Within our constructed environment there are things that have been lost to our perception. We have either abandoned them because they no longer serve a purpose, or we have never taken the time to consider them. This phenomenon exists from the small artefact (a broken chair) to the scale of the city (poché) to the hyper-object (global warming). It exists within the context of representation, an architectural drawing being only intention, not considered actual. It also exists in a material sense, where one does not consider the inherent properties that can be discovered to manifest something new. Material is not limited to the physical, but also is to be considered within the virtual context. Policy, desire and economics have significant influence on our physical space and therefore have a materiality that can be examined. I am interested in these hidden conditions that stem from the sense that all space, all places have a material consciousness. If we take Plato’s description in Timaeus of prima materia as 'invisible and formless, all-embracing, possessed in a most puzzling way of intelligibility, yet very hard to grasp', then one, if capable, should be able to shape any form out of this material. Plato describes a place of human creation and participation. Alberto Perez-Gomez writes about Plato's three components of reality: being – 'unchanging form, uncreated and indestructible, imperceptible to sight or the other senses, the object of thought', becoming – sensible form which has come into existence, apprehended by the senses, and thirdly, chora –the space in which everything exists, which must exist, but is actually nothing at all. It is this chora , a space or place, that we overlook. We have lost the ability to see material, in all its forms, as a space or place for occupation. It is within this framework that I situate my inquiry into our built environment, specifically, a method of delaying the artefact in order to reveal its latent capacity, its inherent potential.
2 x 4 slices from 60" to 62.875" Bradford Watson. 2 x 4 x 96 , video, 2012
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on site review 41 :: infrastructure
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