SUPER-GRID

04 SUPERSURFACE. SUPERGRID. SUPERSCENARIO

“The grid is, above all, a conceptual speculation…in its indifference to topography, to what exists, it claims the superiority of mental construction over reality” – Rem Koolhaas, Delirious New York.

The projected models gave way to the “model of a mental attitude." Square grid used as a design expression is a symbol of monument Architecture became an object that was of grid Super-studio created The grid covers the Continuous Moneverything – land, arument in 1969, an chitecture, city. “architectural model Super-studio pushes of total urbanisation” to an extreme end the in which an uninternotion of architecture rupted grid occupied as projection. The diseverywhere in the junction of architecearth. ture is replaced by the

built over everyday environment, framing pockets of the past into spaces within the continuous structure of the future, and from the physical interface to virtual environments. Understanding cyberspace as an allegory for the internet the conceptual connections become clear. The homogeneous grid equalises pre-existing power structures of the city, as notion of “supersurface 1 .” This “reduction of the architectonic object” bears witness to a declared will of the “destruction of the object” for the profit of life, of creative behaviour.

all point harness the same resources. The structure enables the individual rather than inhibits, Super-studio’s romantic notion of the nomad comes to mind.

Super Studio imagine the future through the complete breakdown of Western society's history, ideology and material structure. Their "anti-design" concept is destruction of object and thus eliminate all the layered power systems implied by the artificial environment and the object. Super Studio has proposed a new structure for the new equality society, which should be free from hierarchy, ownership and any form of labor. This radical political statement was first clearly stated in its "Continuous Monument", which will replace all man-made structures with a global, non-hierarchical grid structure: a blank, featureless aircraft Globalization of the earth continuously. Although never intending to describe the future in words, Supersurface has become an appropriate metaphor for today's online life.

The grid appeared to infiltrate every parts of our life from the monumental institutional establishment, the social housing, the extension as to concern about sea level increase, but also how the objectified dimension is engaged with us virtually. Facts have proved that its equal grid idea is closely related to the democratization trend of the Internet and today's "post-ownership society" ideal. In this concept, we no longer need to have any objects to use them. Today, Internet-based sharing platforms allow new ways to collectively rationalize the use of available resources. Can the economy after ownership represent life without objects and consumption? Has the Internet achieved a more equal distribution of power?

Apple HQ

Flooding issue of city

GRID ICONOGRAPHY

Omnipresence of rectilinear grid to invade everywhere. Inside of the grid, anything could happen.

URBAN-RURAL DIALECTIC

Continuous monument

FIG 17.The SuperStudio's work In an endless speculation of design action and user reaction, especially those anthropological act

Atti fondamentali, Morte, 1972

In an endless speculation of design action and user reaction, especially those anthropological act The grid as a place of strategy in line with an array of parameters that define the grid itself as a quintessential grids-cape in virtual game environment.

VIRTUAL-URBAN DIALECTIC

Game augmented space