Essay - Urban-Panopticon in Tech-Noir

Urban-Panopticon in Tech-Noir

Chun-Yin Kavika Lau Student ID 001036910

ARCT1064 Theories of Architecture Mark Garcia & Lukas Pauer MArch Architecture Part 2 University of Greenwich

Introduction Always being a big fan of Science Fiction film, I again revisited my favourite ones I have watched, from the CGI masterpiece out last year, Ready Player One (2018) directed by Steven Spielberg to the old yet inspiring Metropolis (1927) directed by Fritz Lang. I was again, and always, impressed by the astonishing power of film to display our sentiment towards the present culture and ways of imagining the future. Questions induced by the very rapidly advancing technologies, which intimately shaping the cultures, provoke reflections and thoughts about the future. For David Fortin, it is more of questions of how we inhabit our world. It is also his belief that the architecture profession might be able to learn from the aspect of SF, i.e. Science Fiction since the current demands on the profession in dealing with social, economic and environmental challenges while understanding the emerging technologies updating everyday, has then tied the hands of architects so much and might not be as useful as SF as an invaluable tool to reflect on all these issues. 1 It is also typical that architects are using different methods or tools for inspiration whilst science and SF are the very much valuable and popular sources to do so.2 It might be a misunderstanding that amongst all kind of films, that SF might be the least films containing real buildings as it might be thought that production designers would be prefer avoiding real objects in the reality.3 Nevertheless, before arriving the career of architecture, Rem Koolhaas was a screenwriter whom, believed there are little differences between film and architecture, which he stated “I think the art of the scriptwriter is to conceive the sequences of episodes which build suspense and a chain of events…..the largest part of my work is montage…spatial montage.”4 In addition, the architecturally trained Fritz Lang, produced the revolutionary SF masterpiece, Metropolis (1927) which later become the template of futuristic urban imagination in movies. The ideas of overhead highways, bridge-connected high rise, crowded streets dominated by people are all inspired by his first visit to New York, 3 years before he had the movie published. 5 The dehumanized dystopian suggests fictional views of what the urban environment would become if expansion and industrialization are not well controlled. These suggestions inflict architects to think of strategies to approach the envisioned possible problems, or the invention of future urban communities.6

Figure 1. Tower of Babel & Cityscape.

Film still, Lang, Metropolis, 18m:46s.

It is true that the experiential essence in film, especially in SF genre, has always been a fascination for architects that extends far beyond the celluloid surface; 7 and the ideas and propositions in SF always help designers to envision and excel lives in the future. But similar to most of other genres, it is an aim for films to persuade audiences to believe in the world displayed on the silver screens, and in the case of SF, it is always the use of real, modern buildings to provide the authenticity and the ‘future’ ambiance to the audiences.8 Props, temporary scenes, clever camera techniques can only do so much. “An effort to predict the future on the basis of known facts, culled largely from present day laboratories.”9 Said John W. Campbell, the well-known SF writer and editor. And the advantage of having ideas based on these facts is that the level of acceptance or understanding by audiences are then better enhanced, hence addressing the conditions of everyday lives and reflecting on current or past society status are vital for productions of SF. In architectural view, it is at a similar process that the absorbance and addressing of current and past environment, and envisioning the future, are as well much considered when coming to produce an ‘architectural design’.

Notes Figure on cover. Visual record check on Jesper Nix’s archive. Film still, Niccol, Anon, 44m:35s.

1. David Terrance Fortin, Architecture And Science-Fiction Film (Routledge 2016), p. 11.

2. Maggie Toy, Sci-Fi Architecture (John Wiley and Sons 1999), p. 7.

3. Charlotte Neilson, 'Through The Lens: Sci-Fi & Architecture' (ArchDaily, 2013) <https://www.archdaily.com/359365/through-the-lens-sci-fi-and-architecture> 4. Maggie Toy and Bob Fear, Architectural Design (Wiley-Academy 2000), p. 5.

5. Jon Jardine, Stuart Campbell and Neil Baxter, Adventures In Space (The Royal Incorporation of Architects Scotland 2016), p. 34.

6. Toy, Sci-Fi Architecture, p. 20.

7. Toy and Fear, Architectural Design, p. 5.

8. Neilson, Through The Lens.

9. Edward James, Science Fiction In The Twentieth Century (Oxford University Press 1994), p. 5.

Tech-Noir The term, Tech-Noir, was the name of the nightclub appeared in the The Terminator (1984).1 Briefly, TechNoir has the characteristics of Film Noir and Neo-Noir, combining the technological essence in SF and cyberpunk; meaning the nature of stories are usually dystopic and are displayed along with the rational explanation by science. The advantage of including science evidences is that science development gave promises to creative industries in having control and thus shaping the environment.2 The ideas and inspirations in SF and architecture are then less bounded, since the logical parts are able to rationalize themselves by science. The ironies within these ideas concerning cultural, economic, social issues, however, maybe better shown in the dystopic spirit of Tech-Noir. Quoting the writings by Rachel Armstrong, that some SF works, “composed by highly integrated relationship between human, machine, artifice and nature….In this new interaction between humans and their environment, a more fluid relationship is portrayed, in which the homunculus is not in control but is absorbed into the matrix of these systems.”3 These thoughts or doubts on systems projected in SF, despite whether they are truly understood or in control by the humans, have been reflected on social and cultural developments. In the book Adventures In Space produced by Stuart MacDonald, Jon Jardine and Neil Baxter, documented the architectural and SF progression throughout 200 years, i.e. 1818 – 2015. To me these works displayed the imaginations and interpretations of society and cultural shift along time, which then induced various influential architectural theories and practices – late 19th century invention of High Rise, early 20th century Sant’Elia’s Futurism, the following Constructivism, Modernism, Postmodernism.…etc, and as well provoked the representations of Tech-noir SF conspiring theories from the black & white movie, Metropolis (1928) to still photos constructed La Jetée (1962), and till the present Digital Age, flourishing SF which questions about digital technology such as Anon (2018). This essay would thus be focusing on a wider scope on the relationships in how SF, especially Tech-noir, and architecture observe, share, interpret, invent, envision the dynamics of society in the past, present and future. The genre Tech-noir is chosen mainly because its adequate competence of being cultural manifestations without disregarding historical roots.4 Though technology keeps advancing in lightspeed and productions of tech-noir film are still rolling at present, the pessimism from the past to present are always inspiring for me as an architecture student, and surely it is another lesson to speculate social conditions under our present concern of the Digital and the Technology.

Notes 1. Decio Torres Cruz, Postmodern Metanarratives: Blade Runner And Literature In The Age Of Image(Palgrave Macmillan 2014), p. 34.

2. Maggie Toy, Sci-Fi Architecture (John Wiley and Sons 1999), p. 20.

3. Toy, Sci-Fi Architecture, p. 21.

4. Emily E Auger, Tech-Noir Film (Intellect 2011), p. 11.

Mirror of society and metanarrative Other than opening up new prospects for architects and designers, by either inspiring or encouraging aspirations for the audiences, it is no doubt that the ideas of futuristic gadgets, modes of transport, usage of technology, appearing in various SF, which in time, might become real inventions and hence breeding new technologies and science. It is then when society experience fundamental changes, which help the creation of settings in SF, are also reflected in architecture and urban form transformation.1 Tech-noir has been a mirror for many aspects: rapid technological advancement, shared fears of the population, revolutions in any form, manifestations of art/architecture/urban theories and the everchanging political conditions. Therefore Tech-noir as a distinct genre in SF, with their briefly contemporary speculations, led a fundamental way of how buildings are being built and hence on a wider scale, the form of cities on the earth. This way of design speculations by observing the emergent changing in conditions, however, could have been confronted with skepticism by the old Modernists that it is only a traditional way of thinking in design: it was often not new, nor really architecture but illustrating a narrative by building. Thus the exasperation of Mies Van der Rohe “One cannot have a new architecture every Monday morning”.2 Personally, I do not agree with the perspective as the shift in values and philosophies are so rapid especially with the push of science and technology. According to this notion, a shift in architectural realm, as well as other forms of cultural expressions, such as films and novels, is expected, since the mental paradigm is so dominant amongst all individuals in the same era. Thus I consider Tech-noir films as distinct expressions of metanarratives of the society, of different places on the world, and of time. I am not using the word metanarrative as defined in Collins English Dictionary – “a narrative about a narrative or narratives”;3 nor using it with JeanFrançois Lyotard’s definition – “not in an original founding act, but in a future to be accomplished” or “grand narrative” or “narrations with a legitimating function”;4 but with the similar use by Charles Jenck’s view of the postmodern as a new metanarrative of the story of the universe, one which replaces humanism with the cosmos as the measure of all things,5 and the use by Decio Torres Cruz which does not limit it to a time period and conduct analysis in a postmodern view, and not classifying all metanarratives as postmodern. 6 Blade Runner (1982) and Neon Genesis Evanlegioin (1995-96) series were classic metanarratives displaying the psychological and cultural reflections at different places with large amount of architectural imageries within. The digital age, the metanarrative we are apparently living in everyday, steering our lives by data and digital products, consequently leading us to question about privacy and surveillance. These post-panopticon questions will be examined through a range of different Tech-noir films and case-studies, even some are old and less of technology essence, but provoking critical thoughts in the ‘panopticon’ sense.

Figure 2. Underground cityscape of Tokyo-3 with buildings retracted into the ground Film still, Anno, Neon Genesis Evangelion, Ep.1, 10m:55s.

Notes 1. Jon Jardine, Stuart Campbell and Neil Baxter, Adventures In Space (The Royal Incorporation of Architects Scotland 2016), p. 6.

2. Charles Jencks and Maggie Toy, New Science=New Architecture? (Academy Editions 1997), p. 7.

3. Collins English Dictionary (HarperCollins 2018).

4. Jean-François Lyotard, La Condition Postmoderne: Rapport Sur Le Savoir (Les eĚ ditions de minuit 1992), p. 17.

5. Charles Jencks, What Is Post-Modernism? (Academy Editions 1996), p.70-1.

6. Decio Torres Cruz, Postmodern Metanarratives: Blade Runner And Literature In The Age Of Image(Palgrave Macmillan 2014), p. 35.

The Urban Vision Though the settings of the early SF works might emphasize more on the quick pace of development of science and technology in a smaller scale, and being less futuristic as the built environments were more decidedly of its era,1 however, there comes Fritz Lang’s 1927 masterpiece – Metropolis, which reflects his depiction of anxiety induced about future city after his visit to New York in 1924. On the protagonist’s way to his father, to the new Tower of Babel, the futuristic representation of cityscape is shown. By removing the elevated highways passing through skyscrapers and the floating city transports, it was not hard to identify the image of city is essentially the New York at that time. The Russian Constructivists and the Italian futurists, especially Sant’Elia, as well envisaged the densely inhabited urban environment in their works of future imagery. Le Corbusier, nonetheless proposed new ideas of the Modern in Vers une Architecture, where decorations are not needed in such notion, is using structural frame to free the facades of buildings from decorations. As such, he expanded that idea into city scale in his proposition for The Radiant City where convenient transport weaves in between tall buildings. Noticeably, Lang, Sant’Elia, Corb all consider the transport links as crucial part amongst their depictions of the modern metropolis because of the expanding population in the city. In the early 20th century, following the ongoing 2nd Industrialization roughly till the 1st world war, prompt a massive population shifts throughout time as the working and living style changed - people are progressively moving from the rural to the urban. It then reaches a tipping point where a shift of the population from the cultivated lands to urban environment is observed. At this point the films, are playing a vibrant role by acting as a shared urban phenomenon. 2 And Metropolis’s arrival is a very key moment well displaying this observation of shift.

Then and there proofs of designs led by culture shift. Vice versa, it is also a fundamental idea that behavior of the population is also moulded by designs particularly in architectural field. The Japanese architect, Takasaki Masaharu, who built a futuristic community centre Nanohanakan in Kagoshima Prefecture, understood part of human behavior is build up amongst communication to other individuals. He believes it is a spiritual and human work to design for architecture and it is crucial to realise space induced from architecture influences behaviours of the individual before arriving the concept of creating platform for people from different generations to communicate and make contact.3

Figure 3. Takasaki Masaharu’s Nanohanakan – Community Centre for Seniors Source: https://www.japanallover.com/2014/0 5/a-walk-around-kyushu-day32kagoshi mato-ibusuki/

The linearity of mechanical science of last two century, however, has now develop to new sciences of complexity from the Newtonian paradigm.4 The question hence reaches a partial sociological aspect: is there really new science that grew from the old modern linear ones and does it divert itself into a socially more acceptable mechanics? Does it matter that the nonlinearity of so called post-modern sciences being superior or not over the old Modernism by zooming into matters, atoms of material and nature or by expanding understanding of the cosmos? Is it closer to functional, liveable environment and built itself better in human perception? The answer of â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;yesâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; might be too early to tell, since the values of the traditions, though implicitly justify changes, all have their own supporting arguments in the sense of cultural and spiritual nature.5 Exploring new languages in architecture and Tech-noir might be a more accurate answer at present age since they presents a more lively forms in art and in the spirit of contemporary culture.

Looking at Japanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Akihabara area in Tokyo, the electronic paradise which inhabit different scales of retail of electronic industry, the dense amount of glittering billboards with neon lighting in the evening, populated by vast amount of people, demonstrate a spectacular cultural movement in their country. It might be that the fluid relationship between their organic inhabitants and the intelligent technology, is not well exhibited throughout.

Somehow I consider this as an evolutionary step in urban design strategies, which then expand and encourage that transition in design strategies could replace the classic scientific fossils with more intellectual, responsive, molten interfaces which both inform and learn from the homuncular inhabitants.6 Smart City might be holding the key of such intellectual social experiment, yet the mechanism of achieving such goal requires multi-faceted perceptions of how human society adapt to its state.

Figure 4. Akihabara, Tokyo, 2018 Source: https://anaintercontinental-tok yo.jp/en/location/akihabara/

Notes 1. Jon Jardine, Stuart Campbell and Neil Baxter, Adventures In Space (The Royal Incorporation of Architects Scotland 2016), p. 8.

2. Jardine, Adventures In Space, p. 7.

3. Maggie Toy, Sci-Fi Architecture (John Wiley and Sons 1999), p. 43.

4. Charles Jencks and Maggie Toy, New Science=New Architecture? (Academy Editions 1997), p. 7.

5. Ibid.

6. Toy, Sci-Fi Architecture, p. 21.

Hierarchy and Stratification “Prone to fits of mania, narcissism and power failure.” 1 It was the dialogue of comment on the tower block by Dr. Robert Laing, the protagonist role played by Tom Hiddleston in High-Rise (2015), after he had moved in for a short while. It was obvious that the movie is taking the tall building to express and unintentionally drive social stratification, ending it with Margaret Thatcher statement about capitalism and state capitalism “…There is only one economic system in the world and that is capitalism…...where there is state capitalism, there will never be political freedom.”2 In the movie the high-rise is designed by a brutalist architecture, which brutalism were flourishing at post-war (post WWII) era and hence provided J.G.Ballard to set in the dystopic novel published in 1975. The projection of future forward of 1975 seemed where we are living in now and the prophetic issues in the novel are current issues we are struggling. The time of the movie released is very appropriate in my opinion as it resonances well with the social and the political at present age – the struggle and aftermaths of detailed stratification eventually made part of the disservice social-psychological effects. The model of skyscraper dividing classes also appeared in the Lang’s Metropolis, though the characters are not detailed as High-Rise, the images of the privileged living at the top of skyscrapers are similar to each other: enjoy expensive red wine, riding horse in botanic gardens, meanwhile working classes / middle or lower level residents struggle their working lives at lower levels / underground.3 It is easy for audiences to understand such hierarchy with the image of high-rise façade or elevation of skyscraper, however, in reality, the “class warfare” could happen diagonally, horizontally and of course through other non-physical forms and configuration.4 Yet the isolating atmosphere is distinct, keeping away from other authorities physically, socially and economically. And there is certain authoritarianism / state capitalism order going on within the high-rise. Though at the end the architect admitted his design of such development (few other high-rise are expected to linked together when they are built) is a failure, he failed to acknowledge the real problem there but saying inhabitants could find a “new beginnings” elsewhere or in the same building, though it might just an irony dialogue, still it sounds to me like some advertisement or slogan of the very typical urbanrenewal development propaganda.

Figure 5. High-rise development led by architect Anthony Royal.

Film still, Wheatley, High-Rise, 2m:40s.

In fact, the 1970s built tower blocks, Heygate Estate in Elephant & Castle, had been knocked down and taken over by developers to built on an area which they describe as “city of the future”. Some areas on site have already finished building and these in fact is part of a master plan: the Elephant & Castle Town Centre Regeneration. It is expected to be a utopia for middle class population with shops, restaurants, and largest park built in London for 70 years as they claimed. Though these shiny advertisements were so loud and pretty, there lies lots of shady truth underneath: former tenants (council housing tenants) are forced away leaving them insufficient funds to buy any apartment in the same area, hence forcing them to live suburb; Elephant Park (part of the new development in the scheme) flats are displayed and sold in Singapore before opening the sale in UK. 5 ‘Gentrification’ was the term they used, nonetheless it might be true and seemingly healthy for a metropolis to develop higher standard of certain aspect but there is doubts whether it is a right decision to take. The replacement of white collar professionals and students might be pleased by councils since they now have higher tax payers in their borough; the promise of developers that they will deliver future profits and display its true value of the land mystifyingly never arrive; and a never ending carousel carrying public relationship firms, local authorities and consultancies.6 Most affected population who are forced to leave to many miles away has the last to say, let alone control of, choice of how they want their city to be changed. Protests have been caused in the area and the fact that only 33 newly built homes are affordable out of 979 was easily understood as an act of social cleansing. It is reasonable that stratifying and setting in hierarchy in the urban environment could be good in allocating appropriate people at the appropriate place or position within the system. However too much of authoritarianism and capitalism resulting complicated classes division might not be the best way round and prompting inflicts which may then leads to moral issues and unforeseeable actions that is out of control such as protests or even revolutions and insurrections.

Fig. 6 Rendering of urban view, Elephant & Castle Town Centre Regeneration.

Source: https://www.delancey.com/elephant-and-castle-redevelopment.html

Fig. 7 Protests in east London on forced removal and demolishment on 23.09.2017 Source: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2017/oct/29/gentrification-pushing-out-the-poor-haringey-council-housing-battle-corbynlabour

Notes 1. Ben Wheatley, High-Rise (United Kingdom 2015).

2. Ibid.

3. Jon Jardine, Stuart Campbell and Neil Baxter, Adventures In Space (The Royal Incorporation of Architects Scotland 2016), p.8.

4. Laura Bliss, Kriston Capps and Brentin Mock, 'Roundtable Review Of 'High-Rise,' Where Luxury Architecture Turns Dystopic' (CityLab, 2016) <https://www.citylab.com/equity/2016/05/a-citylab-rountable-review-of-high-rise-whereluxury-architecture-turns-dystopic-jg-ballard/482505/>.

5. Hettie Brien and others, 'How J.G. Ballardâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S Science Fiction Tells The Future Of Our Privatized Cities - Failed Architecture' (Failed Architecture, 2018) <https://failedarchitecture.com/how-j-g-ballards-science-fiction-tells-thefuture-of-our-privatized-cities/>.

6. Ian Steadman, 'Look To The Heygate Estate For What's Wrong With London's Housing' (NewStatesman, 2013) <https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2013/11/look-heygate-estate-whats-wrong-londons-housing>.

The Control Building up hierarchy on society for the system to work is understandably essential. On top of that, in order to avoid less inflicts, a certain degree of population control is to be introduced. In the last century, from theories to actions, there are lots of examples to illustrate different methodologies are being used to achieve such goals. Mostly aiming at changing behaviors of individuals, since the individuals are the basis of forming urban and country system. Many examples like Soviet Marxism, Italian Fascism, Chinese Communism and German Nazism and some ideologies are involved, however few are chosen in this essay to be explored in this essay for best explanations.

The first is an object small enough to put in a bag or even into one’s pocket: a book. The power of publishing the book is that it promotes propaganda and beliefs in a way that the public might not realise. During the Cultural Revolution of China, the Chinese government published the little red book, Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung, to promote the Communism propaganda to the public. It is almost compulsory for anyone to carry that book at anytime at that era.1 The words in such a book provokes many and as a result millions of people were killed or persecuted. Looking at Nineteen Eighty Four written by George Orwell in 1949 and a film version in 1984 directed by Michael Radford, authorities used word dictionary which everyone has to carry one, to control amount of information to be exchanged amongst individuals. The dictionary updated constantly and words in it reduces in every editions, hence regulating intellectual conversation of the public. The protagonist in the story found out the book of such methodology of maintaining the totalitarian society, The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical Collectivism, and hence revealing the ideas and nature of bureaucratic collectivism which did not come to his favour and inducing his opposing behaviour afterwards.2 Along with the book, the built environment is also another key to display the symbolic dystopic totalitarian atmosphere. The conceptual project took up by WAI Architecture Think Tank pictures the urban landscape of the story and designed towers for the authorities. “Visible from any point in the city, the towers exploit the potential of architecture as iconography. They are archetypes of power…..the towers deliver an explicit message of datum and order,” says WAI. “War is Peace; Freedom is Slavery; Ignorance is Strength.” was a main dialogue of authority’s slogan to the populous. The linguistic conflict combining the monumental scale of the tower exhibit the “resistance fatigue” and signifies the suppress of potential rebellion in both physical and psychological forms.3

Figure 8. Rendering of Oceania cityscape Source: http://waithinktank.com/Project -1984

The second is the punishment, during China’s Cultural Revolution, many of the public was fear of the violent punishment by the Red Guards (paramilitary organization formed by high school and university students), as a result obeying their orders. The unofficial army’s aim is to help Chairman Mao to achieve his revolutionary goal on society, country, or even the universe they say, which this thought of them are provoked by Mao and facilitated by Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung. Party leaders, school officials and teachers, intellectuals, people with traditional views, thousands of people died by prosecuted by the Red Guards.4 In Lewis Mumford’s Myth of the Machine, it was the punishment in the form tools and weapons that accelerate the idea of power. And moving toward modern society, there was the discovery of immense power provided to individuals within social structures, which he defines such structure as a whole with the word ‘megamachine’.5 This megamachine is mainly based on punishment which imprisonment is one of them.

The third is controlling behaviours by drug consumption of individuals. In THX 1138, workers like the protagonist are compulsory to take drugs/pills prescribed by authorities in order to suppress certain thoughts and human desires being induced. The dreadful form of control by technology (drugs/chemicals in this case) is blended well with shooting scenes at Frank Lloyd Wright’s Marin County Civic Centre. Urban dark landscape superimposed with the internal spaces on scene; Cracks, decay, wears, tears sprawling on clean modernist wall implying immense level of stress on the occupants. Le Corbusier’s affectionate description of “revolution in the aesthetics of construction”6 contradicts hard with the dirt and grunges captured in the scenes.

Figure 9. Superstructure superimpose with scene Frank Lloyd Wright’s Marin County Civic Centre (1962) Film still, Lucas, THX 1138, 28m:49s.

The fourth is a more violent way of punishment which leads to an extremely suffering way of brainwashing, it might be the first prototype of panopticon of the mind. In Nineteen Eighty Four (1984), the protagonist was forced to accept the concept of worshipping the Big Brother when being quartered in a torturing space.7 The physical pain at the end changes him to refuse on his own original belief. As well as Brazil, after the protagonist was caught, he is being brain washed with devices and torturing tools in cylindrical and isolated space.

The scene had been shot in one of the cooling towers of Croydon Power Station, which had been demolished shortly after the movie has finished. The gigantic structure emphasises the scale to which society has capitulated a total dominance and suppression over individuals.8 From the scene, the cylindrical form seemed to emerge with the form of original panopticon prison which leads to the topic of panopticon and post-panopticon idea in the next chapter.

Figure 10. Brainwash chamber Cooling towers at Croydon A Power Station (1896) Film still, Gilliam, Brazil, 2h:05m:24s.

Notes 1. 'Who, What, Why: What Is The Little Red Book?' (BBC News, 2015) <https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine34932800>.

2. Michael Radford, Nineteen Eighty-Four (Virgin Films 1984).

3. Paul Keskeys, The Architecture Of George Orwell’S “1984” (Architizer Journal, 2015).

4. 'Red Guards | Chinese Political Movement' (Encyclopedia Britannica, 2016) <https://www.britannica.com/topic/Red-Guards>.

5. Lewis Mumford, The Myth Of The Machine (Secker & Warburg 1971).

6. Le Corbusier, Jean-Louis Cohen and John Goodman, Vers Une Architecture (Frances Lincoln 2007).

7. Ankita Chawla, 'The Film On ‘Nineteen Eighty-Four’ Proves That It’S Never A Bad Time To Wake Up From A Bad Dream' (Scroll.in, 2019) <https://scroll.in/reel/830981/the-film-on-nineteen-eighty-four-proves-that-its-never-a-badtime-to-wake-up-from-a-bad-dream>.

8. Rishabh Hajela and P.S. Sreekanth, 'Architecture In Movies – Brazil' (Futuristic Architecture in Movies, 2011) <https://futuristicarch.wordpress.com/2011/05/07/architecture-in-movies-brazil/>.

Panopticism & Post-panopticism In addition to methodologies of control, surveillance is needed to comprehend the actions or even the thoughts of the population and to apply appropriate control that follows. Scholarly, Foucault’s studies on the surveillance is the leading model in the field. Foucault’s panopticon then becomes a metaphor of surveillance analysis. The book Displine and Punish: The birth of the prison published in 1975 brought surveillance to discourse amongst sociologists and the public. In the book, he introduced panopticon prison design as a new form of mechanism in social control.1 For Foucault, power of panopticon lies within enclosing the subject in discursive manner so that the subject is made to be a foreseeable individual. In order to leave the power constantly settled, specific spaces are required, this is where the logic of ‘confinement’ lies.2 In the original panopticon design, inmates are not able to tell whether the surveillance is truly occurring or not because of the way of the central tower is built and the backlighting into the cells. As a result inmates have to behave under their own psychological pressure. In Nineteen Eighty-Four, the two-way TV monitors act as a new way of such panopticon pressure which inhabitants include the protagonist were not able to tell if they are being monitored. The giant monitors also constantly displaying the ‘Big Brother’ which exploits the post-Nazi fears of totalitarianism.3 The confinement in this sense requires less necessity of certain spaces as prisons which advanced itself to post-panopticon with the futuristic imagination of technology.

Figure 11. Two-way monitor giving brainwashing speech and surveilling individuals Film still, Gilliam, Brazil, 11m:03s.

In the sense of post-panopticon, Deleuze & Guattarian argued that the surveillance power operates like ‘flows’ and distinguished itself from the old panopticon theory.4 It can be seen that the punishment starts shifting from body to soul, and confining the thoughts of population in a psychological way. In Boyne’s literature, postpanopticon has two main starting point: first it is the true capacity of technical-technological in surveillance technology has advanced; secondly it is the surveillance itself becomes nowadays daily practice of people’s daily lives.5 On this basis, he argues that surveillance at the contemporary age shift from a power technique to a cultural tool practice.

At present, China has 200 million surveillance camera installed across the land.6 Hiring group chat admins to monitor conversation over internet activities, online shopping behaviors; Smart glasses for law enforcement officers; Authority to check on smartphones of citizens on street by police; Predictive software that collects data from population routine and behaviours; Facial recognition software combining the use of surveillance camera;7 all these flows of monitoring activities on citizens serves as tool for adopting new policies for the urban and country.

Some might argue that this gigantic social experiment is a violation of privacy or even cheated people in the country as these information seemed ‘personal’. However, it is true that the technologies nowadays allow people to spy, or say ‘stalk’ on other people and information is easily retrieved by somebody else. For Mathiesen, it is already a fact that observing each other by technological product has been constantly practiced by individuals in daily life which then everyone is witnessing the “continuation of observing”.8 And the social relations building up by such a way has been adopted by many individuals as a cultural practice at present as said by David Lyon that social relations has always involved the element of surveillance.9 It is just the way of surveilling a subject advances and takes in/out of information (as we now call them) from our comfort zone.

Figure 12. Security cameras in Tiananmen Square, Beijing Source: https://www.npr.org/2013/01/2 9/170469038/in-china-beware-a -camera-may-be-watching-you

Notes 1. Michel Foucault, Discipline And Punish: The Birth Of The Prison (Pantheon Books 1977).

2. Ibid.

3. Jon Jardine, Stuart Campbell and Neil Baxter, Adventures In Space (The Royal Incorporation of Architects Scotland 2016), p. 69.

4. Gilles Deleuze, Félix Guattari and Robert Hurley, Anti-Oedipus (Univ of Minnesota Pr 1983), p. 45.

5. Roy Boyne, 'Post-Panopticism' (2000) 29 Economy and Society.

6. 'Mass Surveillance In China' (En.wikipedia.org, 2018) <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_surveillance_in_China>.

7. Alexandra Ma, 'China Is Building A Vast Civilian Surveillance Network — Here Are 10 Ways It Could Be Feeding Its Creepy 'Social Credit System' (Business Insider, 2018) <https://www.businessinsider.com/how-china-is-watching-itscitizens-in-a-modern-surveillance-state-2018-4?r=US&IR=T#8-stopping-pedestrians-at-random-to-check-theirphones-9>.

8. Thomas Mathiesen, 'The Viewer Society' (1997) 1 Theoretical Criminology.

9. Stephen Graham, The Cybercities Reader (Routledge 2004), p. 299.

Building on Surveillance The word surveillance in fact has two sides, stated by David Lyon in his book, Surveillance Society. The first meaning, is to ‘watch over’, which means ‘protection’ is the primary goal and care is shown in context. The second dives to the standard of moral, where elements like direction, proscription and control come in the play.1 Hence surveillance as whole should both allows and constrains, cares and controls. The advantages of surveillance in public environments were originally undeniable and palpable: to control and avoid traffic accidents; to ensure no fraud transaction when shopping online; to enter a country with just a touch of your thumb on the sensor.

Convenience and safety are the care part and of course a bit of control in it. As said above, the dependence of social relations built up is so obvious which surveillance, in every conceivable corner, exists. It is not surprising then if breach of security on surveillance system happens, personal data would gone into open, public sphere. The privacy questions induced by surveillance hereby reduced to personal matter rather than inherently social concern. For sure this is important yet in Lyon’s book, his focus tends to speculate on the sociological sphere as it contributes to the order of society.2 The second face hence arises as it is surely capable of reinforcing the social and economic divisions, to direct human desires and to conduct voices, thus at its sharp end, to constrain and control.

In Minority Report (2002), many forms of objects are projected and visualized as holograms. In this imagined world of technology, it requires different spatial content to contain matter: photos, books, identity documents, personalized advertisements no longer required walls or shelves to present. It is then the revolution of spatial design in surveillance as the way of recording matters are different. As Coyne argues “The putative architectures of intelligent buildings, responsive environments, invisible computing……are not only benign, but hopefully present a series of dangerous and radical transformations on society and environment, with a challenge not least to the practices of the engendered species of architects, engineers, planners and geographers.”3

Figure 13. Protagonist playing hologram record at home along with other advance techonological products Film still, Gilliam, Minority Report, 20m:15s.

Notes 1. Zygmunt Bauman and David Lyon, Liquid Surveillance (Polity 2016), p. 3.

2. Ibid, P. 4.

3. Marco Frascari, Jonathan A Hale and Bradley Starkey, From Models To Drawings (Taylor & Francis 2007), p. 133.

Conclusion Though the topic of privacy was not further investigated in this essay, yet in Anon (2018), whereas privacy is no longer an issue that information is just as transparent as seeing through the air, it seemed to have suggested a new way of approaching design of spaces and how human occupy and experience the space. It might be ‘privacy’ is a glitch we are digesting through history of humanity. It might as well be a depiction of true cybercity in the future. By creating Tech Noir novels and movies, we are yet evaluating the future with our present moral standard, and hence usually dystopic. Post-panopticon might as well sound dystopic but then again speculatively, architecture plays an important role of how to weave our rapidly developing technology together with humanity.

There is another interesting Tech Noir novel, B.F. Skinner’s Walden 2, though surveillance was not the main discussion in it. The technological advanced society in the story propose to govern occupants by making them feel satisfying and enjoying the tasks they were given. “Sweet-coated drug” was the term Lewis Mumford used to describe such a proposed society. In my opinion, this post-post-panopticon way, a moving cage which follows the bird flies, seemed more like a metaphor of our current society status. It is not necessary to interpret it as a miserable framework since the basis of most social theories is to make the best use of abilities of individual humans. Indeed conflicts and human desires might be hard to resolve, yet by technology advancement and appropriate constraints on the population, the maximum or the best of human might be able to be teased out. In architecture means, it is the experiments of different ways to achieve such ambitions, regardless of imprisonments or urban artifices, dystopic or utopic interpretations in SF. The job of an architect is trying to plan, imagine, experiment the appropriate/best/most useful methods by thoughts/ideologies/physical or abstract representations in human, urban, country, planetary, or even galactic scale.

“It is not that I have something to hide, I have nothing that I want you to see.” Anon (2018)

Figure 14. Human vision after technological advancement on eyes Film still, Niccol, Anon, 2m:06s.

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