BORDERS OF CHANGE

There is a particular word in Russian language that defines a fence as a special border only. It is not the essential bearing element, it is a paling, a fence, cutting through an area and turning it in two. This type of fence appeared to be a given element of every Russian landscape, especially countryside, which is a beginning point of this broad place.

One can say it is immensity of a country is one of the factors causing this peculiar need to designate boarder, trying to organize land. From a lath fence, to a fortress wall, fences are always a continuation of an object, they surround, it is a second skin of a special place which belongs to it. The typology and history of the fence is so quite continuous and reflecting on every activity mankind had concerning their personal and common real property.

Fences- facades, Fences- defenders, fences- organizers, fences- decorations- they all meant to serve in their own way.

Brought to a highly complex city landscape fence mutate into hierarchy of borders, into sometimes weird hybrids, which depending on scale and purpose control our ways, our timetables, our safety, our accessibility- our life. It also creates certain number of phenomenon such as emptiness framing.

Places like that can be found everywhere around Moscow. It is usually some construction area, or abandoned zones, or some massive badly organized storages. Closing places like that makes it legal, makes it impossible for us to know what is there and of course question the relevance of it.

Fence as a basic spatial controlling device, is used broadly and easily, especially in Russia. This influential side of a fence we wanted to investigate.

Looking at Moscow- the city which grew up from Kremlin-fence made us think about this city- borders, this massive modified fences, which have number of purposes. Now, when the city is so overgrown its first footprint so much, we can still find chains of fences, surrounding Moscow as you move from the center. Now they are high raised living houses, fence shaped, hive- structured living fences.

To question this hierarchy, this circular system we created this utopian scheme which divides Moscow plane in several slices, turning existing highways as guidelines of the division. Predicting the possible scenarios we made this grand scheme where every zone takes its own piece of a center area, which always was the most interactive in the city and probably in some future this little attractors of each place will move to the center of the zone they belong to be maximum accessible to all its citizens.But what is still the crucial about how all this regulating process works is what appears to be a fence. Changing the opacity, density, mass of possible walls can generate ambivalent effect on an object containing. Appearance of the structure begin to dictate further scenario.

For testing this set of qualities another scale was chosen. By placing up the same square fence on different sites of Moscow- as it is now- a powerful character of a fence was discovered. Abstractly placed on various squares- absolutlely different in their historical , geographical and urban context it was interpreted as sundry boarders with its own climate inside and outside as well. Changing physical aspects of a wall moderated surroundings as a scene.

The act of boarding something existing articulate almost the same degree of changing potential as building an object itself. It defines an object, indicates its meaning and relation with outside world. Reading boarder pattern, abstracting from objects they frame, opens up a new level of capacities of city life, it’s hidden or visible communications.