Technology and the other social capital that architecture needs

Cedric Price and Andr茅s Jaque

El dispositivo tecnol贸gico y el otro capital social que la arquitectura necesita

Technology and the other social capital that architecture needs Degree Thesis

Author

Javier L贸pez-Menchero Ortiz de Salazar

Tutors

Jose Mar铆a Torres Nadal Gregory Bracken July 2015

TFG de Arquitectura

Universidad de Alicante / TU Delft

INDEX

1. INTRODUCTION Note. Muestra la vinculación del autor con ambos arquitectos y los temas planteados en el enunciado.

Cedric Price. En la década de los sesenta abre el debate sobre el papel de la tecnología en la creación de situaciones arquitectónicas.

Andrés Jaque. Trae a la contemporaneidad y actualiza las cuestiones intuidas y parcialmente experimentadas en la arquitectura de Cedric Price.

2. ABOUT TECHNOLOGY AND SOCIAL CAPITAL. Introduce el vocabulario específico de este TFG y dilucida cómo lo entienden cada uno de los autores.

Objetives. Expone de qué forma se van a argumentar las formulaciones del apartado anterior.

3. [FROM MOVEMENT TO TELEPORTATION] [SINCE HOMO-LUDENS UNTILL TRANS-SOCIETY]. Las evoluciones sociales y culturales han determinado cambios en el entendimiento y las posibilidades de las tecnologías y viceversa.

[Movement. Homo-Ludens]. Cedric Price vislumbra una sociedad basada en la fluidez y la incertidumbre donde se producen nuevas formas de interacción, y busca desplegar unos dispositivos que refuercen estos comportamientos.

[Teleportation. Trans-Society]. Las formas de comunicación, interacción, y congregación han cambiado y con ellas el papel de la tecnología y el capital social en la creación arquitectónica. La multiplicidad digital es un nuevo parámetro que tam bién afecta en la disposición de comunidades.

4. SPECIFICATIVE POSITIONS. La comparación de temas externos a tecnología y capital social, pero a su vez representativos de su entendimiento por parte de cada arquitecto, es un recurso que cimienta las formulaciones propuestas en los apartados dos y tres.

Concealed descriptions. Steel Housing and Fray Foam Home. Mientras Cedric Price describe lo oculto a través de la comparación de frames (en este caso temporales) rigidizados, Andrés Jaque expone las relaciones entre elementos distantes y cercanos en una misma identidad.

Instrumentalization of machineries. Cosmo and Fun Palace. Ambos autores (con diferente eficacia) utilizan las disposiciones tecnológicas para descubrir procesos ocultos, ya sean sociales, políticos o de otras índoles.

Edge lines. Cosmo and Aviary. La materialización arquitectónica conlleva unas predisposiciones espaciales por parte del usuario por su entendimiento como continente (Price) y como ente (Jaque).

5. PINTEREST. Se estudia esta herramienta como dispositivo visualizador y potenciador de las relaciones entre tecnología y capital social y se pone en valor la vinculación entre ambos arquitectos.

6. CONCLUSIONS. Las formas de producción arquitectónica de ambos autores son muy relevantes por traer comportamientos contemporáneos e impulsos sociales a la arquitectura.

ABSTRACT (Spanish) Desde que Cedric Price pronunció su conocido: ‘si la

tecnología era la respuesta, ¿Cuál era la pregunta?’, se abre el debate sobre el papel real de los artefactos en

la arquitectura y cómo afectan estos a las relaciones entre ellos y con el capital social. Entendemos capital

social como el caudal de acontecimientos que tiene

que ver con los sensible y con lo cognitivo producido en el contexto de las redes sociales. Estas tecnologías

también definen y modifican las relaciones entre los usuarios. Cedric Price entiende la arquitectura como la configuración de situaciones en las que entran en contacto

diferentes entidades: arquitectónicas y sociales, pero también políticas, culturales, económicas, etc. e intenta

disponerlas desde lo arquitectónico. En concreto, su

arquitectura está basada en la creación de dispositivos al servicio de los usuarios que cuestionan las prácticas

arquitectónicas actuales de la sociedad, exponiendo la

falta de representación que dichas prácticas han dado a

formas alternativas de interacción social. Esto se sitúa en

un momento histórico en el que la necesidad de entender los procesos sociales y creativos como procesos de interacción es vital para el desarrollo de otras formas de comunidad.

Este TFG parte de la tesis de la condición vanguardista

de Cedric Price, precursor de una posición que entiende la arquitectura como una inventividad no exclusivamente

disciplinar. Ha sido necesario que transcurrieran 40 años para entender en toda su amplitud la propuesta de Cedric

Price y ha sido a través de las representaciones de algunas arquitecturas contemporáneas que podemos entender ese

legado. Este TFG trata de desplegar las concomitancias

6

y extensiones que la arquitectura de Andrés Jaque complejiza y actualiza sobre ciertas propuestas planteadas

por Cedric Price. Es precisamente la evolución de cómo son entendidas y aplicadas la tecnología y el capital social

la principal aportación de este trabajo. Creo que ambos campos de estudio son la argumentación clave para

explicar sus arquitecturas y sus prácticas arquitectónicas (que Cedric Price intuyó y Andrés Jaque ha tenido la ocasión de experimentar y desarrollar). Entender su evolución nos permitiría comprender las transformaciones culturales que las soportan, y vislumbrar aquellas situaciones

contemporáneas que pueden convertirse en tendencia de formas de compromiso de la arquitectura actual.

Por último, se introduce Pinterest como un dispositivo

tecnológico que en sí mismo nos permite visualizar y

potenciar las relaciones entre tecnología y capital social.

Esta herramienta forma parte del medio de investigación y ayuda a construir la vinculación visual entre ambos arquitectos. Otra vez, Price entrevió el papel de este tipo

de tecnologías en la arquitectura y Jaque lo ha testado en varios de sus proyectos. A través del estudio de una tecnología actual como Pinterest, quiero atestiguar

que Cedric Price y Andrés Jaque son imprescindibles actualmente, que quizá no sepamos contestar, pero sin

duda tenemos que seguir investigando: ‘Si la tecnología era la respuesta, ¿Cuál era la pregunta?’.

Este documento está compuesto por textos y dibujos que

tratan de entender y mostrar el alcance y las definiciones específicas que relacionan tecnología y capital social en las arquitecturas de dichos autores.

7

ABSTRACT (English) ‘Technology is the answer… but what was the question?’

- From the moment Cedric Price addressed these famous words, the debate upon the role and influence of artefacts towards social capital in architecture was

open. We understand social capital as the flow of events

that are related to senses and cognitions produced within the context of social networks. On the other hand, these technologies also define and modify the relations

produced between the users. Cedric Price understands architecture as the configuration of situations in which different entities relate and confront (architectural and

social, but also political, cultural, economical, etc.), as he tries to arrange them from the architectural point of

view. Specifically, his architecture is based on the creation

of devices at the service of the users that challenge the traditional and actual practices of architecture in society.

Along with this, he exposed the lack of representation that

those practices have given to alternative social interaction methodologies. All this is framed by a historical context

where the understanding of social and creative processes

as interaction methods is vital for the development of different ways of community.

This document starts with the conviction about Cedric

Price’s cutting-edge condition, forefront of a position that

understands architecture as inventiveness not exclusively discipline. It has taken 40 years to understand the full

extent of Cedric Price’s proposal and it has been through

representations of various contemporary architectures

that we can understand his legacy. This thesis tries to display the similarities and extensions that Andres Jaque’s architecture updates about certain proposals made by

8

Cedric Price. The main contribution of this document is precisely that explains the evolution of how technology

and social capital are applied between their architecture.

I think both fields of study are key arguments to explain its architectures and architectural practices. Particularly

those of that Cedric Price sensed and Andres Jaque had the opportunity to experiment with and develop.

Understanding its evolution allows us to understand the cultural transformations that support them, and glimpse

those contemporary situations that can become trendy forms of commitment to contemporary architecture.

Finally, Pinterest is introduced as a technological device

that in itself allows us to visualize and enhance the relationships between technology and social capital. This

tool is part of the research environment and helps build a visual link between both architects. Once again, Price

glimpsed the role of these technologies in architecture and Jaque has tested it in a range of his projects. Through the study of a contemporary technology such as Pinterest,

I want to attest that Cedric Price and Andres Jaque are

contemporary day society’s indispensible figures. Perhaps we are still not able to give an answer to this statement but

we certainly need to persist the further exploration on: ‘Technology is the answer... but what was the question?’.

This document consists of texts and drawings that

attempt to understand and illustrate the scope and specific definitions that link technology and social capital in the architectures of Cedric Price and Andres Jaque.

9

10

This thesis is developed in five chapters in which I discuss mainly the themes of technology

and capital social in the architecture of Cedric Price and Andrés Jaque. I also study and meditate about the relation (commonalities and differences) between the authors and the importance of the drawings in their architecture.

Chapter one is the introduction, in which I first comment on why I chose this thesis and how it

is connected to me, then I introduce both above-mentioned architects. The next two sections are where the main argumentation related to technology and social capital takes place, discussing what the consequences of these terms in architecture are through personal drawings and texts.

The fourth chapter shows several case studies that compare a project of Cedric Price to one of

Andrés Jaque. With the comment on a particular topic in each case, this section helps to define more and more what it has been introduced in the second chapter. Lastly, in the conclusion

we try to figure out what is the relevance of both architects in the architecture history and nowadays.

1. INTRODUCTION

NOTE This particular topic that explores about technology and social capital interests me a lot in

both personal and academic contexts.

From an academic point of view, the research stimulates me due to my situation between the

Universities of Alicante and Delft. Obviously having inputs from both universities and contexts

helps me to detach myself from my immediate background and to have a broader view about what I am producing. Furthermore, the possibility of giving visibility in a foreign country of what is happening in architectural environments in Spain attracts me as well.

Talking about my personal context, for some time I have been wondering about how the

contemporaneity has affected me as an individual. I have developed an opinion about the understanding of the society that we live in and what kind of architecture could work with it.

This idea of creating an architecture that supports the social agitations of the time was clearly developed by Cedric Price, who introduced it as one of his main topic in all his projects.

As in other periods of time the new ways of mobilization or some political changes became

the main defining points of a society, I strongly believe that the fragmentation, multiplicity and

uncertainty (of sources, authors, conflicts…) is what will define this first society of the twenty-

first century. I feel like this transmedia and known ambiguity of which I am talking about is highly developed by authors such as the sociologist Bruno Latour and the Spanish architect

Andrés Jaque (to whom we will now turn). That is why trying to understand the connection that is produced between these two architects is so relevant for me.

11

CEDRIC PRICE Cedric Price (born in 1934 in Stone, United Kingdom) was one of the first architects to introduce

several disciplines in architecture, giving them primary importance. He was considered one of the most visionary architects of the twentieth century and nowadays has earned a lot of

relevance between some contemporary architects such as Rem Koolhaas, Bernard Tschumi,

Richard Rogers, et al. due to his developments of topics that nowadays are present in society (fluidity, mobility, obsolescence, etc.).

His architecture production started from the late 1950s and he founded Cedric Price Architects

in 1960. It was during the 1960s when he shaped his most influential projects, but he never

stopped designing and discussing architecture until his death in 2003. In spite of this, it was the emerging transformations of the society in the post-war Britain what conformed the basis for the development of his architecture.

During this period, with the establishment of the welfare state in America, some parts of

Europe, and in particular Britain, there was supposed to be a transformation of the working

life. These changes were presented mainly due to the prediction of the decreasing working hours thanks to mechanization processes and high-tech machinery, leading to more leisure

time for the citizens. This new kind of work will probably need better qualified workers. This is the reason why many of his projects (including his two most relevant) join together leisure and

culture. The previous events in the century, in particular the changes in the British economy, has

also made the architect understand how fast the technology, social and economic environment can change. This context led to his main subjects for his projects: mobility, unpredictability, and

time. This three concepts are trying to explain and address the change and the uncertainty. It is very easy to track this concepts through all his work.

We have to distinguish Price from the vast number of utopian architects of the 1960s in Britain

and its near neighbours. We are talking here about the projects developed by the famous group

archigram, the projects of Yona Friedman and other European utopias as New Babylon by Constant, etc. Even though the subjects of the projects agreed sometimes (and at first sight can

look similar), he was never a utopian. He always developed his projects until the construction

detail, assuring that they were realizable projects. The fact that almost none of his projects were built does not mean that his architecture production was not valuable or achievable, this can be easily proved with his most know project, the Fun Palace. Plans for this project were completed and prepared to be located in London but in the last moment the agreement failed.

Neither had it meant that he was a theoretical architect, because if not all, most of his ideas were present in the projects he developed.

Obviously time has passed and many things have changed. If we compare ourselves with

the people from the fifties and sixties we see clear differences between us: we eat, move, 12

communicate, etc., differently. But if we study for example the way we communicate nowadays, it is easy to recognise that is not only us who have changed. Devices and media elements have transmuted and our relationship with them have changed as well. In particular the digital era

has created a difficulty in detaching ourselves from technological devices that work with us.

For example, a big amount of data that we assume that we have is retained not by our brain but by our smartphone (phone numbers, addresses, birthdays, etc.).

In this context we should mention the work of Bruno Latour and in particular his statement

‘Technology is society made durable’ (Bruno Latour 1991). In this publication just mentioned, Latour explains how we cannot look at social relations anymore to understand power

relationships, but instead we need to focus our attention on the association produced between humans and non-humans, both called equally actants. These non-humans are active elements

in the task of keeping the society together. This is part of the so called the Actor Network Theory (ANT).

In an architectural context Andrés Jaque understands these relations and, instead of hiding

them, he gives visibility to these community processes.

ANDRÉS JAQUE

Andrés Jaque is a Spanish architect who was born in 1971. He directs Andrés Jaque Architects

and the Office for Political Innovation, which he founded in 2003. His architecture office is a

transdisciplinary studio where they investigate how architecture and architects participate in the creation of communities and urbanism.

To describe the context of this architect is a very much more difficult task due to its proximity

in time and location. Probably, as Jaque express in his interview by Hans Ulrich Obrist for the Venice Biennale 2014, what moves the projects of this architect are very personal concerns that

are centred in how politics are created from domestic and small scale actions. He claims that

the action of preparing the table for the dinner, or the decoration of the Christmas tree produce political encounters that configure community. The connection between these elements and other actants, is what generates urban enactments which ultimately will create urbanism.

Urbanism is not a static place anymore, but an agglomeration of technologies and actors connected from a different set of places.

Knowing the importance of these topics and by the way he produces architecture we could

relate him with Cedric Price (of whom we have already discuss and will keep on doing), Ernesto

Laclau and Bruno Latour. This last philosopher, anthropologist, and sociologist is of vital

importance because his theory of the actor-network (which we have commented before) is very present in Andrés Jaque’s projects. Influenced by this theory, the architecture of Andrés

Jaque is developed in an ecosystemic understanding of each project. This concept means that is 13

not only the architectural and social contexts are treated in his projects, but also the conflicts, problematics or resources processes that have (many times) been hidden in each situation.

2. ABOUT TECHNOLOGY AND SOCIAL CAPITAL

Both Andrés Jaque and Cedric Price understoond their architecture as the creation of

situations that generate communities. For this purpose they use social capital and technology as components (ingredients). But what do social capital and technology imply for me?

Technology, described by the Oxford English dictionary consists as follows: ‘machinery and

devices developed from scientific knowledge’, but to be more precise, in our case we would

define it as a set of devices and dispositifs which establish specific links with users or other technologies and are elements that create debate. It is an instrument that transcribes situations

into others with different potentials. Many times these elements are visualizers of conflicts and operational matrices in themselves.

Social capital is defined from a sociologic perspective as ‘the expected collective or economic

benefits derived from the preferential treatment and cooperation between individuals and

groups’, or ‘as networks together with shared norms, values and understandings that facilitate co-operation within or among groups.’ Yet, in this case this definition is once more not accurate

enough, since it excludes conflict when using compatible sources and fixes situations when including norms and values in it. Our understanding of social capital is more primitive as it is

simply defined as the group of potential users that become actants in architecture (active longterm users).

It is through the interaction of these two elements where ecosystemic communities are

produced. In this definition of community we include thereby not only technologies and social capital but also the set of rules and links that are established between them and other elements (both stabilizing and destabilizing) that make the set develop and transform.

OBJETIVOS

The main objective of this thesis is to develop and demonstrate the provenance of these

statements through the projects carried out by both architects, focusing mainly in their drawing production.

For me and the above-mentioned architects the drawings themselves go beyond merely

architectural representation, and have the ability to raise discussions as much as built

architecture does. The importance of the drawings in each architect is very obvious for several

reasons. First of all, as Cedric Price argued, architecture is too slow. While the process to

complete one building can easily take many years, the drawing production is much quicker.

Even more important is the fact that the vast majority of the architecture that we have received 14

from Cedric Price is through his drawings. As we know, his main projects and most theoretically developed (Fun Palace and Potteries Thinkbelt) were never built, but this did not impede that

the theory of these projects (through the drawings) influenced many subsequent architects

and projects. It is manifested that the Pompidou Centre, designed by Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers, followed closely principles of the free space design of the Fun Palace. In the architecture of Jaque, not only the drawings are very important but also many other forms of architectural

‘representations’. He uses models, artefacts, and installations until the point that you cannot

distinguish were representation finish and architecture starts. This is very useful for many of

his investigation projects, in which the descriptive (research) and proposal (new) aspects of the projects merge together.

This is the main reason why a big part of this thesis consists in the production of drawings

that also open a debate about the ideas that we are commenting about technology and social

capital. These drawings that I produce are new interpretations of their projects; or alterations, modifications and adjustments of the original drawings and images created by the architects.

It is essential to situate each of them inside the different interpretations that technology

and social capital have and which I will venture to stablish based on my further research. This conceptions will lead me to understand better the actual position of the architects inside the architectural context nowadays.

We also need to investigate what is there that interests us, is it the type of communities that

their projects produce or the way in which they are being produced? Is there any difference between communities created by its architecture and others with a different understanding of architecture? It is very easy to distinguish their methodologies (technology + social capital) from other architects, but very hard to exclude the rest of the architectonic situations from the word ‘community’.

If the answer to the first question is yes then what we should analyse is what kind of

communities are generated, not so much if they are created or not.

3. FROM MOVEMENT TO TELEPORTATION. SINCE HOMO-LUDENS TILL TRANS-SOCIETY In order to understand and explain how these architects face technology and capital social

I developed a series of drawings. There are two sequences of two drawings, the first series is related to Cedric Price and the second one to Andrés Jaque. In both first drawings a number of representative projects are shown through drawings and images created by its author, only

they are fragmented trying to emulate how them see the connections between elements. The second drawing of each sequence is the consequence of mingling their own representations, with this method I intend to understand better their conceptions, arise questions about how they really work, and what consequences would have the change of some elements.

15

MOVEMENT. HOMO-LUDENS Figure1

Drawing by the author

METAMORPHOSIS Figure2

Drawing by the author

MOVEMENT. HOMO-LUDENS (METAMORPHOSIS)

In the first drawing, ‘Movement. Homo-Ludens’ we can see different projects developed

by Cedric Price, not only his best knows (as Fun Palace and Potteries Thinkbelt), but also

constructed and experimental ones (Aviary and Interaction centre, and Market Stall). I selected

only drawings of the author for this experiment since it was his main representation form of architecture and where he developed mostly his theory.

The purpose of both illustrations is, through a re-enactment of the original material, to

understand how the connection between the technologies and the social capital are functioning.

This first drawing has a clear structure. The projects conform a solid closed line that encircle a central, free space. It has been designed this way because this is how the technology works mostly in the projects of Cedric Price. One characteristic of all his projects is that the uncertainty

is addressed, but always there is a strong control on the scope of the design as well. Even when the maximum movement and adaptability is possible, the projects are designed in a range and its maximum movement is always controlled.

In the original drawings, technology is described from the most objective way of looking

at it. The infrastructure composed by tubes, wires, cranes, stairs, etc. is drawn usually in a

neutralized way. Technology is described always from the same point of view and very technically determined. It is the people who move and create. In the image of the Fun Palace

we can see that people is the part that is active. It is more clearly shown in the sketch of the interaction centre: a series of activities are illustrated simulating the range of situations that can be produced in the free space that the technology generates. This activities vary in graphics, shapes, and sizes, showing that there is an array of freedom and uncertainty in the possibilities.

In fact, the social capital is described as evolutionary: first, a clown appears outside the centre,

but when he enters (shown with the arrows) a performance is developed. But it could be also the other way around, a group of people interested in the circus take classes, and then leave as clowns, lengthening the situations produced inside the centre.

Cedric Prices makes a distinction between technological dispositif and social capital in which

the first one possibilities the other. Architecture is the creation of situations (architecture is under and also for social situations).

The technology of Cedric Price, understood as the whole united infrastructure that possibility

the social interactivity, was understood as a container. It was an independent element, a capsule

that differenced the interior and exterior elements. But also differenced the fluid activity and the movable structure. Even though the technology was movable, was not adaptable, and

therefore, will get obsolete. The best example for what we are discussing here is the Fun Palace,

a large installation that moved the inner parts of its frame in order to full fill the new desires and activities of the users. But the frame is unmovable and the mechanisms never evolve.

18

Cedric Price argues that technology does not have a fundamental importance. He uses the

latest development to increase the activities and situations, but as you can see in his built projects, you do not actually need all that high technology to create architecture. The situations

are architecture. Architecture is relevant (but you have to distinguish where architecture should

go, architecture does not solve all the problems), technology is not that much. Even though this is the way the architect thinks, the technology gets a great importance in their project through

his drawings, where it gets the maximum importance. As we have discussed before, technology also gets obsolete, which reinforces the difference with social capital.

The technology in Cedric Price’s mind is not as fragmented as it is in Jaque’s architecture, but

instead conforms one element, as it represented in my own drawing. This is more present in his first projects, for as the time passes, this ideas and the limits of them become blurrier.

This is the reason why the drawing of the Interaction Centre (diagram on the right. 1976)

becomes so vital. A transition point could be seen in the drawings made during the design of this project. We have discussed in this drawing how the social capital is understood as evolutionary and changeable, but something that could go under seen is the difference in the representation of some technologies. We have there a big set of steel trusses (as in the rest of drawings, they

are very technical and neutral), but some other small devices appear and they are represented in the same playful way as the social capital. We are talking about devices as a saw or a simple

sewing machine. The author shows a woman that, in the interaction with this machine, gets

trapped in a wooden stick, or a man transforming wooden elements. This small gesture is

incredibly significant at this point, because it shows a detachment inside the technologies.

There are still technologies that allow situations, the ones that are meant to supports other

geometries or set up the spaces, and they are still perceived detached from the users. But there are some other small devices that are more relevant because of their connection with the social capital that because of its pre-designed utility. This is what we could see as a first, small step

towards a more ecosystemic understanding of architecture, creating a direct connection with the architecture that Andres Jaque produces.

This is the interpretation that we extract from the architecture of Cedric Price about

technology and social capital, but obviously each project has a particular way of referring to

this topics. A transformation and evolution can be seen through his different themes. We have already talked about the drawing of the Interaction Cetre, but talking about social capital, while

in Fun Palace there is only human social capital, in the Potteries Thinkbelt we can see what

we could call a starting point for posterior developments such as ecosystemic ideas. In the second project, there is no technology and humans, but a mixture of technology, human, actual

resources, recycling processes, nature, and personal motives that together develop a more networked project for the modern man.

19

My second figure connects all the projects shown of Cedric Price and merge them in one. We

can clearly see that this ‘new’ project makes a lot of sense. It is understood as one plan that is working well together. I believe this is because it follows the same principle as the architecture

of the English architect. All the devices are disposed together forming one only element and dispositif that allows the social capital to develop and have interactions that cannot happen anywhere else. This drawing also makes visible that each series of technologies develops a

particular series of situations or not, the configuration of those technologies also have an impact

on the space and what happens inside the ‘free’ space. But as well as Cedric Price addresses the uncertainty in his project, this one would also need to have space for it. The combination of all

these parts does not mean that the result is going to be the simple addition, but a more complex system that we can never know how exactly will work and what kind of situations will produce.

TELEPORTATION. TRANS-SOCIETY (METAMORPHOSIS)

I studied the transformations of the conception and treatments of technology and Social

Capital inside the architecture of Andrés Jaque from six projects that I considered relevant for the

discussion: Rolling House for the Rolling Society, House in Never Never Land, Fray Foam Home, Escarabox, Sales Oddity, and Cosmo. With this purpose, I took several forms of representations

to show the projects: models, installations, drawing, buildings, etc., that the architect himself produced and modify them through transfiguration, disintegration, reassemble, etc. All the projects are detached in possible gears, both technologies and capital social that all working

together producing architecture. But none of this get-togethers are ‘clean’, but instead carry a background that relates with distant resources and problematics.

The representation’s methodology chosen for each project has a consequence in how

technology and social capital are described and understood. The variety produced in Andrés

Jaque’s work makes very difficult to establish a pattern that allow us to analyse from the same point of view all projects. Some technologies are described as consequences of the interaction

between them and the capital social, like we can see in the models of the Rolling House for the

Rolling Society (both images on top on the left). In this case, the social capital remains invisible but present at the same time. This situation is very common in his architecture, and depicts very well how it is possible to create architectural and political situations from the connection

between technology and social capital, and how this interaction change both elements. In other

pictures, as in the one that shows the Escarabox project (second image on the right column), devices and users are exposed together in the moment when architecture is produced. In this image, users are activating discussions strengthened by the disposal of the technologies. As a consequence, both groups of actants evolve and will prolong the architectural process through the extension of those discussions in other contexts. This distant relations again reinforce the

conception of teleportation and multiplicity of locations of architecture in the architecture of 20

Andrés Jaque. One last example that shows the variety of representations and conceptions is the Fray Foam Home installation for the biennale (diagram on the centre and left column). That

drawing expose the conflicts that are immersed in the domestic decisions: it does not directly describe technologies or capital social, but through the understanding of their influence in

other resources and situations, both terms are understood and expressed. It is very interesting

to see how in this project he makes no difference at all when he represents the technology or the capital social, both affects in other, distant, contexts and must be studied.

The first drawing of this series also tries to understand the differences between the conceptions

of both architects. We previously saw how the technology in Cedric Price’s architecture

is an uninterrupted constituent, here is different. Of course my own representation tries to emphasize this fact, but I believe it is clear how the movement in the British architect has been

transformed into ‘teleportation’, understanding with this term that even if the technological

dispositif is not always locally continuous or defined, it creates a strong connection between the elements. This has been very much helped by the new developments that affect all kinds of communications. We are talking about virtual communications such as phones or Internet,

which allows the spatial connection between distant elements, but also about other types. For

example the fact that we are able to eat every kind of fruit in every season of the year is due to the increase of aeroplane connections in the last 50 years. This last fact again shows that domestic decisions are politicized: buying and eating a tropical fruit out of season talks about

petrol consuming, about labour politics in distant countries, etc. The architecture of Andrés Jaque always tries to reveal the consequences of domestic decisions instead of hiding them, and intends to create a space for democratic confrontation and discussions.

Lastly, these drawings demonstrate the more ecosystemic view of the architecture of Andrés

Jaque, where humans and technologies can never be completely differentiated because they have

too much influence on each other. Andrés Jaque’s architecture talks about actants (developed in the Actor-Network-Theory). The architecture gains power through its participation in the

processes of creating communities (architecture is in the same level as people and objects),

because it is only when they merge together that architecture is produced. Andrés Jaque gives more importance to technology than Cedric Price when he mix it with the situations. We can see this in project such as IKEA disobedients, Cosmo, Escarabox, etc. In these projects, the

difference between technology and social capital vanishes, giving both the same importance in

the creation of communities. In the projects of Andrés Jaque we could say that the differences and transformations in the understanding and management of technologies comparing to the

examples of Cedric Price are quite big. For example, focusing on aesthetics, in contraposition to the sober, unornamented structures from Price, Andrés Jaque enriches his technologies with

heterogeneity, daily nature, expressivity, and the rejection of neutrality. Technology, as well as people do, always finds a way of making it personal and specific.

21

TELEPORTATION. TRANS-SOCIETY Figure3

Drawing by the author

METAMORFOSIS Figure4

Drawing by the author

Each project shown in the first figure has a specific complexity that makes it work as an

open ecosystem and this one is defined by the interaction between all its parts. Following the methodology of this drawing series, the last illustration (metamorphosis) tries to follow the understanding of the architectural conceptions developed by the architect and work with them

using manipulation processes. From this point, the conceptions in each project are studied and connections or exchanges are produced in the drawing to analyse how the projects would

modify. For example, what would change if instead of having a pool you have a bath tub? How the management and treatment of the water and the interaction with it would be adapted?

These are the kind of questions that the second drawing wants to arise in the reader.

The second drawing of this series shows how if we change some of their parts the projects

can be completely modified, maybe not aesthetically, but the discussions and processes that it arises are may not be the same. In order to put the drawing in words I will explain several

cases. If we change one regular bathroom for a swimming pool inside a private apartment the politics that surround the water in the house will change, probably chemical cleaning products would be introduced, a more public use of that area will be developed and other agents will participate in that architecture. In a bigger scale in the project of a Rolling House for the Rolling

society, the behaviour of the community will be different if we merge together the small, very

personalized with some mediatised houses from Sales Oddity and an installation as Cosmo.

We are talking in the last examples about modification of technologies but it works the same with social capital. That is shown in the Escarabox metamorphosis: it is not the same project if a collection of different people from different backgrounds participate than is it is only a group of people with the same ideals and concerns.

The idea of these series is to analyse and experiment with the ideas about technology and

social capital, trying to see how they work by analysing them but also by transforming them into different things.

NOTES

It is interesting that the work produced by the architects are done from different scales. This

is very easy to identify when the projects by themselves have big scalar differences such as Fun Palace and Escarabox, which treat similar topics but with different instruments. But even in

similar size projects you can realize how the reduced scale of the quotidian is very present in

the architecture of AndrĂŠs Jaque, while Cedric Price uses always a more top-down methodology.

Let’s put the example of Cosmo and the Potteries Thinkbelt. Cosmo is a pretty big mechanism

that moves around a particular place producing data. In spite of its size, how it really works is with the interaction between water and some specific algae in small departments. On the

other hand, the Aviary, Potteries Think Belt or any other project of Cedric Price is worked first from the general infrastructure and only then, the small objects. This could be related with the 24

understanding of the role of the architect in each of them. Cedric Price, in spite of categorizing himself as a non-architect, thinks as an organizer in some way. Not an organizer for the life, decisions or modification of the users, but as an organizer of the project. This can be shown in

his determination of the necessity of finishing a project in ten years. He could have given this authority to the connection and the actants themselves, to discuss if after ten years the project was not valuable anymore. Andrés Jaque moves himself out of this general view of the architect, positioning himself more as an active participant of the project.

It is vital to understand the importance of the projection of the produced situations to

comprehend the link between Cedric Price and Andrés Jaque. Both architects believe in the importance of the continuity, not only of the event, but also the development that is produced in

the actants and how this modifies the project. The users will lengthen the architecture because it has transform them.

4. SPECIFICATIVE SPARS

To comprehend better the differences and commonalities in the understanding of the

architecture and the dichotomy of technology and social capital we match up two projects (one

of each architect) and we investigate one theme that is very present in both drawings. So far I

have done three experiments in this series that are shown next and that I called Descripciones no manifiestas, Instrumentalización de maquinarias, and Líneas de borde.

CONCEALED DESCRIPTIONS. Steel Housing and Fray Foam Home

Figure5

Original drawing by Cedric Price

25

STEEL HOUSING

In his document ‘Towards a 24-hour economic living joy’ (1967), Cedric Price proposes a

design of Steel Housing. These houses would be built with a steel structure forming rings seven metres long, separated every two metres, and that could have a maximum of two floors.

The diagrammatic schemes that the architect use for explaining the project shows an

abstraction of the life of the users in time terms. In these diagrams you can see some common characteristics in some time uses, but also the unpredictable and uncertainty of the use of the

house. This drawing is directly connected with the society from his epoch and shows how Cedric Price projects. He claimed that the rate of change of occupancy of houses will keep increasing and therefore the house will not be valued for its long-term capacity but for the way it adapts

to the 24-hour cycle of daily life. That is the reason why the design criteria should now be the design of spaces that are able to support the most variety of possible functions.

This kind of design is much related to other of his projects, from which we should stress the

Fun Palace. All the technology implemented in this project is meant to achieve a complete cycle,

in which all the spaces are adapted to the maximum number of uses, exploiting the capacity of the place until the extreme.

The representation of this houses reinforces the difference between the authors in the

understanding of the technology. In Cedric Price’s drawings we see a large gap between

technology and social capital. The first one appears to be adaptable but it is still rigid and the frame for the activities. The social capital, masked as geometrical shapes, is an element that

changes, increases, decreases appears and disappears. This difference never happens in the

drawings of Andrés Jaque, in which technology and social capital are, if not the same, integrated as symbiotic elements of a bigger network.

FOAM FRAY HOME

26

Figure6

Original drawing by Andrés Jaque

Fray Foam Home is an installation project by Andrés Jaque and the Office for Political

Innovation built for the Venice Biennale 2010. In the event, the architect recreates ‘the network of spaces upon which a specific home –an apartment shared by four people on Pez Street in Madrid– is truly built: the network of landscapes, resources and infrastructures that are

necessary so that the forms of comfort, supplies and fictions that are activated in daily lives can be possible. The distribution of water, the exploitation of energy resources, the intellectual

property rights or the ideology of audiovisual contents are compulsory transit points of the polemics which connect us as societies, and in which our collectivities take shape.’ (Andrés Jaque 2010).

This specific house is just an example on how urbanism and communities are produced. With

the installation, Jaque explains that these connections between the house and some distant sources (urban enactments) are what produce urbanism.

Foam describes political resources inside the apartment that are also connected with

external sources, creating a domestic active net. For Jaque, this is describing the transmedia

globalization, in which nothing can be described just from one perspective. The narrative of

Andrés Jaque includes the connections between worlds, and describes the machinery more as an alive and changing element than as static situations.

With his view of architecture, would it not be possible to explain the concept technology

by drawing a domestic recipe? For Jaque the technologies are not highly developed scientific devices, but also elements from everyday life which connects us with different social and architectonic contexts. For instance, a particular series of clothes can be technologies that relates some inhabitants of a house with the collapse of a factory in Bangladesh.

If we focus on the representation of the studied house, it does not show the elements or

technologies of the house by themselves, but as a relation with other sources. These elements

put in contact distant capsules at the same time in everyday associations. That, apart from

demonstrating that Andrés Jaque is a supporter of the theory of the actor-network, defines a very different drawing from how Cedric Prices describes his Steel Housing. This drawing is

less abstract, and even though it looks more intuitive is oddly more meticulously precise: it is measurable. If you want you could follow the cleaning process of the water to understand how

much energy does it spend, how many people intervene in the process and therefore estimate the impact on the living, it is traceable.

27

NOTES

Figure7

Drawing by the author

It may look as if Fray Foam Home and Steel Housing are not architectural projects by

themselves, but their drawings and installations differs a lot from merely representation.

Both in the installation and in the drawing of the technologies of the Fray Foam Home, Andrés

Jaque is proposing with this representations new ways of understanding the relations between the architectonic elements, the people and the ideas of urban. Cedric Price in the drawing of the

time schedule of the steel housing projects the idea he has of the society, and how ‘the house is no longer acceptable as a pre-set ordering mechanism for family life’ (Cedric Price 1967).

Both drawings are very relevant for the architecture of the authors and very representative

of the way they think. They show the differences between the two architects but also the similarities and the connections that brings them together: both use the drawing to make their

anxieties visible, and they are a frame for discussion and debates. Once more, the Fray Foam Home drawing express the need for understanding the relevance of the everyday technologies in the production of architecture and society. The Steel housing drawings, on the other hand, show how the British society cannot follow the traditional architecture model to its development.

The model of Fray Foam Home in a sense is the same as the questions that Cedric Price asks

about house, houses, housing and home in the book published by the Architectural Association Works II. Instead of exhausting the definitions of their ideas by explicitly showing them, they open a discussion in which the issue is present, but not solved in a closed way. Andrés Jaque and

Cedric Price choose a representation in which the definitions are not obvious, addressing the

change and the different points of view (exactly as they do in their other architectural projects).

28

INSTRUMENTALIZATION OF MACHINERIES. Fun Palace and Cosmo FUN PALACE

Figure8

Drawing by the author

This project is the most representative-influential-theoretically developed project of Cedric

Price. He started working on it in 1960 together with the theatre director Joan Littlewood, and its development ended in 1964, when it was supposed to be built in London.

The Fun Palace ‘was not a building in any conventional sense, but was instead a socially

interactive machine’ (Stanley Mathews 2007), a melting-pot of technologies created for the development of leisure and cultural activities together.

In order to satisfy the necessities of the quickly changing society Price needed to address

the uncertainty and make his project rapidly adaptable. For this purpose, the authors brought together many different disciplines and put them into the service of the architecture. By that time, the game theory and the cybernetics were being developed and the architect realize that

could be used to analyse the society preferences and control automatically the changes inside the mechanism. It was the perfect match for the context of the project. Together with the main

authors, a committee of cybernetics expert participated actively in the development of the

project until the point that the project could be draw and explain from that perspective. The Fun Palace became the first transdisciplinary project of architecture.

During its design process, the Fun Palace changed several times in shape and dimensions,

but the concept for the design was the same from the beginning. Price, imagined a series of

structural trusses that were strong enough to hold the desirable activities and the architecture 29

elements that those could bring. With the help of Frank Newby and others, the final design ended up being of 109.7 metres long and 237.7 metres wide. The modular distance between

trusses was of 18.3 metres and had two central bays were the trusses were separated 36.6m, leaving all the space for the activities without obstructions. Two perpendicular gantry cranes

covered the 73.2 metres of the bays and moved along them, in order to carry capsules from one place to another. Movable stairs and ramps completed the infrastructure. The devices inside the

Fun Palace needed to create the perfect environment conditions for the people inside, which is why high technologies for thermal control were added.

As we can see through the way the project is explained, there is a big difference between

technology and social capital. It is clear that for the architect, you need both to create the

situations that define architecture, but each remains on its place. The technology acts as a frame work, an operational matrix that embraces and give the appropriate conditions for the

activities and encounters. The social capital, on the other hand, is the component that activates those technologies and interact, becoming the main character in architecture. Even though we

can realize that for him, all the devices were designed in order to support the activities and adapt to them in the best way possible, they earn a lot of importance, in an aesthetic and a working way.

This difference is reinforced by the notion of time in the project. Price believes that, as the

society is changing all the time, and we cannot predict its evolution, therefore the project should not last more than 10 years. But why cannot the technology evolve and change in a more

drastic way as society does? It could be imagine some parts of the fun palace that disappears

and moves to other places, while some others stay and join new pieces to develop a Fun Palace 2.0 to call it somehow.

COSMO

30

Figure9

Drawing by the author

The MoMA PS1 is a contemporary art institution that was found in 1971 and develops

installations across the city of New York. It started as a ‘beach busting into the city’ (Andrés Jaque 2014) with the water as a main topic and became a place where there was no need for following the stated daily life values. Andrés Jaque, who won the contest to build the MoMAPS1

pavilion of 2015, retakes this issue and analyse the relation with water, its significance and the conflicts regarding water nowadays.

Andrés Jaque and the Office for Political Innovation propose to build Cosmo. Cosmo is a

mechanism which makes visible a contemporary anxiety. By sharing the data that it produces creates consciousness in an online network.

The object is composed of multiple transparent tubes in which the polluted water will flow. In

between its journey, the water is cleaned (3000 gallons each four days) by a series of algae, and

all this process can be seen and shared through media devices. This makes of COSMO an offline as well as an online element which triggers the awareness of the actual situation of water. We now realize that water is not the infinite source that we expected it to be but we still do not drop the utilitarian and leisure over-use of it.

Cosmo as a unitary, independent mechanism that generates situations around it as a regular

(sculptural) pavilion, but also generates further situations and relations with distance locations, coming back to the notion of ‘Urban enactment’ very present in Andrés Jaque’s architecture.

In a nearby spatial definition, Cosmo will associate tourists and experts from different fields for a short time performing experience. This social capital will extend the urban net created

by Cosmo through social and online platforms with their social circles. The purpose of this

extension is to recreate the cleaning water systems of Cosmo across the world and different

urban cases. Therefore, the more long-term connection and the one that keeps the urbanism alive are the online urban enactments.

Cosmo, as I have already mention, acts like a non-dependant visualizer, this means that it does

not need spatially close social capital to generate urban enactments. What would happen if

Cosmo was not there? If instead of asking for connections from the people that gathers around

the mechanism, it was COSMO itself who targeted social capital to send the information to?

Would it have an impact on the long and the short distance urban enactments?

NOTES

One commonality that is present in both is the will of showing what is hidden.

In many projects Cedric Price creates a very striking image with his multiple steel cranes.

This is what we first realize when we look at the drawing, but when we analyse it deeply we

can observe that many other elements such as motorized components and climate devices are at sight. The modern tradition, with the function over the shape could have influenced in some 31

sense his formalization, together with the utopian aesthetics produced in England by that time.

But in his architecture, the form is approached with more lack of interest in aesthetic than

trying to avoid ornament. There is one particular thing that make us realize that even though Cedric Price has a will of exhibiting the hidden, this idea is still taken shape. In the Fun Palace,

Cedric Price designs a basement underneath the whole area to cover some replacements and elements that he does not want to put in sight.

In Jaque’s architecture, this determination of displaying none visible processes and resources

is more evidently shown in all his projects, being one of his main statements in the production of architecture. In the project Cosmo, which the problematic of water is directly shown by

the interaction between the algae and the polluted water. Jaque himself talk about what he

calls ‘unblackboxing’, which derives of the aeroplane term black box. By this, Andrés try to

give prominence to domestic procedures that work as closed boxes, from which we only know

the input and output elements or interactions, but never the inner consumed or produced

resources. This knowledge of the in-between expenses allow us to have a broader view of

what each decision we take implies. By this, the architecture creates awareness on the users and helps to change the consumerism mechanics towards ones more democratic, conscious, and parliamentary. This, as he always explains, is a very explicit political action. I should also mention that in this case, as we can see in his drawings and opposite to the prior example, the

view impact is created through a strong, cared for aesthetic and a designed structure with the purpose of creating an identity in the installation.

We could see this commonalities between the architects as an evolution and adaptation

to each context (in time terms) of the same principle, first talking simply about the devices that produce the desirable situations on its most elemental forms and more radicalized in

the posterior phase, in which not only shows the elements itself but also manifests latent controversies. The ‘unblackboxing’ process started taking shape in Cedric Price architecture

and has evolved until an even more political and controversial act in the architecture produced

by Jaque.

EDGE LINES. Aviary and Cosmo

These two projects that can visually have some formal correlation can also be used to explain

furthermore the concepts of inside and outside, and how the social capital connects and interacts with the elements that the architects integrate.

32

AVIARY

Figure10

Drawing by the author

Figure11

Drawing by the author

The Aviary project of Cedric Price was built in 1961 and it is one of the few constructions

that he actually built. Located inside the London Zoo, this structure has a peculiarity: the

human beings have a contemplative activity inside this element, for the main reason to this infrastructure is to observe the birds. Therefore, the main efforts were put in the design of the structure.

In this project, Cedric Price develops a structural system based on Fuller’s systems. On each

side, two aluminium tetrahedral were located as the main structure and most visible elements.

The connection with the concrete foundations were produced by other two bigger aluminium tubes in between the tetrahedral of each side of the aviary. A net of tensioned steel wires

33

completes the structure and it is the support for the aluminium mesh that closes the flight area.

For the humans/visitors; a concrete, non-linear bridge which is like floating in the air is located along the project.

The technology in this project is supposed to acts as a visualizer of the flight of the birds, it

delimits where the birds can be and where they cannot, but without closing the views for the

people to the exterior. In relation with other projects that relate uncertainty, he does not design where the birds can be, he only plans an area of possibilities, leaving freedom to situations.

But the sensations created by this project go beyond this, the Aviary become a nest that with

a very light and almost invisible membrane detach what is inside and what is outside. From

the outside, a strong contrast is created between the pre-tensile wire network in the middle and the big tetrahedral structures that produce an illusion of doors in these last elements. The

curved and tensed wire structure is connected to each edge of the tetrahedral, this creates a perception of opening in the edges, as if they were being pulled by the wires. This impression is reinforced by the fact that the triangles that appear to be doors are located in the exterior

of the structure, and the vision from the outside becomes cleaner, there are no several nets juxtaposed in the vision, as occur in other parts of the installation.

COSMO

Figure12

34

Drawing by the author

As we have explained and discussed the main characteristics of Cosmo, we will go directly

to the specificities of this project that are related with the concept of limits, edges, and other similar questions.

The whole installation is itself a border and everything is produced on the edge. The users

never can go further than that, there is no existing interior. But this border is a very delicate and designed congregation of elements that act as an interactive screen. The people that watch at

this bright, changing succession of pipes and plants can gather around or play with it, through the trade of information and data. Therefore the concept of limit is completely different. The attraction produced by Cosmo is more vibrant and flashing than the one produced by Aviary.

NOTES

Figure13

Drawing by the author

The context of the Aviary is a green area inside the zoo, but this area does not allow the

visitors to get very close to the project, therefore the park becomes a public space where the discussions and debates that can take place inside the pavilion are not reproduced. Aviary,

works as a closed space that locks the activities and visions produced by the project in the interior, it is focused towards the inside. Cosmo, on the other hand, is extroverted, meaning that

where the project is really consolidated is on its near exterior, from where the active users are going to be able to interact with the installation. This connection is not so much physical, but focused more on virtual connections that will expand the net afterwards with other points of different territories.

35

Cosmo is created to reflect, while the Aviary creates an inner world. This is very visible in

the drawings that trade each project with the other context. Even when the environment is

changed, the figure of the Aviary, with its strong steel border elements, and the interior view

produces a will of coming inside, not gathering in the surroundings. On the other hand, Cosmo is made for being sensual from the exterior, invites you to stay in the close surroundings, it is in the (outer) surface where the actions occur.

The conception of the limit is vital in both projects. Simplifying both concepts in order

to clarify them, we could say that Cosmo possess the outer space and the edge itself, while

Aviary occupy everything that occurs inside. The technology of the Aviary consist on ‘delicate’ prestressed structures that support a thin wire net that will physically determine where the

birds will be able to go. This transparent effect to the complex strengthen this idea of border and limit. In Cosmo the idea of border is also determining because it is the place where the whole visualization takes place and it is the element in charge of producing the data that will be posteriorly shared.

5. PINTEREST

Pinterest is a technological dispositif that strings together technologies and methodologies

with social capital not using the traditional ways of communication (chat, encounters, etc.).

In particular, it allows us to visualize and potentiate the relations between both entities. For this paper, Pinterest is also used as a tool for visually relate, experiment and study the links between Cedric Price and Andrés Jaque.

At the beginning, this social platform/network was established as a way of searching and

collecting images, making possible to generate an organized archive with ‘boards’. But currently

it is in a more evolved state in which some of its possibilities have been materialized. One of the multiple functionalities of this platform consists in reading diverse information introduced in the search engine as if they were different gears that together form a more complex

combination. The most interesting aspect is that instead of facilitating one result, it generates a

multiplicity of possibilities. Afterwards, they link you with the sources of the mentioned image and technologies. In this sense, Pinterest is an encoder and decoder dispositif at the same time.

The user introduces a series of data which then the platform codes and equalize. The final step

would consist in extracting a series of results. Once the chosen option is selected, it decodes again the information and transcribe it into its origin. Therefore it takes the most out of the possibilities of the introduced data.

The most clarifying example of what I mention above would be the way Pinterest works

with food recipes. This is already part of the evolution that I was mentioning, one recipe is not

an image anymore, but a technology in which many factors play a role. In this way, Pinterest 36

has become a dispositif that strings together multiple sources, situations, resources, people, technologies, etc. In many cases it links a situation (in this case a person with the possession of

several ingredients) with a net of possible technologies (the recipes that are shown) when the data is introduced in the platform. This has consequences in the subsequent situations and it has the ability of attracting and linking other technologies and users.

That is only the most clear and extended series of technologies that are present and shown

by Pinterest. But it is not the only one, we can also find work out sessions, search of products,

etc. In the recipes case, we usually introduce only ingredients, but in the work out sessions, for example, we introduce data of very different nature: we introduce minutes together with muscle, gigabytes with weight, etc. and the platform structure them in the same level. It is very interesting to see how this distorts of data can also be done for recipes: we can obtain different results depending on the annual session that we introduce, the number of dinner guests or

other information that is not strictly related to cooking (but they have demonstrate to transform the result). As we can distinguish in the images, when we write summer and mushrooms in the search engine (left image), it appears more salads and cold dishes than in the winter case (right image), in which warm dishes and stews are more present.

Figure 14

Images Searched in Pinterest

All this behaviour could be extrapolated to more strictly architectonic situations. From my

point of view, this is where its maximum relevance resides. I consider this very novel, given that these tools/platforms become mediators between technologies and social capital; a

role previously fulfilled by companies and architects, amongst others. Take AndrÊs Jaque’s Cosmo exhibition as an example; it generates and gives insight into a series of technologies

that purify water. If the amount of data generated is sufficient, social capital could introduce

data as broad and distinct as: amount of litres of water to be purified, initial and wanted pH, 37

Figure 15

Drawing by the author

type of available algae, etc. The result would be a multiplicity of technologies and subsequently possible domestic situations for cleaning water. This process would be perpetuated with the upload of the new results and technologies to the platform by the users that would allow to introduce new data such as location, shape of container, amount of light, etc. Pinterest would be

even acting as an architecture source, and would bring together clients, architects, architecture,

users, materials, ways of doing, quantities and other beings. The consequence would be a huge net of technologies, dispositifs and social capital connected by Cosmo and Pinterest.

This is one of the ways in which one contemporary platform such as Pinterest can have a

value in the creation of communities and architectural situations, but it is sure that there are more to discover. Right now it is impossible to comprehend what social networks really mean

(and many other similar technologies) and to what extent they can reach. We are currently in a period of actualizing (from power to act) its multiple possibilities and direct them the best we

can toward what interests us. We also have the possibility and should use up the value that they get on their own without us participating.

Pinterest has become and can be further developed as a technology with a high value and

architectonic possibilities. Price, deep into his context, already glimpsed the potential of

similar technologies in architecture (cybernetics) and Jaque has been capable of testing with

success some of them on his projects (app in Cosmo, participation is social nets, etc.). These and many other cases demonstrate that the relationship between technology and social capital

is more alive than ever. With this I want to prove that Cedric Price and Andrés Jaque are vital nowadays, that we may not know the answer, but we need to further investigate: ‘Technology is the answer… but what was the question?’

5. CONCLUSIONS

ARCHITECTURAL RELEVANCE

From the analysis of the projects that we have carried out, we can state that the answer to

the question that arised at the beginning of this thesis ‘what is it that interests, is it the type of communities that their projects produce or the way in which they are being produced?’ would

be both. The way they produce architecture and communities gives visibility to certain topics which foments the creation of different relationships between users and technology, they are

linked one to each other. Obviously in every kind of architecture, communities and ecosystems are created, and a high degree of uncertainty is present in all architectural forms, but is difficult to find links as strong as the ones produced when architecture is understood as a continuity shaped by the proper relation between social capital and resources. The way that Jaque usually

choose to produce these interactions is very much referred to ‘what is close’. With this we mean

the domestic interactions, he believes that this understanding helps to explode the personality 40

and the existing conflicts in each of his projects (water in Cosmo, culture in Escarabox, etc.).

Cedric Price, on the other hand, uses the creation of atmospheres through technologies that allow the architecture to adapt and transform, which is more pertinent in his historic context.

Cedric Price and AndrĂŠs Jaque understand that what architecture is about is the creation of

situations, not about solving problems, and about giving the people tools for confrontations.

This highly differs from the tradition carried out in architecture from the modern movement in which the architecture must rationalize and organize human behaviour. Their architecture expose the contemporaneity that surrounds the users and encourage it, making them

participants in a more complex network. But they go beyond this fact. Both ways of promoting

associations move away from pre-stablished political and social systems in order to develop a refinement in the users in different means without them being obliged to follow the traditional social and interactive practices.

Both architects, with their projects and drawings, are of a great relevance because they bring

contemporary behaviours and social developments to architecture. Cedric Price brings the cybernetic and the transdisciplinary in order to demonstrate that the British society in the

sixties is starting to be fluid and that architecture cannot work if it does not address mobility, fluidity and accept the uncertainty. AndrĂŠs Jaque on a similar, evolved principle, sees that the contemporary society is transdisciplinary on its own. We cannot detach ourselves from

a series of multiples connections with completely different context and situations, society

nowadays works as an endless network of people, resources and technologies that create urban enactments between them.

This has a profound impact in the urbanism, the way we plan the cities and the way we

understand them.

41

42

43

BIBLIOGRAPHY

ABAD, M., 2014. Jaque: “Innovar es directamente proporcional al riesgo que asumes”.

http://ferranadria.fundaciontelefonica.com/jaque-innovar-es-directamente-proporcional-alriesgo-que-asumes/ last accessed: 2015.06.04

BAIRD, G., 1969. ‘La Dimension Amoureuse’ in Architecture HARDINGHAM, S., 2003. Cedric Price Opera JAQUE, A., 2013. Interview Arquinetwork

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gshPMm1-fRQ

last accessed: 2015.06.04

JAQUE, A., 2014. SoA Exhibit: Urban Enactments: An exhibition on the work of Andres Jaque JAQUE, A., 2014. Interview Arquia/próxima 2014

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cc4tqnv5IDY

LATOUR, B., 1991. Technology is society made durable

last accessed: 2015.03.25

MALLOL, M., 2014. El español Andrés Jaque presenta su visión contemporánea de la arquitectura.

http://www.eliberico.com/el-espanol-andres-jaque-presenta-su-vision-contemporaneade-la-arquitectura-en-el-barbican.html last accessed: 2015.06.04

MATHEWS, S., 2007. From Agit-Prop to Free Space: The Architecture of Cedric Price PRICE, C., 1967. Towards a 24-hour economic living toy.

PRICE, C., 1984. Works II Architectural Association ULRICH, H., 2003. Re:CP

ULRICH, H., 2009. Cedric Price - The Conversation Series

ULRICH, H., 2014. Lucius Burckhardt & Cedric Price - A stroll through a fun palace

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

A special thank you to Jose MarĂ­a Torres Nadal, Rosa Villaescusa Alfaro, and Gregory Bracken for their contribution to this thesis.