Return of the Passionate Observer by SophieLRose

RETURN OF THE PASSIONATE OBSERVER Sophie LinnĂŠa Rose Research Led Design P30035 Design Research Dissertation 13.01.2014

This Major Study is presented to the Department of Architecture, Oxford Brookes University in part fulfillment of the regulations for Diploma in Architecture. Statement of Originality This Major Study is an original piece of work which is made available for copying with permission of the Head of School of Architecture. Signed................................. Sophie LinnĂŠa Rose Oxford Brookes University 13 January 2014

Contents Page

DESIGN RESEARCH INTRODUCTION.

pg. 8

1.0 Asger Jorn’s ‘Vandalised’ Art.

pg.19

2.0 Architecture as Fetish.

pg.47

3.0 Architecture as Institution.

pg.67

4.0 Architecture as ‘Vandalism’.

pg.79

DESIGN RESEARCH REFLECTION.

pg. 91

BIBLIOGRAPHY AND IMAGES.

pg. 98

Introduction.

The aim for the dissertation is to focus on key ideas behind by Dutch artists Asger Jorn’s ‘Modification’s’ (1959-1962), a series of ‘vandalized’ kitsch paintings that aimed to communicate to the general public the sterility of creation through the institutionalisation of Art. By making additions to the forgotten paintings, Jorn believed that a new appreciation for them could be instilled and this attitude characterised much of the thinking behind the concept of ‘détournement’, a practice by the Situationists International to create awareness of current social and cultural situations. This Research is intended to explore the possibilities for the development of an architectural theory of investigation inspired by Dutch artist, Asger Jorn’s ‘Modifications’ series and how these methods can be used to critically intervene and expose contemporary capitalist urban space that has been mass-produced under the term ‘regeneration’. “... détournement of pre-existing aesthetic elements. The integration of past or present artistic production into a superior construction of a milieu. In this sense there can be no Situationist painting or music, but only a Situationist use of these means.”

(Jorn, 1958) Internationale Situationiste issue 1, June 1958.

Design Research INTRODUCTION

In 1951 Jorn confessed it was a body of theoretical work that instigated his fanatical interest in architecture; certainly there can be few modern artists who so intensely and so publicly involved themselves in architectural theory and debate. His life-long mission was to define how art and architecture related to one another in the grand scheme of creating a fulfilling life for all. This attitude related to Jorn’s concern with the role of the individual in society and in a Situationist manner, set out to liberate the individual from the preconditions described Debord’s 1967 ‘Society of the Spectacle’, in which an authentic and fulfilling social life had been substituted by representation. In the world of architecture, the representation of a buildings image can become more important than the building itself and this forms part of the fetishized commodity of architecture in urban regeneration projects around the UK.

Although Jorn didn’t deliver a comprehensible theory which can be applied to architecture or urban design and his reflections are decidedly theoretical, sometimes fragmented and at times contradictory, nevertheless his practice of protesting the institution of art through his détourned paintings appears in its time to be highly successful in challenging the art world and its academics. Ultimately this paper attempts to transpose Asger Jorn’s radical methods of sacrificing kitsch art to challenge todays model of the contemporary urban living in an attempt to locate an unravel contradictions within the program of urban regeneration. It must be noted that the aim of this paper is not to exercise a regulated practice adapted to current architectural practices for the urban environment, but explores Asger Jorn’s practice of détournement as a tool to re-evaluate existing conditions of recently regenerated urban environments built on the grounds of cosmopolitan ideology. The testing ground for the theory of détournement will be in Birmingham Bull Ring, a site distinct yet typical of the phenomenon of capitalist-driven design, a space that has endured various stages of development and redevelopment and has therefore witnessed significant sociological and economical changes.

Design Research INTRODUCTION

The acts of détournement in this city space intend to intervene in the lives of the everyday user which aims to suggest critiques of the institutional co-optation of the cities developers and following this journey of protesting the urban environment, the expectation is for questions to be raised by the public as a result of radical action The production of radical anti-‘regeneration’ expressions in order to challenge peoples conditioning through carefully calculated humiliations and playful strategies of détourned spaces, will be used to highlight the current passiveness of the public realm in these artificial environments. The aim to question the classical ordering of urban structures and the subsequent preconditions produced may seem ambitious but this task does not represent an end in itself but is a work which I believe to be not only crucial but inevitable.

Chapter I will demonstrate Asger Jorn’s development of the practice of détournement which resulted in his ‘Modifications’ series, created to challenge the late avant-garde ideologies and the subsequent negative effects of which the imposed institutional classical order had on natural creativity. The section explores how his détourned paintings were produced to question many social and cultural assumptions and accepted positions of the general public, looking specifically at the preconditions brought about by the institutionalization of art and compares and contrasts the ‘Modifications’ form of protest with Marcel Duchamp’s Dadaist approach who’s ready-mades which included a vandalised postcard of Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa pioneered part of the historical avant-garde protest. Following this analysis, Chapter II will evaluate the conservative force of architecture as an institution with efforts to understand the institutions functions, cultural values and its maintenance of society through design and the consequences this has on the individual in the new urban environment.

Design Research iNTRODUCTION

Chapter III aims to critically raise questions about the current situation of urban architecture with specific interest in the fetishized movement of ‘regeneration’ and the system of reproduction of regimented city centres such as the Birmingham Bullring and the effects this has on built environment and the general public today. Chapter IV, Architecture as ‘Vandalism’, will explore the possibilities of urban détournement by transposing Asger Jorn’s art practice or painted protest into architecture to critically re-evaluate in order to question the preconditions created by these mass-produced, artificial and sterile landscapes which suppress natural expression.

Fig 2: Untitled Landscape (defiguration) by Asger Jorn

Fig 1: Summer Song (defiguration) by Asger Jorn

Fig 3: Melmoth by Asger Jorn (1955) Asger Jorn’s progressive idea of displacement as an unavoidable spiritual order, which he believed to be an essential situation for the true artist and he Jorn most closely identified with Ahasuerus the Wandering Jew, depicted above:

“True creation puts an artist in the situation of homelessness [dépaysement], which can only be overcome by his extreme efforts. The mobilization of all his inventive and formal resources, this passionate struggle with the material is inimitable” (Asger Jorn, Pour la forme. Ébauche d’une méthodologie des arts, 1st edition, Paris, Internationale Situationiste, 1958 (phh 132). (Shields pg. 165.)

Chapter I Asger Jorn’s ‘Vandalised’ Art.

Design Research Focus

This chapter aims to explore key ideas behind the ‘vandalised art’ of, Dutch artist and key practitioner within the Situationist International, Asger Jorn in his ironic Modification series (1959-1962) and to develop an understanding of his methods of ‘détournement’ as a tool to protest the Avant-garde institution, which he believed, sterilized art. Jorn’s ‘vandalised art’ manifests itself on the principle that institutionalising art makes it ordinary and easily forgotten, consequently he aims to continually revise art through abstract additions on which challenges the agenda of the art institution. Jorn’s awareness of the art movements and antibourgeois attitude was prominent in The Situationist International group which began in 1957, Asger Jorn who was the artistic influence in the group, had already established the basic ideals which inspired détournement in his critical essay entitled ‘Intimate Banalities’ written in 1941 where he communicates an apprehension for new avant-garde movements and the consequential regulated creativity which was established through its policies.

Design Research Focus

In order to broach the theme of the détourned paintings it is necessary to clarify key terms that will be used throughout this research paper which will be essential in understanding the radical action of artistic protest. Therefore, the earlier practices of the avant-garde will be illustrated in the context of the German literary critic Peter Bürger’s Theory of the Avant-garde written in 1974 which communicates a unique understanding of the artistic practices of political and institutional resistance of historical avant-garde, looking particularly at the actions by Dada and Duchamp. This part of the exploration will endeavour to follow the revolution artistic protest and Asger Jorn’s innovation of the actions of ‘anti-art’. “Those who seek to curtail the production of banal art are enemies of the best of today’s art. The images of woodland lakes found in thousands of living rooms clad in golden-brown wallpapers stands among the deepest, most profound inspiration of art. It is always tragic to see people toiling to saw away the branch on which they themselves are perched”

(Jorn, 1941, p. 33-38)

In 1947 Asger Jorn’s nonconformist attitude towards systems of authority motivated him to for part of the Revolutionairy Surrealist group which targeted a Marxist or materialist aesthetics which formed the possibility of open experimentation. When this group splintered, Jorn founded the CoBrA, (Copenhagen, Brussels, Amsterdam) group in a café in Paris in 1948 which involved artists, poets, musicians and their artistic work was largely encouraged by transgressing the boundaries of their disciplines. Unfortunately, due to Jorn contracting tuberculosis, this group would dissolve and eventually formed a Movement for an Imaginist Bauhaus in 1953. In a series of early correspondence with Swiss architect Max Bill, who was the director of the Imaginist Bauhaus, Jorn demonstrates a critical attitude towards constructing an institution for art and this objection to the academy of art would inspire his détourned paintings between 1959 and 1962.

Design Research Focus

“Bauhaus is the name of an artistic inspiration” -Asger Jorn (letter to Max Bill, January 16, 1954) “Bauhaus is not the name of an artistic inspiration; it signifies a movement that represents a well-defines doctrine.” -Max Bill (letter to Asger Jorn, January 23, 1954) “If Bauhaus is not the name of an artistic inspiration, it is the name of a doctrine without inspiration, i.e. a dead doctrine. -Asger Jorn (letter to Max Bill, February 12, 1954)

After these setbacks Jorn began a very extensive, amateur research into science and art and by the mid 1950’s he had turned to towards art history and iconography in which he revealed and linked artistic developments to motifs of time and place. It is important to communicate that this series of auto didactic endeavours moved away from academic and artistic courses and eventually, in a period of 1960-64 his assortment of investigations came together after catalytic encounters with radical European movements.

Fig 4: A dĂŠtourned set of Architectural plans of a building from Memoires by Asger Jorn and Guy Debord.

Design Research Focus

The Situationists International, which Jorn cofounded with Guy Debord, continued the Dadaist and Surrealist program of radical anti-art expressions created to challenge people’s conditioning through carefully calculated humiliations and playful strategies of détournement, use to criticise the global spectaclecommodity system. These protests were constructed from the embryo of Jorn’s 1941 ‘Intimate Banalities’ essay almost eighteen years earlier and inspired various actions of détournement which consciously linked itself to a system of plagiarism and repetition of mediated images, which form part of a spectacle. Jorn’s disengagement with the Situationists International rested firstly on a disagreement of how the group was co-ordinated by Debord: “That Debord – engaged as he is now – is returning strongly to conventional and convenient positions which are, in effect, those of the Parisian avant-garde, appears neither desirable nor possible to us”

(Quoted in Shields, 1998 pg.7) Secondly, Jorn soon clashed with the ideology of the continuous derive, a process promoted by the Situationists International, as he believed that continually changing the landscape failed to form harmonious logical viewpoints and thus resulted in subsequent disintegration of thoughts. After his amicable separation from the group in 1961, Jorn spent the next decade elaborating on his artistic-morphological practices of iconography.

Ralph Rumney, in an interview, describes Jorn’s relationship to the group: “He was the artist who stayed the longest, while continuing to do whatever he liked and see whomever he liked. You could say that if there was an internal discipline within the SI that prohibited any contact with expelled members, Jorn cheerfully ignored it.”

(Rumney, 2002 pg. 39) To put it simply, the process of détournement under the Situationists International aims smash the culture, which had been produced under the bourgeois rule, and what they believed would surface from the wreckage was the true situation. The practice aims to intensify mans self-awareness in order to create a platform for social and cultural change. What makes the historical avant-garde described by Burger relevant here is that the practice of détournement has strong resemblances to the values of Dada movement, a group which had grown from an ideology of critique and it would appear that the actions of the Situationists International and Asger Jorn’s himself are a continuation of the initial Avant-garde practice.

Design Research Focus

In a similar trend to the Situationists International, the early avant-garde group was predominantly defined by artists, writers and composers that surfaced as part of a movement of social and political revolution and development, historically challenging mainstream cultural values that had been fashioned by the consciousness of industrialization in the late 19th century. The radical autonomy, which was fortified by the historical avant-garde in the twenties, differed from all previous art movements where their manner of working was determined specifically by acceptance of self-governed artistic expression. Burger, in his book, highlights the ideology of critique that outlined the early avant-garde theories inspired by Marx’s Critique of Hegel philosophy of Right, which emphasizes the importance of the critique of religion in order to disenchant man and make him capable of action: “The wretchedness of religion is at once an expression of and a protest against real wretchedness. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people. The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is a demand for their true happiness. The call to abandon illusions about their condition is the call to abandon a condition which requires illusions. Thus the critique of religion is the critique in embryo of the value of the tears of which religion is the halo…”

(Burger 1994, pg. 6)

Be modern, collectors, museums. If you have old paintings, do not despair. Retain your memories but dĂŠtourn them so that they correspond with your era. Why reject the old if one can modernize it with a few strokes of the brush? This casts a bit of contemporaneity on your old culture. Be up to date, and distinguished at the same time. Painting is over. You might as well finish it off. DĂŠtourn. Long live painting.

-published as the opening to the exhibition at Galerie Rive Gauche, May 1959

Fig 5: Image of quote Asger Jornsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s theory of Facade Art.

Design Research Focus

Burger explains that ideologically, the artistic talent isolated themselves from the effects of mass-manufacturing and remained purely as a critical observer of the world, however this state of complete separation from the influences of commercialisation did not persevere which consequently meant that the art genius was being dictated by the bourgeois culture. Therefore the importance of the historical phase of contesting the established rules used in kitsch art which Burger believed to be the first stage of bourgeois art which eventually encouraged a dependence by artists on their customers. Consequently, this formed creative movements in the avant-garde which satisfied certain public tastes in art thus transforming art into a commodity. In retaliation to this bourgeois-controlled development in the artistic world, a new movement of protest under the loose term ‘anti-art’, utilised art to communicate certain artist’s frustration towards this new commercialised art. This expression was associated with Dada which was considered to be one of the first specifically anti-art movements, where conventional artistic standards were rejected along with the art-market. The productions of art generated under this approach included the application of ‘found art’ which was initiated by Marcel Duchamp’s Readymades and, in a similar manner, Jorn used found art to produce anti-art protests.

Fig 6: Paris by Night (defiguration) by Asger Jorn (1959)

Design Research Focus

The re-evaluation of Kitsch paintings were conducted by Jorn in order to question the classical order of society which he contests with natural order. In other words, his ‘vandalised’ paintings emphasised the preconditions created by artificial classification, which he believed suppressed natural means of expression. The topics communicated through his painted protests extended to gender relationships, creative elite and economy and Jorn’s primary interest; the evolutionary theory of art. Firstly, one particular Modification in his earlier painting ‘Paris by night’ (1959) which seeks to demonstrate the failures of the deconstructivist painting style found in contemporary art movements such as cubism and minimalism which were artistic bodies formed between 1907 and 1911 that was theoretically an attempted by artistic institutions to move away from the modernist procedures of pure form. What is interesting about this piece is Jorn’s attempt to protest this artistic doctrine by ‘vandalising’ it through adopting the deconstructivist style in an effort to interfere with the kitsch painting. Despite Jorn’s bold efforts, the eerie blue tones creates a heavy static and these additions, rather than intruding on the contemplative solitude of the figure of the existing painting or disrupting the spatial arrangement in any major manner, are plainly received as ineffective paint dribbles coated on the canvas. Jorn’s message in this modification is clear, the failure to invigorate the painting underlines the failure of the deconstructive strategies promoted by avant-garde.

Fig 7: The Avant-Garde Doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t Give up (defiguration) by Asger Jorn (1962)

Design Research Focus

Secondly, it was after Jorn’s separation from The Situationists International in 1961 where a year later he produced the New Modification series, which was considered a more serious attempt at protest. This included a painting under the title ‘L’avant-garde se rend pas’ (addressed to admirers of Duchamp) which is Jorn’s more ironic version of Duchamp’s cheap poster-size degradation of the Mona Lisa in which they both artists assault the Avant-garde movement. Although both artists vandalised images appears, at first glance, to be approached in the same manner however contrasting the approaches highlights Jorn’s unique practice of protesting established systems. By vandalizing the amateur academicstyle painting that was deemed as obsolete, Jorn aims to find a harmony between the old and the new through his abstract additions which contrast with Duchamp’s nullifying demonstrations. In typical avant-garde provocation, Jorn ridicules the conformist nature of the painting of the girl by vandalizing her portrait through additions of facial hair and the vulgarity of the graffiti text. However, the sentiment expressed in Jorn’s mutations were accomplished by exploiting the classical high-art medium of oil paint and this calculated action reveals a more profound revision of radical protest by Jorn which endeavours to capture and formulate a tension in the work between the appearance and sign. This process embodies a view that Jorn’s satirical attack on the consumers of art also maintains an effort to honour the painting by modernizing it using a few brush strokes.

Fig 8: L.H.O.O.Q by Marcel Duchamp (1919).

Design Research Focus

Although the art produced by Jorn and Duchamp both functioned in expressing resistance to modernisation in the postwar period by devaluing art, there is a fundamental contrast in the manner of protest adopted by each artist. Jorn’s more sympathetic arrangement of comparative vandalism implemented in the painting of the bourgeois girl clearly intends to create a new context which appears to contrast with Duchamp’s terrorism of art and this more thoughtful approach to protesting art is described in Jorn’s Exhibition catalogue for his New Disfigurations series for the Rive Gauche Gallery in which he describes the approach in his protest-paintings: “This sort of offering can be done gently the way doctors do it when they kill their patients with new medicines that they want to try out. It can also be done in a barbaric fashion, in public and with pomp. This is what I like. I solemnly tip my hat and let the blood flow while intoning Baudelaire’s hym to beauty”

(Jorn, 1959)

Fig 9: The Fountain by Marcel Duchamp (1917).

Design Research Focus

Nevertheless, inexplicably, despite Duchamp’s more aggressive approach in his stated indifference of art through his Dadaist intervention of Leonardo’s masterpiece in 1917, the anti-art movement which he formed part of was diluted by the art world who remarkably embraced his protest and turning his revolution into an artistic concept. Probably much to Duchamp’s frustration, his Anti-art movement actually became in the interest of art because it appeared to revitalized and stimulate a new public view of art and this consequently had an enormous impact on art since 1960. Duchamp’s failed revolution to abolish art had turned into a philosophical success and it was this exact disillusionment that Jorn communicated with his sarcastic piece, ‘L’avant-garde se rend pas’ (The avant-garde doesn’t give up), the vandalised painting of the bourgeois girl. Asger Jorn’s and Guy Debord’s agenda for The Situationists International was the continuous search for the methods pure protest and this pragmatic approach, which was insisted by both parties often, meant that members who were involved in artistic or philosophical success were immediately excluded.

Although Duchamp’s approach to protest was deemed as a failure by the Situationists International, it is apparent that Asger Jorn’s theoretical position in his modification series embraces similar tactics which are widely celebrated in Duchamp’s works. In Duchamp’s Readymade’s there is a theme of re production and repetition where the urinal is industrially mass-produced, the autograph ‘R.MUTT’ on the urinal is a wordplay of commercial origins which carries with it the repetition of mass media which he describes; “Mutt comes from Mott Works, the name of a large sanitary equipment manufacturer. But Mott was too close so I altered it to Mutt, after the daily cartoon strip ‘Mutt and Jeff’ which appeared at the time, and with which everyone was familiar. Thus, from the start, there was an interplay of Mutt: a fat little funny man, and Jeff: a tall thin man ... I wanted any old name, And I added Richard [French slang for moneybags]. That’s not a bad name for a pissotière. Get it? The opposite of poverty. But not even that much, just R. MUTT.” (Schwarz, 1997, pg.649.)

Design Research Focus

It is also important to note that only a handful of people had come into physical contact with the urinal as the original disappeared soon after the signing and naming of it in 1917 and for this reason the object was replicated several times. This resulted in the legendary work of art actually being recognised predominantly through Alfred Steiglitz’s photograph of the object which was a series of representations and repetitions but no original object influenced the acceptability of the urinal as a work of art. This method of continuous re-evaluation and repetition not only embodies Jorn’s artistic practices but also highlights his ideas of political progress. Jorn appears to have become an embodiment of this continuum at times, adopting vocabulary from long dead authors etc. Wrote in Manifesto of the “The Scandinavians strive towards reform where the French aim at revolution. We build on the past and we let new ideas grow out of past experience”

Situationist Times (Hengelo NL) 2, September 1962, 61.

The technique of ‘détournement’ consists of two phases; In order to fully appreciate the value of seemingly forgotten objects, the indifference towards it must be firstly documented and understood. This indifference is then exposed through shocking the object back into the consciousness that Jorn achieves through ‘vandalism’ in his art, which intends to ultimately reveal the spectacle. This practice which re-evaluates existing situations, inspired by the Dada movement and explored by Duchamp’s action art through his Readymade’s is seen as valuable to Jorn, however it appears that Jorn’s method of combining action art with the pure creator may in fact support a more sustainable practice of protesting. Duchamp in an interview with the BBC in 1968 explains how the public can no longer be shocked by art and even ‘boredom’ is accepted as art. “Its very interesting to have used ‘boredom’ as an aim to attract the public. In other words the public comes to a happening not to be amused, to be bored!”

Source: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bwk7wFdC76Y

Design Research Focus

The Dadaist practice and methods of critiquing art creates the opportunity for artists to form a condition of separation from mass-production of art and remain as a critical observer of the world and Jorns methods of â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;sacrificingâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; art can be implemented to form practices which re-evaluate existing architecture in recently regenerated spaces which are constructed around a mere image of culture and society provide possibilities of dĂŠtournement.

Chapter II Architecture as Fetish.

Design Research Focus

Jean Baudrillard, who was inspired by situationist theories, developed a notion of sign-fetishism and objects-fetishism envisioned through the combined ideologies of Marx’s commodity fetishism discussed in Das Capital (1867) which describes an object of transference, and Freud’s Fetishism (1927); more sexualized fetishism which depicts the initial phenomenon of substitution and encompasses recognition and negation of reality. Marx, being a man and critic of his times was influenced greatly by how industrial urbanization was affecting the living and working conditions of the everyday lives of ordinary citizens and therefore addresses the exchange-value of commodities at the level of the economic systems of production and therefore does not deal with the consumption of objects. In contrast Freud’s perception of the fetish as a desired substitute for a suitable sex items surveys how objects are desired and consumed. In Baudrillard’s System of Objects (1996) he develops a more contemporary analysis objects fetishism which moves away from evaluation of fetishism as indicative of the human relation with unreal objects and instead uncovers the social exchange of sign value objects that he believed ultimately coordinated objects, fetishized in ostentation.

Generated by the trend for universal consumerism, objects of fetishism exist in all aspects of modern life and this mental attitude of the public described by Baudrillard has influenced architectural direction and the consequence is that architecture is greatly influenced by this fashion and the reverse situation exists, logically, that architecture has to provide consumerism spaces. This ideology of the sign value of objects can be recognised in the production of ‘Global cities’ manufactured by the architectural institution to produce, under careful management and strategic developments, hypercomodified spaces that portray the image of growth. This increasing concern about commodified spaces moved the definition of ‘fetishism’ away from the spiritual value, towards the exchange value and this system of fetishism can be observed in the institution of architecture today, particularly within the image of ‘regeneration’. Today more than ever, in the context of the urban environment, architecture and urban design is used as a tool to stimulate and commercialize city centres which has resulted in a heavily fetishized environment where the objects of trade are fetishized right through to the spectacle of regeneration itself; which has formed part of a large trend inside cities and within the architectural industry.

Design Research FOCUS

Creating an inner city design that responds to hyper commodified spaces encourages a set of rules that regulates and orients an architectural practice which provides a set of fundamental propositions that guide the production of architecture and position it with respect to its ideological background and this can create a false consciousness of the environment. The term ‘regeneration’ is a word coined in the 1980’s which means ‘rebirth’ rather than the more ordinary ‘redevelopment’ which implies a symbolic image of a new economy rising from the ashes of the industrial past with the promise of supplying abundance and opportunity in a new urban landscape. There are many examples of architectural spaces, constructed, promoted and consumed around the idea of ‘regeneration’ with the promise to inject vibrancy and encourage healthy social environments and architects and developers have been devoted to producing and reproducing models of this kind throughout the UK. Such instances of this type of regeneration can be seen in the launch of Birmingham’s Big City Plan (BCP) which provides a master plan to guide development in the city over the next two decades with the objective of producing ‘the UK’s second world city’.

Fig 10: Retaining wall, The Bull Ring (2001)

Design Research FOCUS

These developments are presented to the general public as ideal environments securing future economic and social prosperity but on closed examination it is quite clear that they are designing for the benefit or commercial enterprises and consumerism in general. These pre-conditions for city centres today can be understood as continuous with Anna Minton’s theory of ‘Malls without walls’ described in her book Ground Control: Fear and happiness in the twenty-firstcentury city which provides a sobering account of the market-led regeneration of the urban landscape where she makes a compelling discovery of the privatization of city streets under the Compulsory Purchase act which ultimately allows the owners to regulate and territorialize parts of the city. The spectacle of market-led regeneration fashioned on shopping mall ideology endorses a ‘safe and clean’ environment and has received excessive attention and therefore has encouraged mass-produced and thus fetishized models of city centres within the architectural institution;

“Now, a generation later, what began to specifically serve the needs of business has become the standard model for the creation of every new place in towns and cities across the country”

(Minton, 2012 pg. 5)

Fig 11: Birmingham Bullring view towards Church of St. Martin (2013)

Design Research FOCUS

When an object or space has a fetishized value it usually suggests an element of seduction and this strategy can be observed in regenerated spaces through the idea of ‘place-making’, a term derived by a large movement within Architectural institutions. However, in efforts to preserve the historical identity of a regenerated city space there is a risk of segregating old buildings that formerly occupy the site and examples of this process of selection conducted by contractors of new urban developments can be seen through out numerous cities and town centres in the UK, which habitually isolate the existing classical style churches and town halls which form products of past institutionalised styles of architecture and the contradictions within the spectacle of regeneration damages the importance of these historic buildings, and in the same way as Asger Jorn refers to the treatment of kitsch art, they are reduced to obsolete objects. An example of this occurrence is St. Martin’s church in Birmingham where this entity represents the purist form of immaterial fetishism draw the publics attention and appreciation of an item of construction that’s conceived purely as a spiritual fetish as opposed to the commercially designed and directed modern concepts which occupy the centre of most regenerated cities. In respect of this type of iconic city feature we can understand the reason for Asger Jorn’s vandalized kitsch art which is designed to focus the public’s attention on them so that they will more appreciate the immaterial fetish content in these objectified buildings which they seldom do because they look at them and don’t see them.

Fig 12: Birdâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s-eye view of Bull Ring, Birmingham with etracted church view.

The literature on architectural fetishes so far is largely argued in terms of the building typology and styles, however this chapter aims to challenge the established historical meaning of ‘fetish’ highlighted by William Pietz and radicalise the definition in an attempt to expose the positive emotional implications of the word and demonstrate the The word ‘fetish’ has endured various appropriations by multiple disciplines that suggest no shared theoretical ground; encompassing thoughts on aesthetic, religious, sexual and social value. William Pietz directed an extensive study of the history of the idea of ‘fetish’, which was originally believed to be motivated by the dominant society system of the Catholic tradition. In his essay Problem of the Fetish I (1985) Pietz recaps on the origin of the word fetisso derived from the Portuguese word fetiço which was used during the late Middle Ages described witch craft, practiced innocently by the uneducated classes. Pietz goes on to argue that the term ‘fetish’ was elaborated to literally demonize (through the association of feitiço with witchcraft) during the colonial period to describe the supposedly irrational attachment towards material objects worn or ingested by Africans.

Design Research FOCUS

At this time, the attitude of the colonized Africans and the European colonials were fundamentally contrasting; the Europeans were concerned with the objects exchange value, and in contrast to this, the Africans were focused on the divine value of trifle objects and because the Europeans generally could not comprehend the Africans â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;irrationalâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; attachments to certain objects they therefore established an opposition to the demonized fetishism by rejecting the object. Its apparent that the western world has continued in the direction of object fetishism as exemplified by the development of commercial spaces created for the benefit of capitalism and consumerism where the general public is mislead into a state of euphoria by being subliminally influenced into believing that they are in a space of security, comfort and safety specifically provided for them. As opposed to the continued promotion of commodity-fetishism, itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s obvious that the most honest and purest form of fetishism is the primitive interpretation as exemplified by the indigenous cultures in general which had not been contaminated by the influence of developed countries.

Fig 13: La Comtesse au fouet by Martin van MaĂŤle (1926).

1. Function The object extends or enhances the human physical action of its user11; e.g. as a tool the car actually transports its user. 2. Ostension The object signifies the social group membership of its user: e.g. the distinction of a tiara, the clan identification of a football scarf. 3. Sexuality The object arouses its user or others or both, as a sign from a code indicating sexual action, identity and interest, throughbodily display, sensuality or substitution; e.g.

4. Knowledge The object delivers knowledge to its user by storing simple information or a synthetic understanding of some aspect of the world; e.g. book or any other complex textual object. 5. Aesthetics The beauty or form of the object directly moves the emotions of users by representing pure values; e.g. the ‘object d’art’. 6. Mediation The object enables or enhances communications between humans; e.g. a telephone; the decorative item that is a talking point; the heirloom that links generations

(Dant, 1996 pp. 495-516)

Fig 14: African Sculpture covered with nails named Nkonde.

The fetishist object in African religion of Nkonde was mostly an observer, and an significant one in view of his theoretical relationship with the realm of the supernatural. The Nkonde, as guardian of collective memory, would inflict sudden disease on any defaulter, or even bring about their death, however he protected the innocent. The Nkondeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s face is always aggressive and deliberately terrifying; the mouth is always open, as if shouting a warning to the person making a vow. The object brings together considerable natural and wholly psychological powers together and functions through the employment of relatively meagre physical objects

Henri Lefebvre, the French sociologist warned about the repercussions of treating city spaces simply as a product to sell to consumers would result in replicated models of near identical spaces, produced according to the same tick-box recipe. This phenomenon can been observed in the spectacle of regeneration which has become a movement within the institution of architecture and thus the architectural industry manufactures ideologies of potential lifestyle opportunities through the creation of the spectacle of â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;regenerationâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; and within this, capitalism encourages architects to continue to create new architecture that disregards past buildings. To address this situation, the radicalisation of the fetishised idea of urban regeneration might perhaps divorce the image of the movement and thus could allow for the opportunity for existing architecture to reestablish the more primitive portrayal of object fetishism, in other words, restore the divine and immaterial value of the existing architecture which could aid in forming a resistance to the new ideals of urban regeneration.

Design Research FOCUS

Chapter III Architecture as Institution.

Design Research FOCUS

Already in the early 1950s, when industrially manufactured commodities were just about to become part of everyday life in Europe, Jorn was warning us not to base our lives on the â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;acquiredâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; needs which had been stimulated through the use of advertising. Jorn warned about the profound impact that commercialisation would have on public spaces, brought about by profit making and exploitation in the modern capitalist world. This theory has had a direct impact on the way architects perform as an institute and now more than ever, new movements of profit driven architectural spaces and city centres have produced models for social living through their designs. Currently many global institutes of the architectural fraternity promote policies and public programmes that aim to stimulate the urban environment and its planning systems and have therefore been the cause of the mass-produced model for urban regeneration strategies. The first ever form of urban renovation came in the form of Haussmannâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Paris (1854), which after its completion became a model for following regeneration plans around the world. Although, unfortunately most of these approaches were inspired by Napoleons paranoid nature and concern for policing which appears today to have resulted in a model for urban regeneration inspired by similar policing ideals.

Before the Haussmannâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s urban reformation plan, Paris had remained unchanged since the Middle Ages; the city had been allowed to develop organically. The size of the overall project envisaged by Haussmann could never have been approved by a democratic government whose politicians would never have authorised this level of financial risk and thus Hausmanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s ostentatious reformation plan could only have been initiated by a totalitarian government and by such a domineering personality like Napoleon III. The new geometric arrangement of the wider streets inspired many of the urban regeneration projects to follow. However, now urban regeneration projects are driven by capitalism rather than imperial power although it would seem that the imperial power has shifted to the large multi million pound corporations who ultimately dictate the urban environment commercialised city centres and the individuals within it.

Design Research FOCUS

Two of the most significant features of this process in the built environment of the late twentieth century have been the destruction and privatisation of public urban space, and the development of zoning patterns described in Anna Mintonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s sobering account of regeneration projects around the UK which describes an alarming movement among architectural institutes which inspired architects to produce urban environments that encompass shopping mall ideals. â&#x20AC;&#x153;The consequence of running places like this is that it removes all the imagination and creativity from city life, both for the managers controlling events according to a fixed schedule, and for the participants who are unable to depart from the script.â&#x20AC;?

(Minton, 2012 pg. 55)

Fig 15: Collage describing view towards St. Martins Church (2013)

Design Research FOCUS

The regeneration plans for the centre of Birmingham assigned a development process entirely to the private sector after they had bought the land and this meant that private developers could build upon a previous phase of public investment in landmarks. The Bull Ring Centre, which is promoted by the developers and the architectural institution as being inclusive rather than elite territories, promises to lay the basis for cosmopolitan democracy however these spaces which are designed by the institution of architecture are dictated and formulated by large capital globalized service industries, and produce uninspiring and sterile environments which only reduce the significance of the everyday man within this space which also devalues the institution of architecture.

Chapter IV Architecture as ‘Vandalism’.

Design Research proposal

There are two phases involved in Asger Jorn’s practice of détournement that ‘vandalised’ kitsch paintings in which he attempts to create a monument to the painted images of idyllic landscapes and amateur portraits of bourgeois people which had become forgotten and obsolete. The first stage for an effective practice of détournement involves understanding and documenting the stated indifference towards the specific object (in Jorn’s case the piece of kitsch art found in a flea market or junk shop) and the second stage is to expose this indifference to the spectator by shocking the object back into awareness which Jorn accomplishes through vandalism. This is a process used to expose the spectacle which has been artificially manufactured and encourages the spectator to react to the prerequisites of the society which follows the spectacle.

In chapter I it had been understood that détournement practiced by Jorn consciously encompasses both action art and pure creation to produce a desired tension on the canvas between the two oppositional terms. This strategy of reevaluating existing situations through Jorn’s practice of ‘vandalism’ can be executed in the urban environment to interfere with the artificial stillness of the ‘malls without walls’ which aims to raise questions about the fetishized environments and the surrounding architecture of the regenerated space that is the Bullring. ( Jorn) “he demands a new interplay, a trioletic of the intrinsic dialects of the three main cultural grouping, again following his strategy of retreating down the tree of evolution to find a suitable side-branch for a new direction, rather than attempting to cut down or abandon the tree.”

(Shields, 1998 pg. 93)

Design Research proposal

The opportunity for critically intervening in the Birmingham Bullring comes in the form of a proposed détournement, or ‘vandalism’, of the grade II listed stone church of St. Martin which currently sits on the site of a 13th-century predecessor and has been cleaned and repaired as part of the 2003 Bull Ring regeneration. The proposal describes a plan that promises to revitalise and modernise the church through the détournement of the pre-existing aesthetic church spire with the addition of contemporary materials and façade textures and this is presented in earnest using brash and stylised leaflet and then offered to the general public of Birmingham. The rational behind this urban intervention is to deliberately challenge the public to withdraw and then reject the spectacle of regeneration and the accepted status quo of the passive urban individual.

Fig 16: Front page of Leaflet for proposed architecture.

R TA EVI LIS ING

Proposed by: The Big City DĂŠtournement

The objective for this proposal is to modernise the church building using new facade schemes inspired by the celebrated neighbouring building, Aesthetically this will enhance the old church structure in its new setting by continuing the sense of uniformity within the Bull Ring. The update means that the church can form part of the iconic image of the existing new city centre. The new interior window feature aims to encourage toursists and the local shoppers to enter and utalise the building.

Proposed Interior Church Altar feature

Fig 17: Back page of Leaflet for proposed architecture.

Proposed Aims for Renovation of Church features:

Surrounding the historical building is the Selfridges Department Store whose vivacious faĂ§ade (design by world-renowned architecture firm Future Systems) has now become the dominant feature of the Bull Ring square and thus the new landmark of Birmingham, an instantly recognisable signpost for the department store brand and the establishment behind the coordination of the build. Obviously the condition generated by the fetishized environment has isolated the old church from the general public and consequently appears to strip the structure from its divine value and reduced it to an object fetishized for its value of transference; for example, providing a nice view for the spectators at Costa CafĂŠ. This disregards entirely the original divine architectural image and intrinsic value of the church as a vision of reverence. This phenomenon can be observed in the manner in which the Bull Ring centre has utilised a crescent shape to surround the old building in order for the adjacent cafes and restaurants to obtain views of the image of the church.

Design Research proposal

This continues to produce an increased commercial value for the owner of these units although the church is actually reduced to an obsolete fetish item and valueless in terms of modern architecture and it corresponds to the way the architectural institution treats the individual within regenerated urban spaces Although those highly coordinated environments perhaps constitute a successful vehicle for the developers, they falsely provide a comforting illusion of economic and social prosperity for the general public by association and this dichotomy is what the vandalised architecture of the church of St. Martin tends to reveal and demonstrate. It’s fairly obvious that the general public does not benefit from these commercial architectural trends and these developments constitute substantial erosion of democracy and of the public realm. These highly co-ordinated environments, which falsely promise economic and social prosperity, is what the ‘vandalised’ architecture of the church of St. Martin intends to highlight and reveal to the users of the space. The leaflet for the proposed ‘vandalism’ is a double-sided A5, which contains collaged images of the church in its new form accompanied by short bullet points that explain the ‘aims’ of project, a format that is easy for the everyday urban participant to instantly digest and then engage with.

Seeing the value in Jorn’s concern for the coexistence of the old and new, the ‘vandalism’ of the existing church is treated with respect rather than completely dominating it however the contradictions within the proposal are highlighted by vandalising the most defining features of the church’s architecture i.e. the spire and the large stained glass window at the altar. These vandalised features are constructed by applying the abstract façade of the Selfridges Building into the church and although these actions of re-evaluating the building may appear extreme, the image is mediated by the passive nature of the figures in the collages. These vulgar additions are intended as a mocking reflection of the artificial ordering provided by the schemes of regeneration that, in the same manner as Jorn’s Paris By Night modification painting, ultimately doesn’t dynamically improve or impact the environment.

Design Research proposal

The pamphlet design itself is actually dĂŠtourned with bold splattered paint which energizes the pamphlet under the image of excitement and promise of a new architecture. However, the leaflet is merely a tool to encourage the general public to challenge assumed perceptions of the urban and give voice to societies sense of itself through its radical suggestion to â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;moderniseâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; the isolated and forgotten building. In proposing a sense of chaos through vandalising architecture, it invites reflection and debate on the control that developers and planning authorities have on the urban public spaces which can provide for a practice that aims to increase mans self-awareness in order to establish a platform to revolutionise the model for urban living promoted to the public by certain institutes of architecture Currently, the commodification of individualism within the architectural world promotes models of consumption in recently regenerated spaces, the Selfridges building being a typical example and a sober confrontation with its contemporary global experience is more crucial than ever therefore proposed vandalised cities could be a instrument in allowing the public and architects to realize and radicalise questions related to the possibility of creation.

Reflection.

Design Research reflection

This research has uncovered and acquired an understanding of the past early avant-garde practices of radically protesting the institution of art through the major anti-art movement under the title of Dada which inspired Dutch artist Asger Jorn to explore and apply a unique interpretation of protesting existing conditions of the art world. Asger Jornâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s developed practice of dĂŠtrounement combined the present and the past through over painting existing academic kitsch art through abstract additions to create a new milieu, which aimed to realize a critical response to existing situations and preconditions pioneered by institutionalized art. Jorn strongly believed that institutionalizing art limited creativity and also intended to establish the existence of a creative elite within the artistic world, encouraged by its commodification and therefore he protested this through his vandalised paintings which initiated an often satirical attack on certain movements of art and even artists.

It appears that Jorn’s view of the way in which 50’s and 60’s art was presented to the public is similar to the way architectural design is currently presented to the public and therefore this paper attempts to transpose Jorn’s practice of détournement into the urban environment in order to encourage the public to question these preconditions. The aim of this paper, after careful consideration and research into the actions of Jorn’s, was to establish whether his practice of modification can be translated into the urban environment of regenerated spaces can be used as a tool to provoke the general public in the capitalist influenced environment and ultimately whether vandalism in architecture is useful as research tool. This form of experimental action in the urban environment isn’t an entirely new idea as there is a handful of artists today which chose to test the cities physical and social parameters that often determine social life, however it appears that the process of détournement which was initiated by Asger Jorn is often neglected within the art world today and almost certainly within the architectural world.

Design Research reflection

For the purpose of completely understanding the practice of détournement, it was necessary for the research to revert to Asger Jorn’s ‘Modification’ series as he was the artistic influence in the radical movement of détournement within the Situationists International and this is frequently overlooked as the domineering initiator of the group, Guy Debord, wanted to eliminate any sense of individualism within the movement for reasons of keeping the movement uncontaminated by egotistical artistic styles. Asger Jorn’s art and private and increasingly open research was far from self-absorbed and this is what made him interesting and credible and thus he was able to practice an accurately critical art towards consumerist culture. The research paper validates the concern about the state of consumerist culture which appears relevant today because the present commercially driven design style has initiated a trend within architecture and urban planning which has ultimately lead to banal city centres replicated all over the UK and this research points to the forces behind this increasing phenomena.

Exploring the practice of détourned art has drawn attention to critical thinking towards established movements within art inspired by the culture of commodification and this has raised questions that relate to the new urban environment and this has resulted in a theoretical investigation into the conditioning and maintenance of urban life. At this juncture it became clear that architectural institutions were endorsing this urban model of commodified space and therefore negating their responsibility towards the general public and this situation highlighted an opportunity for détournement in the urban environment. The core of this research is an initial proposal to the general public for the détournement of the now obsolete church of St. Martin, which follows the practice of Asger Jorn’s Modifications, and emerging from this intended vandalism are further questions leading to a challenge of the current urban situation. Beginning with this initial pamphlet is the obvious procedure to develop and continue with Asger Jorn’s historical avant-garde principles and strategy of provocation and in this way intervene with the current urban environmental strategy in a practical and confrontational manner by means of radical physical action in relation to commercial city developments.

Design Research reflection

Bibliography and Images.

KEY TEXTS

Atkins, Guy (with Troels Andersen): Asger Jorn. In three volumes: Jorn in Scandanavia: 1930-1953, (1968) Asger Jorn: The Crucial Years: 1954-1964, (1977) and Asger Jorn: The Final Years, 1965-1973, (1980). London: Lund Humphries. Atkins, Guy (1964). Bibliografi over Asger Jorns skrifter til 1963. A bibliography of Asger Jorn’s writings to 1963. Copenhagen: Permild & Rosengreen. Atkins, Guy (1964). Asger Jorn’s Aarhus Mural. Westerham: Westerham Press. Baudrillard, Jean (2005). The conspiracy of art: manifestos, interviews, essays. New York: Semiotext. Baudrillard, Jean (2005). The system of objects. London: Verso Birtwistle, Graham M (1986). Living Art: Asger Jorn’s Comprehensive Theory of Art Between Helhesten and Cobra, 1946-1949 Borden, Iain (2001). The unknown city: contesting architecture and social space. London : MIT Burger, Peter (1984). Theory of the Avant-Garde. Minneapolis : University of Minnesota Press Cartiere, Cameron & Willis, Shelly (2008). The Practice of Public Art. London: Routledge. Charley, Jonathan (2013). Memories of cities: trips and manifestos. Surrey: Ashgate Publishing Limited Crampton, Jeremy W. & Elden, Stuart (2012). Space Knowledge and Power: Foucault and Geography. London: Ashgate Publishing. Crow, Thomas E. (1996). The rise of the sixties: American and European art in the era of dissent, 1955-69. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson Debord, Guy (1992). Society of the spectacle and other films. London : Rebel Press. Debord, Guy (2006).Theory of the Derive. 1959. The Situationist International Anthology. Ed. Ken Knabb. Bureau of Public Secrets. 62-66. Debord, Guy. (2006)“Towards a Situationist International.” 1957. Participation (Documents of Contemporary Art). London: The Mit Press 100

BIBLIOGRAPHY AND IMAGES

Ford, Simon (2005). The Situationist International: a user’s guide. London: Black Dog Foster, Hal (1965). Design and crime: and other diatribes. London: Verso Foucault, Michel (2007). Space, knowledge and power: Foucault and geography. Aldershot : Ashgate Gombrich, E. H. (1977). Art and illusion. 5th ed. London: Phaidon Hatherley, Owen (2012). A New Kind of Bleak: Journeys through Urban Britain. London: Verso. Harvey, Davd (2012). Rebel Cities: From the Right to the City to the Urban Revolution. London: Verso. Jorn, Asger (1998). Modifications. Antwerpen: Ronny Van de Velde Kennedy, Liam (2004). Remaking Birmingham: The Visual Culture of Urban Regeneration. London : Routledge. Lefebvre, Henri (1991). The Production of Space. Oxford: Basil Blackwell. Lefebvre, Henri (2008). The Urban Revolution. London: University of Minnesota Press. Mann, Denis Alan (1990). “Fetishes in Architecture” in Objects of special Devotion. Fetishism in Popular Culture. Popular Press, 1982 Minton, Anna (2012). Ground Control: Fear and happiness in the twenty-first-century city. London: Penguin. Proto, Francesco (2006). Mass, identity, architecture: architectural writings of Jean Baudrillard. Chichester: WileyAcademy. Rumney, Ralph, 1934 (2002). The Consul. London: Verso Sadie, Plant (1992). The most radical gesture: the Situationist International in a postmodern age. London: Routledge Sadler, Simon (1998). The Situationist City. London [England]: MIT Press. Shields, Peter (2002). The natural order and other texts by Asger Jorn Aldershot ; Burlington, USA : Ashgate. 101

Shields, Peter (1998). Comparative vandalism: Asger Jorn and the artistic attitude to life. London: Ashgate Publishing Limited. Saunders, William S (2005). Commodification and spectacle in architecture: a Harvard design magazine reader. London : University of Minnesota. Schwarz, Arturo (1997). The Complete Works of Marcel Duchamp, revised and expanded edition, London: Thames & Hudson Greenberg, Clement (1939) Avant-Garde and Kitsch. Partisan Review