling stone and Smirnoff advertisement by using two cameras shoot in the same scene, morphed from one to another, in order to make an illusion movement.

figure 12

figure 13

From the work of Chris Cunningham on music video for Aphex Twin’s “Come to daddy” in the beginning of the scene, he used a camera to introduce the abandoned building, suggesting a sense of looseness and predicament in an industrial landscape. The movement of the camera in this scene has no direction. Moreover, in the beginning of his music video for Leftfield’s “Africa shox” are inspired me the way to depict the image of a typical modern city and city streets. The struggle movement of the camera which is represents the main character view attack cut with a holding shot of the metropolitan man cause an effect of alienation and estrangement.

Uncanny architecture in film/Project

Christ Cunningham

24 Virtual three dimensional space > defination what?

Virtual three dimensional spaces is a technique to create a virtual spatial system by using a computer software generation, which actually can do in various applications such as Autodesk 3ds Max, Autodesk Maya, Rhinoceros, Cinema four D, and Adobe After Effect. In this project, I choose Adobe After Effect software as my tool because it provides an opportunity to create a distinctive illusion virtual space by using still images as a source, rather than try to make it realistic by making a model, assign material, compose the lighting, and render as the mainly three dimensional software do. From my practice in second term, I found that the virtual space in After Effect can be created in three different ways, which are Vanishing point technique, Three dimensional projection, and three dimensional layers environment. All of them can be construct the different effect of virtual space and also can mixed them together to compose an effective result.

Vanishing point The vanishing point technique is a collaboration of Adobe Photo shop and Adobe After Effect in order to make a virtual 3D space from a single still image. This technique can generate a strong effect from a clearly single vanishing point image, apparently it also the limit of this technique. figure 14

Uncanny architecture in film/Project

> defination what?

25 Three dimensional projections layers environment > defination what?

Three dimensional layers environment is one of the other ways to create virtual 3D space in After Effect by extracting an image into many parts in terms of foreground middle ground and background. This technique provided an opportunity to explore the capacity of still image an also allow us to see the absence aspects which is hidden in flat surface image. For example, my experiment on this technique in the second term, I create an imaginary derelict city by using many different still images and put it in different distance, and then create a camera move through the space.

figure 15

Three dimensional projections > defination what?

This technique creates a virtual space by projecting a still image to a virtual three dimensional screen. By this method, the level of complexity in the scene is depended on both details of the screen and the image source. figure 16

26 Editing > defination what?

To suggest a sense of the uncanny, the unreality of space and time is the subject my film wants to create, and the editing technique is the primary tool for this particular purpose. Hence, I decided to use “jump cut” and “montage” editing technique as the tool to manipulate in the project.

> defination what?

Sergei Eisenstein creates a montage editing technique that offers discontinuity sequential shots and generates impossible spatial matches. Eisenstein’s montage theory is based on the idea of “collision” between different shots dealing with the contradiction of scale, volume, rhythm, and motion. He describes the theory of montage in five methods: Metric, Rhythmic, Tonal, Over tonal / Associational, and Intellectual. Each method deals with different aspects. (Eisenstein, 1949) He also claims that most perfect example of his theory of montage is found in his film October. (Oktyabr, 1917)

how?

In this project, I use the technique of intellectual montage to create a combination of two different shots. The collision of the montage sequences creates new ideas. In the first scene, it shows a routine of the character setting on where he works and lives in the city of glass. Then I insert the image of the machine, metaphorically to suggest that he works as a machine, forexample.

figure 17 some images sequence from Eisenstein’s October which are depicted both matric and intellectual montage

Uncanny architecture in film/Project

Montage

27 > defination what?

George Méliès invents a jump cut intended to construct the subject of the shots appearing “jump” from one position to another. The technique combines two separate shots of the moving object, making it as if it moves continuously. (Fairservice, 2001) This technique is considered as a violation of classical continuity editing, but it draws attention to the constructed nature of film. (Bordwell, 2006) It appears, for example, in the work of Jean-Luc Godard in late 1950s-1960s, Breathless (1960), and, recently, in Guy Ritchie’s Snatch, and Tom Tykwer’s Run Lola Run.

how?

The use of “jump cut” technique in my project is used for making the audiences aware of the unreality of the film experience. This draws the audience’s attention to the significance of the film rather than the emotion of the narrative.

This is a series of images of one sequence from Godard’s Breathless, all of them are the first frame in each shot which are construct in order on the time line by using a jump cut technique

figure 18

Uncanny architecture in film/Project

Jump cut

studio methods

exploration phase one In the first term, my research was to understand architectural drawing and filmic techniques. The drawing technique which is called chronogramme is introduced as a first assignment; the second project allows me to understand the nature of film and to use a film as architectural representation.

chronogram The objection of this project is to learn â&#x20AC;&#x153;How to make a drawing of film from the final product (a piece of video clip)â&#x20AC;? which is called Chronogram, and to produce a series of drawings which anybody can use it to make the same film or create the same internal dynamic film. My first chronogram is focus on the relationship between the movement of the camera and the way the camera occupied space and how it creates a dynamic of space within the film. First of all, I analysed the movement of the camera by capturing one frame from every six flames. So I get 4 flames per second, then I mapped the information into virtual spaces by plating the relation between the camera and its vanishing point. By this technique, I got parts of camera, the movements of vanishing points and the diagrams of their relationship. After that I did the same process in order to analyse the movement of the characters in the film. From then onwards, I traced the movement of the character and that of the camera. By mapping the movements on the existing architectural space, an invisible shape was created within the room.

figure 19

Uncanny architecture in film/Project

> defination what?

figure 20 Uncanny architecture in film/Project

studio methods 29

studio methods

Synthetic Space and Synthetic Time The second project investigated the relationship between the reality and the unreality of time and space. I use my dream as a site. It allows me to construct an imaginary sense of place where the different between the real and the unreal is hardly to distinguish. I used two tactics to create senses of synthetic space and time. Firstly, I explored and practiced on how to use a camcorder to record and compose the sense of place, to play with speed up and slow down footage, in order to depict a synthetic time. Secondly, I used an editing technique to create the unreality of space by shifting positions of myself from place to place in the city. Those places are not physically connected to one another. In sound part, I mixed together the sound from real footage (a situation in my dream) with the sound of the parallel world (the sound from the world outside the dream) to make a confusion of the real and the unreal situation. Moreover, I slowed down the sound in some shots in order to emphasise the important of the scene. Finally I used an alarm clock sound at the beginning and the end of the film to suggest a sense of the predicament. The alarm clock sound creates a looping dynamic. Accordingly, I tried to make the audience confused about where is the beginning and where is the end of the film.

figure 21

Uncanny architecture in film/Project

> defination what?

studio methods

Christmas Work experience During the Christmasâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s break of 2008, I had an opportunity to work with Miren Maranon Tejedor. She is a freelance Art director working at the moment for a small music video project for Emilianna Torrini. The theme of the project is a Jungle Drum. Due to limited budget, she made a set of forest out of papers. The project took 6 days. At the beginning a meeting was hold to explain the whole area of the project, at which we met with the film director, the producer and the art director. The discussion of what we were going to do during the shooting day was very interesting in that all scenes were going to be built for the shooting of the video. When they were shot they appear as real. Because everything were depended upon what camera could see in the scene and what were best angles the camera wanted to shoot. From then on, we started cut and prepared stuff for making the paper forest. It took three days in the process. Then we spent two days more to build the set in studio, and one day for shooting. In the shooting day we had to stand by for moving and rearranging the set for difference scenes. The camera man always focused on how the character appeared on the view finder. The director mainly focused on the monitor (although sometimes, he had to coach the singer about her acting) for making the best of the post-production process. After one scene was finished, the director, the producer, the camera man, and the art director went together to the story board and discussed about the next scene. The director then explained what he wanted for camera man to shoot, and the art director and he producer would remind everybody about the schedule at the end. So it meant that they planed everything almost perfectly before shooting and all of them were strict to the storyboard. However, at the end of the shooting day, they have to skip some scenes because they did not have enough time.

figure 22

Uncanny architecture in film/Project

> defination what?

studio methods

exploration phase two The second term, the research was extended to the study of creating a virtual three dimensional space by using a computer generation software. And also investigate an effect of specific editing technique and video transition. Moreover, a development of an idea for the final project was start from a point of near future landscape of Detroit.

after disaster The â&#x20AC;&#x153;After disasterâ&#x20AC;? is a theme of a location in the near future landscape. The nature of this landscape was described as a derelict, abandoned, and flooding city. The scenarios pursue to depict the contradictory image of a memorable modern city and its present emptiness. The virtual three dimensional spaces were used as a representation of the future imaginary landscape. I had practiced on using computer software to create a virtual landscape in my first short footage. I found that the virtual three dimensional spaces which was created from still images in Adobe After Effect can provide a distinct characteristic space. The study of editing techniques and video transitions improved my skills and also provided the flexibility and adaptive solution to construct architectural space. The practices and experiments on the technique during the second term lead me interested in the idea of reversing and tracing back architectural design process, in order to understand architectural space in different point of view, and hopefully can regenerate and reorganise the space. figure 23

Uncanny architecture in film/Project

> defination what?

Reference

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15.

16. 17. 18. 19. 20.

Antonioni, Michelangelo, Blow-Up (fp. 1966), (screenplay). Lorrimer Publishing: London, 1971 Bachelard, Gaston. (1969), ‘The poetics of space’ Boston, MA Berger, John. (1972), ‘Ways of Seeing’, Penguin: London. Bordwell, David and Kristin Thompson. (2006), Film Art: An Introduction, New York: McGraw Hill. Buchler, Pavel. (2000), ‘Ghost story’ between the lines, pp.30 Brunsdon, Charlotte. (2007), ‘London in Cinema: The cinematic city since 1945’ Curtis, Barry. (2008), ‘Dark places, the haunted house in film’. Dries, Manuel. (1999), ‘David Lynch’s Lost Highway: Perpetual Mystery or Visual Philosophy.’ Eisenstein, S. (1949), ‘Film form’. The united State of America : Harcourt, Brace and World. Eisenstein, S. (1938), ‘Montage and Architecture’ (CA. 1938) in Assemblage 10, December 1989 Fairservice, D. (2001), ‘film editing: History’, Theory, and Practice: Look at the invisible. Graham, Dan. (1997), ‘Dan Graham: Architecture’ Graham, Dan. (1979), ‘Video, architecture, television’ : writing on video and video works, 1970-1978 / edited by Benjamin H.D. Buchloh. Healy, Alice. (2002), ‘Camera Obscura or Mobile Eye? Spectatorship’ : Interpretation and Ambiguity in Blow up and The Well, Alice Healy, Department of Australian Studies. Lynch, David. (1997), ‘Lynch on Lynch’ edited by Christ Rodley Schivelbusch makes, Wolfgang. (1986), ‘these claims in The Railway journey’: The industrialization of time and space in Nineteenth Century (Berkeley, CA) Vidler, Anthony. (1992), ‘The architectural uncanny: Essay in the Modern Unhomely’ (Cambridge, MA). Vidler, Anthony. (2000), ‘Warped Space: Art, Architecture, and Anxiety in Modern culture, Introduction’ Vidler, Anthony. (2003), ‘Fantasy, the Uncanny and Surrealist Theories of Architecture, Papers of Surrealism Issue 1 winter 2003’ Wall, Jeff. (1991), ‘Dan Graham’s Kammerspiel’. Wall, Jeff. (2007), ‘Jeff Wall: black and white photographs 1996-2007’ / [text, Craig Bunnett]... London: White Cube, 2007

Uncanny architecture in film/Reference

Bibliography

Filmography Antonioni, M. (1996) ‘Blow-Up’ Amenábar A. (2001) ‘The others’ Aronofsky, D.(1998) ‘Pi’ Aronofsky, D.(2000) ‘Requiem for a dream’ Cunningham, C. (1997) ‘Come to daddy’ Cunningham, C. (1998) ‘Afrika Shox’ Eisenstein, S. (1928) ‘October’ Fincher, D. (2002), ‘Panic Room’ Hitchcock, A. (1954), ‘Rope’ Juan Antonio Bayona. (2007), ‘The Orphanage’ Lynch, D. (1997), ‘Lost Highway’ Lynch, D. (2001), ‘Mulholland dreive’ Michael G. (2003), ‘Directors Label: Polaroid… resignation. Sokurov, A. (2002) ‘Russian Ark Russkiy kovcheg’

Uncanny architecture in film/Reference

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14.

List of illustrations Research map : meaning Battle of Alexander at issus passerby, Jeff Wall (1996) colour phographs, Jeff Wall reflection painting, Richard Estes light intensity project map story planning story board David Fincher’s video transition Alfred Hitchcock’s video transition Michael Gondry’s camera movement Chris Cunningham’s cameramovement Vanishing point virtual space Three dimensional layers environment Three dimensional projections montage editing technique (October) jump cut technique (Breathless) exploration phase one chronogram synthetic space and time work experiece exploration phase two

08 10 13 14 15 15 18 19-20 21 22 23 23 24 25 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32

Uncanny architecture in film/Reference

figure 01 figure 02 figure 03 figure 04 figure 05 figure 06 figure 07 figure 08 figure 09 figure 10 figure 11 figure 12 figure 13 figure 14 figure 15 figure 16 figure 17 figure 18 figure 19 figure 20 figure 21 figure 22 figure 23