THE STORY OF A WOMAN, HER FETISHES, SOCIETY AND HOW ARCHITECTURE FRAMES IT ALL
SUCH A THING AS RESURRECTION
RECORDS OF THE UNDERSTANDABLE, THE MISSUNDERSTOOD AND THE INSPIRATIONAL
SOMETIMES YOU FIND THINGS INTERESTING OR TOO BEAUTYFUL FOR OTHERS TO MISS OUT ON
DEFENSIO 21.03.2024
THE VILLAIN
A VILLA
GALARY OF THE UNWANTED
Sitting in the middle of a spacious pasture is filled with many memories, [1] delighting the senses with direct experience. [2]
Surrounded by broad lawns and formal gardens with rows of tall Italian cypresses leading up to fountains, Etruscan vases, and marble statuary groups, [3] a dove house, and all that is necessary. [4]
A fantasy which is impervious to reality, [5] as well as a desire to create mediating spaces. [2]
Near Town is extremely convenient, [6] whenever you have occasion for a change of air. [7]
The higher above ground it is the greater the presence it will possess. [8]
In practice the ideal life combined both yang and yin, that is a career of public service during one’s prime and relaxation in one’s informal. [9]
This seems to propose a relationship of architecture and nature, [10] ideological rather than typological. [11] Epitomizing the idea of an architecture that incorporates landscape but is also distinct from it. [12]
They could hardly have avoided creating a dialogue. [2]
Things have sometimes a certain luxury and pleasureableness in places meant for idleness, [13] in which nature makes architecture into a series of disjunctive moments disrupting the boundaries between the natural and the man made world. [10]
A simple cubic form, reminiscent of local Tuscan farmhouses, [10] selected with an eye for repetition and symmetrical pendants. [14]
Opening up the architecture towards the exterior and inviting nature into the interior, [2] creating an illusionistic exterior in the indoors, ripe and redolent with allusion. [2]
A different kind of spatial experience, a potent idea about architectural space and its emotional and psychological possibilities, [10] spaces with varying degrees of the blending of indoors and outdoors. [2]
Zones of refuge and outlook, contrasting adventurous areas with the intimacy of solid corners [15]
Some fitting admission of trickeries of this kind, as of pictured landscapes at the extremities of alleys and arcades, and ceilings like skies, or painted with prolongations upwards of the architecture of the walls. [13]
Pretty enough to ensure that the mother of the family will enjoy living there. [7]
A succession of varied rooms, views, and experiences. [10]
A sequence of spaces [10] provides for the psychological as well as physical comfort. [16]
A one off, custom built one, [5] surprising in its rich painted decoration that interacts and responds to the building. [10]
An artwork, in which each movement through the house, and each view, is a conscious composition of building, furniture, people, and landscape, [17] ringed by emotion. [18]
CRUELLA DE VIL
I'm not just anyone, I'm Cruella de Vil. I am the Astrologer, I am the Calculator! [1]
I was born fabulous, with a fire in my soul and black and white hair.
Black and white, it's my signature look.
My hair is not just a look, it's a statement.
Why settle for one color when you can have two?
If you want to change the world, you need to set it on fire.
I'm not a villain, I'm the hero of my own story. What I am accused of, [2] I am precisely the contrary. [3]
If I am wrong I am wrong in good company. [4]
There is a fine line between crazy and brilliant.
You're either with me or you're in my way.
I don't want to fit in, I want to stand out.
I want what's coming to me, the respect, the recognition, the power.
Style is a weapon, and I am the arsenal.
I'm always one step ahead, because I don't follow the rules, I make them. I am determined! [5] I am betrayed! [6] I am but fantasy of fornication; Therefore am I safe and unimpeachable. [7]
Life is short, but style is forever.
Being famous is easy, being notorious takes real talent.
I don't just want to be famous, I want to be infamous.
Fame is fleeting, but infamy is forever.
The world is a stage, and I am the star.
I was born to be in the spotlight. And I have earned it I am sure. [8]
If I come across beautiful things, I am glad to pay what they are worth. [9] I am delighted with pictures, and painted tables. [10]
But my car is my only true love.
I've never met a car that didn't give me what I want.
A fur coat is just a pile of dead dogs.
Dogs are just a necessary evil in the fashion industry.
Dalmatians, darling. They're the next big thing.
It is richer than I am, yet I am wiser than it. [11] I assure you that there is nothing of which I am more ignorant and unaware. [12]
People only love me for my secrets, but I love them for their curiosity.
A little mystery is what makes life interesting.
- "Cruella de Vile" -
[1] The Book of the Thousand and One Nights; [2] Lusebrink Reichardt, The Bastille a History of a Symbol of Despotism and Freedom; [3] Rousseau, The Confessions; [4] Harrison Wood Gaiger, Art in Theory 1648 1815; [5] Wollstonecraft, Complete Works; [6] Mozart, Cosi fan tutte; [7] Hovestadt Buehlmann, Quantum City; [8] von Strassburg, Tristan and Isolde; [9] Haskell, Patrons and Painters; [10] Baxandall, Giotto and the Orators; [11] de Montaigne, The Complete Essays; [12] Grafton, Leon Battista Alberti; [regular] Cruella de Vil
ROOM FOR A FETISH
WHERE DRESSES TURN INTO POSTERS
QUEEN OF FASHION
THE LINE
What goes out of fashion passes into everyday life. [1] What disappears from everyday life is revived in fashion. [1] The developing world cannot wait as long to undo its dominance. [2] We manifest ourselves in a ghostly fashion for are we not already shadows? [3] So I say, "fuck Vogue, fuck fashion, fuck what’s pretty." [4] Also fuck Greta and fuck Putin. One argues to save the world while one does everything to destroy it. Rather fashionable, isn't it?
A one piece, [5] as protection against the cold. [6] Its warmth gives us hope in the dally search for meaning, [7] and it isolates us from the outside world. [8] The coat or the man? He refuses to classify desire, rivalry, or sex as separate drives [9] “The fuck you doin’?” [10] Femininity is back in fashion. [11] So is sexappeal, and so are men! Because the properties of such men would lead us to men, and not to angels. [12] Love them, love whoever but wear you and wear a coat, because the winter is coming! [13]
It is not the artificial form of individualization that fashion offers to those who want to affirm their singularity, or that of their class. [14] Its tone is of an extraordinary warmth and mellowness, [15] an icon of aggression. His coat is red as the blood he hopes to shed. [11] Fur coats have become the fashionable alternative. [16] They are the real thing. "Fuck opinions, to fashion or to personal morality!" [17] As long as people eat meat and wear leather, I just don't understand their message. [18] Glued to the ground, while booking a flight to Mexico. What are we doing? Fucking global warming? Electric cars. I love them! Just not for my precious Panther de Ville.
Fashion frequently flattens the elegant, the gentle, and the great, into one lumpy mass of disgust. [19] To the innocent eye seduced by decorative color and [11] seen on a coat hanger, with no man inside it, the uniform loses all its blustering significance. [11] It is as abstract in symbolic information as a parasol to a [11] dog. A filter covering up everything. Black dots, more than just six, more than twice as many. [20] Even when empty, it implies his enduring presence. [21]They preach to be true but hide behind their own facade. How can we believe what we see if we do not even know what it is we are seeing? It is a mortal sin to lie in order to cover one's guilt. [12]
[1] Traganou, Designing the Olympics Representation Participat; [2] Nonaka, Renaissance Porticoes and Painted Pergolas Nature; [3] Kipen, San Francisco in the 1930s The WPA Guide to the C; [4]Palladio, The Four Books of Architecture; [5] Barrie, House and Home Cultural Contexts Ontological Rol; [6] Alberti, 10 books of architecture; [7] Alberti, On the Art of Building in Ten Books; [8] Serlio, Sebastiano Serlio on Architecture Volume 1; [9] Tadgell, The East Buddhists Hindus and the Sons of Heaven; [10] Anderson, Renaissance Architecture; [11] Ulrich, A Companion to Roman Architecture; [12] Doherty, Is Landscape Essays on the Identity of Landscape; [13] Ruskin, The Seven Lamps of Architecture; [14] Friedland, The Oxford Handbook of Roman Sculpture; [15] Plummer, The Experience of Architecture; [16] Ashby, Modernism in Scandinavia Art Architecture and De; [17] Moore, Why We Build; [18] Kite, ShadowMakers A Cultural History of Shadows in Ar
[1] Koolhaas, SMLXL; [2] Koolhaas, Elements of Architecture; [3] Carter, American Ghosts and Old World Wonders; [4] Sontag, On Photography; [5] Callan, Dictionary of Fashion and Fashion Designers; [6] Callan, Dictionary of Fashion and Fashion Designers; [7] ArtBasel, Catalogue; [8] Roetzel, Gentleman A Timeless Fashion; [9] Watson, Guattaris Diagrammatic Thought; [10] Powers, The Overstory; [11] Carter, Shaking A Leg; [12] Aquinas, Summa Theologica; [13] Game of Thrones, A Song of Ice and Fire, George R.R. Martin; [14] Ranciere, Aisthesis; [15] Saunders, The Art and Architecture of London; [16] Callan, Dictionary of Fashion and Fashion Designers; [17] Hovestadt Buehlmann, Quantum City; [18] Karl Lagerfeld [19] Harrison Wood Gaiger, Art in Theory 1648 1815; [20] Handke, Crossing the Sierra de Gredos; [21] Koolhaas, Elements of Architecture
An incredibly exclusive car. This is its exclusive operation; this activity that facilitates the circulation process of industrial capital is the exclusive function of the money capital with which the merchant operates. [1]
Only 60 pieces were ever produced. It is the exclusive realm of Freedom, Equality, Property and Bentham. [2]
Outrageous levels of customisation are what makes the cars as unique it is. Method is the absolute, unique, supreme, infinite force, which no object can resist; it is the tendency of reason to find itself again, to recognize itself in every object. [3] You are unique, amazingly unique in fact, suspiciously unique. [4]
Hand-painted by one man to ensure the best possible results. This is not just a car, it's a work of art. [5] All art is a low and common thing, and what we indeed respect is not art at all, but instinct or inspiration expressed by the help of art. [6]
Featuring vintage styling and exaggerated curves. True art should aim to hide art itself. [7] Art applied to art, and stratagem against stratagem, may produce, for a time, alternate defeats; but ultimately the most cunning will triumph. [8]
The Panther De Ville is perhaps the most exclusive example of a retro car while showing off luxury, prestige and timely elegance. That car is a masterpiece, darling. [9]
a|temple [1] Ruskin, The Stones of Venice; [2] Semper, Style in the Technical and Tectonic Arts or Practical Aesthetics; [3] Le Roy, The Ruins of the Most Beautiful Monuments of Greece; [4] Semper, Style in the Technical and Tectonic Arts or Practical Aesthetics; [5] Tschudi, Baroque Antiquity; [6] Semper, Style in the Technical and Tectonic Arts or Practical Aesthetics; [7] Harrison Wood Gaiger, Art in Theory 1648 1815; [8] Quincy, Letters to Miranda and Canova; [9] Joyce, Ulysses
[1] Marx, Capital Volume 3; [2] Marx, Capital Volume One; [3] Marx, Collected Works; [4] Asimov, Complete Robot Anthology; [5] Cruella De Vil; [6] Ruskin, The Stones of Venice; [7] Harrison Wood Gaiger, Art in Theory 1648 1815; [8] Wollstonecraft, Complete Works; [9] Cruella de Vil
b|family home[1] Koolhaas, Elements of Architecture; [2] Stickley, Gustav Stickley s Craftsman Homes and Bungalows; [3] Jacobs, The Death and Life of Great American Cities; [4] Zimring, Encyclopedia of Consumption and Waste; [5] Alexander, A Pattern Language; [6] Deplazes, Constructing Architecture; [7] Mitchell, Me The Cyborg Self and the Networked City; [8] Marzano, The Roman Villa in the Mediterranean Basin; [9] Hovestadt Buehlmann, Quantum City; [10] Hovestadt Buehlmann, Quantum City; [11] Asimov, Complete Robot Anthology; [12] Mumford, The Culture of Cities; [13] West, Scale The Universal Laws of Growth; [14] Leatherbarrow Eisenschmidt, Twentieth Century Architecture
BEHIND THE FUMES
WHERE A CIGARET CAN BE ENJOYED
THE CIGARET
I’m a hero, haven’t you heard? [1]
It‘s not who I am underneath, but what I do that defines me. [2] And yet, for all its supposed reality, my list is pervaded by vague, blurry, unbelievably elusive abstractions. [3]
They thought I was hiding [1] behind the fume. But by hiding the truth a man abstains from giving evidence. [4]
Hiding or being hidden. [1]
What hiding place is there, where the fear of death does not enter? [5]
His art is not that of disclosing what is hidden, but of hiding what is disclosed. [6]
Like hiding something costly behind something less costly. [7]
Still, however, it is sufficient fume to have demonstrated the theory; the modifications of its results depending, in a great degree, upon attentive observation. [8]
Where a god, devil or hero sits, there is left a mark in the stone. [9] and you may mix these [...] mordants at your pleasure. [10]
The world is changing. It‘s time we changed, too. [11]
I‘m not a villain, I‘m the hero of my own story. [12]
And of Yours!
[1] Asimov, Complete Robot Anthology; [2] Batman; [3] Hofstadter, I Am a Strange Loop; [4] Aquinas, Summa Theologica; [5] Seneca, Complete Works; [6] Marx, Collected Works; [7] Semper, Style in the Technical and Tectonic Arts or Practical Aesthetics; [8] Pliny, Natural History Volume 4; [9] Grimm, Teutonic Mythology The Complete Work; [10] Adrosko, Natural Dyes and Home Dyeing; [11] Iron Man; [12] Cruella de Vil
c|castle[1] Grimm, Teutonic Mythology The Complete Work; [2] The Book of the Thousand and One Nights; [3] Cervantes, Don Quixote; [4] Frankl, The Gothic; [5] Cervantes, Don Quixote; [6] The Book of the Thousand and One Nights Supplementary Nights; [7] Carter, Shaking A Leg; [8] Harrison Wood Gaiger, Art in Theory 1648 1815
It is evident that a man possesses lawfully the price of a dog
he has lawfully sold. [1] But also he possesses the dog he has lawfully bought. He’s my dog. [2]
Therefor the fur of my dog, is in possession of its owner. It is in my possesion. For poverty does not mean the possession of little, but the non possession of much; it is used, therefore, not of what a man has, but of what he lacks. [3]
The feeling of affection of a dog towards his master is combined
with a strong sense of submission, which is akin to fear. [4]
Man shows the same feeling in his strong love for the dog, which the dog returns with interest. [5] My dog is different. [2]
It is a more remarkable fact that the dog, since being domesticated,
has learnt to bark in at least four or five distinct tones. [5] Still we wonder why humans seem to not understand the dog.
Listening is respecting, Respect means love, and love and fear cannot be mingled. [6] Time suggests that we can separate love and fashion for we might not wear what we love only love what we wear.
We respect, we love, we wear. We wear what we love and what we respect. Also we keep our loved ones close, close to the heart. The love of a man for his dog is distinct from sympathy, and so is that of a dog for his master. [5]
WHERE CLOUDS ARE YOUR NEIGHBOURS
d| apartment building [1] Koolhaas, Elements of Architecture; [2] Mallgrave, Modern Architectural Theory; [3] Marx, Collected Works; [4] Wollstonecraft, Complete Works; [5] Marx, Collected Works; [6] Hugo, Les Miserables; [7] Wollstonecraft, Complete Works; [8] Rousseau, Collected Works of Jean-Jacques Rousseau; [9] Zimring, Encyclopedia of Consumption and Waste; [10] Girard, Violence and the Sacred; [11] Sloterdijk, Critique of Cynical Reason; [12] Carter, Shaking A Leg
[1] Aquinas, Summa Theologica; [2] Asimov, Complete Robot Anthology; [3] Seneca, Complete Works; [4] Darwin, The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals; [5] Darwin, The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex; [6] Seneca, Complete Works
SQUARING THE CIRCLE
e| skyscraper [1] Greenspan, Shanghai Future Modernity Remade; [2] Greenspan, Shanghai Future Modernity Remad; [3] Koolhaas, Elements of Architecture; [4] Sudjic, The Edifice Complex; [5] Koolhaas, Delirious New York; [6] Leatherbarrow Eisenschmidt, Twentieth Century Architecture; [7] Sudjic, The Edifice Complex; [8] Zimring, Encyclopedia of Consumption and Waste; [9] Teige, The Minimum Dwelling
A square, so symmetrical and so unique, yet presented in black and white. In the darkness [1] a sullen red glow and the dim shadow [1] as if it had the less life of the two. [1]
A square as a plaza, a square as a tile, a square as a field, a square is not a circle. Intuitive estimates had suggested, [2] that each is the same and yet so different, and it even proved to be much more difficult. [2] than that.
The problem solver knows when he has done his job, [3] accompanying compelling sense of the best move. [4] Easy to predict yet impossible to foresee. Abstract entities and relations between them. [5] Who will I meet and who will meet me?
A friend or an enemy? There is always a best next move. [6]
Rules of pure logic, [7] pure and simple. [7] Logic but unclear.
Precise and mysterious. Remember, the advanced beginner must be able to recognize repeated, meaningful elements such as the motor sound when the car is straining to leave first gear or the way the chessboard looks when the king’s side is weak. [8]
For you too hard, and for me just hard enough. For you too ugly, and for me just pretty enough. Sufficiently beyond our natural abilities so that it is challenging and intriguing. [9] It does strike me, though, that [10] the queen protects. The Queen of Engines being the queen of fashion as well. [10]
This arises the question of who must be protected by the queen? The friend, the enemy, the square, the beauty? Might it even be all of them? One seems unequivocal, they may refresh their beauty as and when required. [11] Even so, it is possible to find great beauty, [12] apart from their beauty, as a skeleton has beauty of its own. [12] The skeleton, the queen, as well as the pawn. Beauty became a quality that was made. [13]
f| farm [1] Van Eck, Eighteenth Century Architecture; [2] Marx, Collected Works; [3] Justinian, The Codex; [4] Herman Chomsky, Manufacturing Consent; [5] Zizek, Less Than Nothing; [6] Van Eck, Eighteenth Century Architecture; [7] Seneca, Complete Works; [8] Marx, Capital Volume 3
[1] Asimov, Complete Robot Anthology; [2] Hofstadter, Godel Escher Bach; [3] Schumacher, The Autopoiesis of Architecture Vol 2; [4] Dreyfus, Mind over Machine; [5] Tegmark, Our Mathematical Universe; [6] Ball, The Selfmade Tapestry Pattern Formation in Nature; [7] Popper, The Logic of Scientific Discovery; [8] Dreyfus, Mind over Machine; [9] Chomsky, On Language; [10] Plant, Zeros and Ones; [11] Roetzel, Gentleman A Timeless Fashion; [12] Carter, Shaking A Leg; [13] Leslie, Synthetic Worlds
THE DIARY OF A QUEEN
THE FALLEN ANGEL
THE GUARDIAN
SEPTEMBER 2022
BY KARL LAGERFELD
Fashion Icon Cruella de Vil Cancelled Over Fur Controversy
London's fashion world is being shattered by the new line consisting of only fur coats, created by the highly anticipated and iconic fashion designer, Cruella de Vil. What emerges if, in a vague homology, we push the symbolic as far as the same self canceling into which the face is pushed to give rise to the faceless abyss of the Neighbor? [1]
Since the presentation of the new winter line protesters have been besieging the streets in front of her office, in midtown London, creating enormous chaos. It would have to be content with being treated so badly for it would not deserve anything better, since even reveries are better than its own emptiness. [2] Campaigns by animal rights groups and activists, have been calling for a boycott of the brand, claiming that the use of fur in fashion is cruel, inhumane, and unnecessary. If, however, he defends an unjust cause unknowingly, thinking it just, he is to be excused according to the measure in which ignorance is excusable. [3]
The lion signifies the Redemption by canceling its tracks, the elephant by attempting to lift its fallen companion, the serpent by sloughing off its old skin. [4]
Cruella de Vil, a name that is synonymous with luxury and high fashion, has been a fixture on the London fashion scene for decades. Her extravagant designs have been seen on the likes of royalty and celebrities around the world. Fashion is not something that exists in dresses only. Fashion is in the sky, in the street, fashion has to do with ideas, the way we live, what is happening. [5]
The tide in the fashion world begins to turn and the designer is caught right in the middle of it. Removing the granite from its place, in ignorance of the geological process that caused its presence, meant canceling testimony from the record. [6] Therefor, why fake the real and not just celebrate it?
Horror and beauty may not be so different after all. [7] De Vil's canceling lacks understanding of many colleagues as well as rivals in the fashion world. They see her designs not just as a wardrobe but as works of art and a reflection of her unique creative vision. In a world, where the fake prevails, a little realism is more than welcome.
[1] Zizek, Less Than Nothing; [2] Zizek, Less Than Nothing; [3] Aquinas, Summa Theologica; [4] Eco, From the Tree to the Labyrinth; [5] Coco Chanel; [6] Forster, Schinkel A Meander Through His Life And Work; [7] Alexander McQueen
THE ASCENT
BERLINER ZEITUNG
APRIL 2023
BY ALEXANDER MCQUEEN
London not only mourns the death of her Majesty Queen Elisabeth, but also the loss of their Queen of Fashion, Cruella de Vil.
While the Majesty passed on to haven de Vil created her very own hell in Germany. To stand still and survey, may afford some slender satisfaction, through the change derived from perspective; but to move on continually and find no change of scene in the least attendant on our change of place, must give actual pain to a person of taste. [1]
The London fashion empire *devil fashion* does not exist anymore due to the rather harsh cancelation of its queen last fall. But as of a couple of days ago, we can be sure that the devil is back. This change of form does not imply a change in the magnitude of the value, [2] only causing the artist to rethink her ideas about distance and measure. [3] The Queen has chosen her new empire and it is nothing less than Berlin. More precise, it is the part of Berlin called Hellersdorf. Could the name of her Kingdom be any more fitting? Just as fitting as the place is the name of Cruella de Vil's new Fashion Empire *divine devil*. Her kingdom is an everlasting kingdom. [4]
The troubles de Vil had to face over the last month do not seem to have passed by her without marks. The world is in peril, and we must take decisive action. [5] Her strong personality, and her fabulous creations are a constant, quite contrary to the real fur. The fur she used for her coats, seemed to have had their time. She wants to be honest about the world that we live in. [6] And this is shown not only in her decision to use fake fur but it is also transported within the philosophy of her new fashion house. She found the love for the 'art' as she herself calls it, talking about the fake. Let's embrace the fake since the real is too hard to handle for our society anyways!
We have a responsibility to make sure that the world you grow up in is one that's filled with hope, and possibility, and opportunity. [7] de Vils way of pulling attention has always been one of her strongest qualities. Seeing her reappearance, I am sure that she did not lose her superpower. Fashion is not for the moment, it's for the future. [8]
The Queen is back and her statement clearer than ever. The greater the change, the more unfavorable it is to beauty. [9] Therefore, let's break down some barriers. [6] No more real no more fur. Let us not kill the animals for the love we have for them, let us instead kill our individualism and hide behind a veil of uniformity. Since we do not seem to love either the animals nor ourselves. But what do we love?
[1] Harrison Wood Gaiger, Art in Theory 1648 1815; [2] Marx, Collected Works; [3] Ponte, The House of Light and Entropy; [4] King, James Bible; [5] Doctor Strange; [6] Alexander McQueen; [7] Superman; [8] Karl Lagerfeld; [9] Harrison Wood Gaiger, Art in Theory 1648 1815
A PARTY YOU DO NOT WANT TO MISS!
THE INSPIRATIONAL
THE HIGHRISE
THE EMPIRE
DIVINE DEVIL
squaring the circle
A circle, the London Eye, a Square, the Brandenburger Tor. Dots - smooth, loved and what they want. Fields - edgy, playful and what they get. A change of soul [1] and a change of climate. [1] The same but yet so different. Willful and forced - willful to win and forced to play. „It’s a change for the better, I admit. [2] “Squaring the circle, like trying to achieve the impossible, is a noble challenge. [3] A reminder that even the most daunting challenges can be overcome with persistence, ingenuity, and creativity.[4] The circle and the square. A puzzle that has captured the imaginations of people for centuries. [5] Imagine the value of change. Those who refuse to change anything are effectively the agents of true change: the change of the very principle of change. [6] We loved the dog and kept it close, we love the dog and keep our distance. The distance is smaller at a greater distance from the base, and greater at a smaller distance from the base.[7] The square, no more circle. The artificial, no more real.
the art and the official
We are artists and artificial and we square the circle. The circle, the official, the real. The square, the art, the fake. The art of judging and the art of reasoning are one and the same. [8] Art can never be the real, but who decides what is real and what is fake anyways, since you can't fake it in your own eyes. [9] We paint fake as negative. A fake painting falsifies the history of art. [10] A fake photograph falsifies reality. [10] Reality can not be faked. This extreme and clear case of fake participation is an appropriate metaphor for the participation of individuals in our “postmodern” political process. [11] Shown as there is something fake about all photographic controversies [10] Fake is real and the fake is our reality. The Real is essentially accessible only as entities within the world, [12] and only on this basis can anything Real still remain hidden. [12]
mephistopheles
We hide the fake but fake is all we are. The fake is the real and fake is beauty. I think there is beauty in everything. What 'normal' people would perceive as ugly, I can usually see something of beauty in it. [13] Hiding is exhausting - faking even harder. Some people are born to be wild, others are born to be tamed. [14] Be wild and be fake. Hide, be present and provoke. It is not my intention to provoke him, whoever he may be, and to get for myself enemies of my own making, [15] but there is no case so clear that it does not provoke controversy. [16] Be seen and show what they want to see - show the devil inside you, but be the angel. People find things sometimes aggressive. But I don't see it as aggressive. I see it as romantic, dealing with a dark side of personality. [17]Embrace the darkness, embrace the artificial, embrace what you want to be. Be the angle and wear the devil.
THE OLD, THE OUTDATED, THE BEAUTIFUL
nickel & dime
The hidden and the shown. The angle and the devil. The wealthy and the poor. Nothing without each other, nothing without their masquerade. The mystery of what we see and what it is. All we have is what we see, and all we see is what they show. It goes without saying that the social classes are not completely homogeneous.[18] But make no mistake, the traditional elite are under threat, [19] and in need of fabulous dresses, plenty of them. There is plenty but it is little if you don't understand. There is never a discontinuous break between social classes or between “people” and “elite.” [20] Value the pawn and be the queen, value the nickel and earn the dime. Embrace you but show better. Clothing is a form of self-expression - there are hints about who you are in what you wear. [21] If you know what suits your purpose [22] then wear it. Wear the devil in berlin.
[1] Seneca, Complete Works; [2] Asimov, Complete Robot Anthology; [3] Charles Jencks; [4] Edward Witten; [5] Carl Sagan; [6] Zizek, Less Than Nothing; [7]Copernicus, De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium; [8] Rousseau, Collected Works of Jean-Jacques Rousseau; [9] Rand, The Fountainhead; [10] Sontag, On Photography; [11] Zizek, Less Than Nothing; [12] Heidegger, Being and Time; [13] Alexander McQueen; [14] Horace; [15] Spinoza, Complete Works; [16] de Montaigne, The Complete Essays; [17] Alexander McQueen; [18] Marx, Collected Works; [19] Hovestadt Buehlmann, Quantum City; [20] Piketty, Capital in the Twenty First Century; [21] Marc Jacobs; [22] Halston, Interview
THE VILLAGE
BERLIN
THE CITY
A carious fashion, the way in which we proceed in an unfamiliar city. [1] Unfamiliarity.
The child stared with bewildered eyes at this great star, with which she was unfamiliar, and which terrified her. [2] Second, Boolean expressions might be unfamiliar to users who are not programmers or Logicians. [3] And it doesn’t matter where I find myself, in Califas or Mexico, in Barcelona or West Berlin; I always have the sensation that one belongs to the same species: the migrant tribe. [4] Or does it matter after all?
She danced in Berlin [5], I danced in Berlin. Berlin is an amazing place to present shows. [6]
The whole world will come to Berlin to see our buildings. [7] To see me!
Known for its reputation as a fashion capital, Its avant-garde, diverse and experimental fashion scenes. The acceptance of unconventional styles and the demand for provocation. Berlin, Hauptstadt. [8]
The principal task was the rebuilding of Berlin. [7]
Rebuilding the city, rebuilding the reputation, rebuilding the wealth rebuilding my empire.
Much of Berlin has surprisingly large blocks. [9]
When a man goes to city hall to take action on a neighborhood or community issue, he is at once on the defensive: the building and the staff of city hall serve the entire city; his problem is very small beside the problems of the city as a whole. [10] My problems will become the city's problems and my celebration will be the celebrated with the city!
The image of the city is also composed by waste. [11] This is real. Berlin fosters art and is art; the city creates the theater and is the theater. [12] The big city is a magnet. [10] But the nature of the city is not to be found simply in its economic base: the city is primarily a social emergent. [12] It is very discouraging to do our best to make the city more habitable, and then to learn that the city itself is thinking up schemes to make it uninhabitable. [13] Berlin is not a place, but a process. [14] It will be my process and it will be my place!
[1] Lynch, The Image of the City; [2] Hugo, Les Miserables; [3] Russell Norvig, Artificial Intelligence; [4] Anzaldua, This Bridge We Call Home; [5] Carter, Shaking A Leg; [6] ArtBasel, Catalogue; [7] Sudjic, The Edifice Complex; [8] Leatherbarrow Eisenschmidt, Twentieth Century Architecture; [9] Speck, Walkable City; [10] Alexander, A Pattern Language; [11] Zimring, Encyclopedia of Consumption and Waste; [12] Mumford, The Culture of Cities; [13] Flint, Wrestling With Moses; [14] Castells, The Rise of the Network Society
HELLERSDORF
THE KINGDOM
There are riots in Berlin and the cafes offer no protection. [1] The city, the center is not for me. Too obvious, too dull. Hellersdorf much more suitable. Mysterious, controversial, and provoking. A place for work and for life. Is there even a difference? Gold and azure have their precious sparkle, [2] so does Berlin and Hellersdorf. But to see one's work outshine matter [2], makes their worth equally precious. Equal but different. Half city and half village. [3]
Half society and half wealth. Thus it is only by way of money that the individual’s wealth is realized as social wealth; the social nature of that wealth is embodied in money. [4] Their wealth was considered as our wealth. [5] Because capitalism is about the concentration of wealth, a concentration of power follows this flow of wealth. [6] The wealth and the power, both absent but present. If not now then soon.
Hellersdorf will flourish with me and outshine Berlin itself, just as I outshine you. Wealth is the cause of luxury, and luxury has a destructive effect on wealth. [4] Wealth increased rapidly, but as does the wealth of individuals. [7] And as does mine.
All this they have suffered to gain a kingdom, and, what is more marvelous, to gain a kingdom that will be another’s. [8] I was troubled from all these points of view. [9] But let us see if this view can be upheld. [10] You can either carry on with what you’re doing now or become reconciled with me, [11] and reign with me. Enjoy the view with me.
The point of view climbs incessantly until at the top, [12] and the scene of the whole world unrolls. [12] The bottom is not for me, The sky in [13] Hellersdorf, like its weather, seems to have different orders of magnitude.[13] This landscape is completely divorced from ordinary experience, [12] from ordinary people for it seems to play no part in [12] society's action; it is invisible to the actors inside the picture.[12] Invisible but very real. The view from the top. All those poor people. [14] I will give them a kingdom, for that it needs people to give it life and meaning. [14]
HELLERSDORF
MARZAN-HELLERSDORF
[1] Leslie, Synthetic Worlds; [2] Harrison Wood Gaiger, Art in Theory 1648 1815; [3] Teige, The Minimum Dwelling; [4] Marx, Capital Volume 3; [5] Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations; [6] Zimring, Encyclopedia of Consumption and Waste;[7] Marx, Collected Works; [8] Seneca, Complete Works; [9] Hugo, Les Miserables; [10] Rousseau, Collected Works of Jean-Jacques Rousseau; [11] Herodotus, The Histories; [12] Wood, Albrecht Altdorfer and the Origins of Landscape R; [13] Ackroyd, London A Biography; [14] Ammon, Bulldozer Demolition and Clearance of the Postwar
THE VILLA
VILLA DE VIL
From detached villas to apartment buildings, [1] girls learnt not to let themselves be surprised in lonely places. [2] I am poor and lonely and I never play, unless it is a game of chess now and then, and that is more than enough. [2]
Buildings increased in size, apartment blocks grew taller, and [3] people no longer had the feeling for what was grand. [4] We try to justify good shelter,[...] but we fool ourselves. [5] A cheap apartment simply means a bad apartment, and building cheaply means building badly. [6] Berlin apartment houses, built in such a way that [7] rehabilitation becomes virtually impossible. [6] This is called “feeling the ground.” [4]
From this merciful interpretation of the law, [2] variety is still farther increased by the inclusion, [8] the inclusion of a dog. [9] The property owning classes and the better situated middle class is [6] not free to make friends outside the family, [10] the property owning classes and the better situated middle class is the family. [6]
A normal family life, [6] a mixture of differential benefits and fear of unemployment. [11] The mixture of the social classes [6] were induced to engage freely and fully in the work tasks assigned to them. [11] When the boss wasn’t around, I could sit... and talk to my neighbour or do what I wanted. [11] This mixture is a confession [4] on the pretentious grounds that it will work social or family miracles. [5] But the mixture hardly represents a ‘parting of the ways’, [5] this subset defines your “extended family” and the size of your social module. [12]
All this in an apartment building! [13]
It is above all a tower [...] with a colorful [...] central room dominating [14] the spatial dimension. [14] The height always far exceeds human needs, and it is that which affects the soul of someone experiencing it as something pleasant, imposing, uplifting, and overwhelming. [14] It is the character of my villa to be intensive, to be exciting, to be dramatic, and this is one of its greatest assets. [5]
Neither the building nor the city is a cultural product, [15] it is an inner chamber, locked up, where family secrets are encrypted. [13] The apartment building commonly came with [16] the “natural and spontaneous” balance of light and air. [13] The “natural and spontaneous” [13] ground floor shopfronts as [16] a well equipped parking lot. [13]
A Large rental apartment building. [17] A mystical fashionable Villa and Views of the garbage trucks as they made their way through the city streets, picking the sidewalks clean. [18]
In any case, I will be hosting a party Thursday at my villa. [19]
In any case, I will be hosting a party Thursday at our villa. [19]
[1] Shane, Recombinant Urbanism; [2] Rousseau, Collected Works of Jean-Jacques Rousseau; [3] Blackwell, Nineteenth Century Architecture; [4] Hugo, Les Miserables; [5] Jacobs, The Death and Life of Great American Cities; [6] Teige, The Minimum Dwelling; [7] Mumford, The Culture of Cities; [8] Gothein, A History of Garden Art; [9] Harrison Wood Gaiger, Art in Theory 1648 1815; [10] Ockmann, Architecture Culture 1943 1968; [11] Chiapello, The New Spirit of Capitalism; [12] West, Scale The Universal Laws of Growth; [13] Hays, Architecture Theory since 1968; [14] Mallgrave, Modern Architectural Theory; [15] Ockmann, Architecture Culture 1943 1968; [16] Kunstler, The City in Mind; [17] Le Corbusier, Toward an Architecture; [18] Flint, Wrestling With Moses; [19] The Young Pope
[1] Seneca, Complete Works; [2] Cicero, On Duties; [3] The Book of the Thousand and One Nights;
[4] Asimov, Complete Robot Anthology; [5] Aquinas, Summa Theologica
[1]Koolhaas, Elements of Architecture; [2] Alexander, A Pattern Language; [3] Carter, Shaking A Leg; [4] Asimov, Complete Robot Anthology; [5] Zimring, Encyclopedia of Consumption and Waste; [6] Craig, Atlanta Architecture; [7] Marzano, The Roman Villa in the Mediterranean Basin
[1] Asimov, Complete Robot Anthology; [2] Beckett, Waiting for Godot; [3] Harrison Wood Gaiger, Art in Theory 1648 1815; [4] Roetzel, Gentleman A Timeless Fashion; [5] Marx, Collected Works; [6] de Montaigne, The Complete Essays; [7] Hugo, Les Miserables; [8] Aquinas, Summa Theologica; [9] King, James Bible