92 arhitektov bilten • architect's bulletin • 207 • 208 Markus Schaefer / prevod Kristina Dešman Perspektive Ponovno odkritje časa1 The Rediscovery of Time1 Napovedano je bilo, da bo Edward Soja, veliki nedav- no preminuli politični geograf, obiskal 14. beneški bienale »Fundamentals« in sodeloval pri Salon Suis- se. Na žalost pa takrat ni več mogel potovati, pešala mu je gibljivost, potrebna za navigacijo po beneških mostovih, stopniščih in ladjah. Zame po tem velika- nu, prav zares učenjaški Šeherezadi, ostaja spomin na najin pogovor na sončnem trgu v Münchnu in ne- kaj večernih klicev preko Skypa, ko sva razpravljala o njegovem projektu knjige o neolitskih mestih. S terminom “prostorski obrat” Edward Soja v poznih devetdesetih opiše spremembo perspektive v hu- manizmu. Ugotavlja, da se je raziskovanje predolgo osredotočalo na časovno komponento, ali še slabše, na zgodovino kot naštevanje dogodkov brez upošte- vanja njihovega prostorskega konteksta. Z njegovim »obratom« prostor postane univerzalna kategorija mišljenja. O prostorskem obratu priča zanimanje za kartiranje, ki v arhitekturni stroki raste že zadnjih 20 let. Zemlje- vidi so poskus ustvarjanja otokov pomena v svetu hitrega spreminjanja, v katerem ni več velikih mo- dernističnih pripovedi napredka. Kartiranje se je uveljavilo z novimi orodji za opisovanje teritorijev, od sistema GIS do Google zemljevidov, in ob na novo odkritem aktivizmu v planerski stroki. K upoštevanju geografije kliče še dodatna spodbu- da. Zgodovinarja Jo Guldi in David Armitage v svojih esejih in knjigi The History Manifesto, opisujeta, kako so v šestdesetih v javni administraciji zgodovi- narje nadomestili ekonomisti. S tem temeljni pojmi, ki so jih uporabljali pri strateškem svetovanju vladi, ne izhajajo več iz dolgoročnega konteksta zgodovi- ne, temveč iz kratkoročnih detajlov tržno vodene politike. Braudelovo longue durée je nadomestila kratka preteklost. O današnjem dnevu vemo vse, o jutrišnjem pa prav ničesar. Temu v posmeh se nedavni projekti planerske stroke ob tisočletju mest ne ogradijo od zgodovinske krat- kovidnosti. Urbanizacijo razumejo kot konec zgodo- vine, ne dosti drugače od Francisa Fukuyame, ki je zahodno demokracijo razumel kot kulminacijo hege- ljanskega napredka k racionalni družbi. Ideja urbane dobe predpostavlja, da imamo opravka s prostorski- mi, družbenimi in ekonomskimi učinki sicer neizo- gibnega, a v večji meri neškodljivega procesa urbani- zacije, ki se bo še v času naših življenj zaključil. Smo- ter njihovega delovanja tako postane izboljševanje urbanega okolja s pristopi, kot so Smart cities in ur- ban tech. Prepričani so, da se je vseh problemov mo- goče lotiti z usklajenim oblikovanjem sedanjosti. Pri tem nam še zdaj manjka holistično razumevanje na- šega obstoja v prostoru in času našega planeta. Še vedno nimamo delovne hipoteze antropocena. Edward Soja, the late great political geographer, was scheduled to visit the 14th Architecture Bienna- le „Fundamentals“ to participate in the Salon Suisse. Unfortunately, he was not able to travel anymore at that time and his nimbleness, required to navigate Venice with its bridges, stairs and boats, was wa- ning. The memory of our conversation on a sun-ba- ked square in Munich and of a few late-night skype calls discussing his book project on Neolithic cities are what remains for me of this erudite Scheheraza- de turned man-giant. With his term the „Spatial Turn“ Edward Soja descri- bed, since the late 90’s, a change of perspective in the Humanities. For too long he argued, research had focused exclusively on time, or worse on history as an enumeration of events oblivious to their spa- tial context. Now space was to become a universal category of thinking. The interest in mapping that concurrently developed in the architectural profession over the last 20 years is a testimony to this spatial turn. In the absence of grand modernist narratives of progress these maps attempt to create islands of meaning in a world of rapid transformation. With new tools for describing territories, from GIS to Google maps, and a newly found activism in the planning disciplines, mapping is by now well established. But there is an additional opportunity in the focus on geography. The historians Jo Guldi and David Armita- ge describe in various essays and in their book „The Hi- story Manifesto“ how in the public administrations of the 1960’s historians had been replaced by economi- sts. Thus, the core concepts applied when advising go- vernments on policy were no longer drawn from the long-term context of history but rather from the short- -term details of market driven politics. Braudel’s Lon- gue Durée got replaced by the Short Past. We know everything about now and nothing about tomorrow. Ironically, recent projects in the planning disciplines focusing on the millennium of cities continue this historic myopia. Urbanization is seen as an end to history much like Francis Fukuyama took Western Democracy as the culmination of Hegel’s progress towards a rational society. The idea of an Urban Age presupposes that we are dealing with the spatial, social and economic effects of an inevitable, yet ul- timately benign urbanization process that is coming to a conclusion in our lifetime. The aim therefore is to improve on the urban with approaches such as Smart Cities or Urban Tech. All problems are to be tackled by a concerted engineering of the present. But we are still lacking a holistic understanding of our existence on the planet in space and time. We are lacking a working hypothesis for the Anthropocene. 93arhitektov bilten • architect's bulletin • 207 • 208 Markus Schaefer The urban is based on agglomerations of people ge- nerating, almost like a fusion reactor, the social dif- ferentiation and division of work, the cultures and markets which allow us to live diverse, complex and relatively safe and stable lives. It is based on our hu- man capability of communicating and sharing goals and cooperating to achieve them. Cities are an in- frastructure for civilization invented not so long ago (seen on the timescale of biological evolution) that took the globe in storm and resulted in the planetary urbanism of today. With a series of innovations we accelerated and increased the spread and stability of the urban. Information technologies (from clay tablets to the internet), infrastructures (from Meso- potamian canals to high-speed trains) and shared narratives (from religion to money and the pursuit of individual happiness) undergird the complex urban system enveloping the planet. On the other hand, we know from systems ecolo- gy and complex systems theory that very open or networked systems increase inequality and reduce resilience when active efforts for redistribution or decreasing the propagation speed of disturbances are not undertaken. The drive to ever larger markets and networks, to universalization and globalization, which is inherent in the urban, compresses time and thereby pulls the event horizon, the point in time after which we are blind, for which we do not have shared narratives, ever closer. We pay for our experi- ence-rich present with our perspective on the future. Landscape and territory are hereby a welcome an- tidote. While urbanity and economy are reinforcing the short term, landscape follows longer cycles and connects us with the long-term. I do not mean the idyllic landscape of Romanticism connecting us to the past, but rather the slowly transforming territo- ry, seen through the lens of ecology, geology, even infrastructure connecting us to the future - the lan- dscape of the Anthropocene. How then to construct from the realia of physical existence, from historic facts and prospective fiction, a narrative landscape with multiple frames of refe- rence, anchored in the layers of geology and in the rhythms of nature, in infrastructural projects and built symbols, inclusive and open in time, defining a territo- ry, a field of vectors that point to a collective future - a Third Space in Soja’s words, a space of opportunity. Two recent projects of our office share many of the fascinations of the Baltic Pavilion and explain what we mean by the term narrative landscape: Urbano je aglomeracija ljudi, v kateri se kot v fuzij- skem reaktorju oblikujejo družbeno razlikovanje, deli- tev dela, kulture in trgi, ki nam zagotavljajo raznoliko, kompleksno ter relativno stabilno in varno življenje. Urbano izhaja iz človeške zmožnosti sporočanja in združevanja ciljev ter sodelovanja pri njihovem dose- ganju. Mesta so infrastruktura pred nedavnim nastale civilizacije (gledano s časovnim merilom biološke evo- lucije), ki se je bliskovito razširila po vsem svetu, njen rezultat pa je današnja urbanizacija planeta. Informa- cijska tehnologija (od glinenih tablic do interneta), in- frastruktura (od mezopotamskih kanalov do hitrih vlakov) in skupne pripovedi (od religije do denarja in iskanja individualne sreče) sestavljajo kompleksni ur- bani sistem, v katerega je zaobjet naš svet. Sistemska ekologija in teorija kompleksnih sistemov nam povesta, da se v zelo odprtih in dobro omreže- nih sistemih neenakosti povečujejo, odpornost pa zmanjšuje, če ni dejavnega delovanja v smeri redis- tribucije oziroma upočasnjevanja motenj. Urbane- mu notranji gon po univerzalizaciji, globalizaciji ter vse večjih trgih in omrežjih zgoščuje čas in nas vodi bližje horizonta dogodkov, točke v času, po kateri smo slepi, in onkraj katere nimamo skupnih pripove- di. Naša perspektiva prihodnosti je tista, s katero plačujemo za bogastvo izkušenj v sedanjosti. Krajina in teritorij sta temu dobrodošel protistrup. Medtem ko sta urbano in ekonomija kratkoročna, pa krajina sledi daljšim ciklom in nas povezuje z dolgo- ročnim pogledom. V mislih nimam idilične pokrajine romanticizma, na katero nas veže preteklost, temveč počasi preoblikujoč se teritorij, ki ga opazujemo sko- zi leče ekologije, geologije in celo infrastrukture. Ta nas povezuje s prihodnostjo – krajino antropocena. Kako graditi na podlagi stvarnega fizičnega obstoja? Kako na podlagi zgodovinskih dejstev in bodoče fik- cije zgraditi pripovedno krajino z več referenčnimi okviri tako, da bo zasidrana v plasti geologije, narav- ne ritme, infrastrukturne projekte in v zgrajene sim- bole, da bo vključujoča in odprta v čas, ter da bo določila teritorij oziroma polje vektorjev, ki kažejo v skupno prihodnost, skratka tretji prostor; s Sojajevi- mi besedami, prostor priložnosti. Termin pripovedna krajina najbolje ponazorita dva nedavna projekta našega biroja, ki se ukvarjata s po- dobno temo kot Baltski paviljon. 1 Besedilo je prispevek avtorja v knjigi The Baltic Atlas, ki je izšla kot del predstavitve baltskega paviljona na beneškem arhitek- turnem bienalu 2016. 1 The essay “The Rediscovery of Time” is part of the publication on the occasion of the Baltic Pavilion at the 2016 Biennale in Venice. Sl. 1-4: Baltski paviljon na Beneškem bienalu 2016. http://balticpavilion.eu/ (foto 1 in 2: Anis Starks; foto 3 in 4: David Grandorge). Figs. 1-4: Baltic Pavillion at the Venice Biennale 2016. http:// balticpavilion.eu/ (photos 1 and 2: Anis Starks; photos 3 and 4: David Grandorge). 1 2 3 4 94 arhitektov bilten • architect's bulletin • 207 • 208 Salon Suisse: The Next 100 Years – Scenarios for an Alpine City State The Salon Suisse is a recurring collateral event at the Venice Biennale initiated by Pro Helvetia, the Swiss Arts Council. At the 14th Biennale in 2014, Hiromi Hosoya and myself curated it. This iteration of the Salon looked at Switzerland as a prototypical territory in an age of planetary ur- banism and in a timeframe of 100 years in order to forestall the extrapolation of trends, searching inste- ad for base principles, narratives, and even political will. It took for granted that the nation state is a hi- storic convention; for many questions we currently face may be both too small and too large a frame of reference. The events were modeled after a Constitutional As- sembly and served as a thought experiment. Projec- ting the Biennale’s preoccupation with the last cen- tury into the future and using the historic arc of the Venetian city-state as a backdrop, it tried to envision the next 100 years in an increasingly urban and vo- latile world. What would a contemporary concepti- on for Switzerland be in this context? If it had to be founded today, what would be its guiding principles, its institutions and its social contract? Urban researchers, complex system scientist and science fiction writers worked on understanding the nature of cities. Politicians, planners and developers discussed the reality of cities. And finally activists, co- operatives and historians sketched a culture of cities. In a final assembly, authors, journalists and game experts worked on turning the findings into narra- tives. Narratives are defined neither by the unat- tainable absolutes of utopias, nor the technocratic pragmatism of scenarios, but maybe again by the transformational qualities of Soja’s Third Space. A consequence and continuation of the Salon was Hosoya Schaefer’s participation in the concept com- petition for the new Swiss National Exposition in 2027. We won the competition in a team with Plinio Bachmann and Studio Vulkan. Expedition 27 – The Winning Concept for the Next Swiss National Exhibition in Eastern Switzerland As a confederation based on common sense more than on common history, Switzerland uses its nati- onal exhibitions, „Expos“, as platforms to regularly refresh its national narrative. Earlier Expos revolved around identity and national defense (1939), pro- gress and innovation (1964) or creativity and the arts (2002). Expo27 is meant to focus on our lives and living environment (“Lebensraum”): It will look at landscape, space and resources, and the challen- ge to develop ideas, institutions and infrastructures necessary for their long-term, collective use. The landscape is stage and scenery, topic and ter- ritory for a research journey, the Expedition27. In- stead of locating themes on designated fair grounds this expo looks for themes on location. The idyllic landscape of Eastern Switzerland is as full of history, technology and stories as it is of nature. As a micro- cosm of our earth-bound human existence it talks of the past and the future, of the archaic (“wüescht”) and the civilized (“schön”). The Expo27 offers new perspectives and establishes meaningful connecti- ons. As an extraordinary event it allows for mobi- Salon Suisse: Prihodnjih 100 let – scenariji za alpsko mestno državo Salon Suisse je stalen vzporedni dogodek Beneškega bienala, katerega pobudnik je Pro Helvetia, Švicarski svet umetnosti. Na 14. beneškem bienalu leta 2014 sva ga zasnovala skupaj s Hiromi Hosoya. Takratni Salon vzame Švico kot prototipni teritorij planetarnega urbanizma. Da bi preprečila ekstrapo- lacijo trendov in lažje identificirali temeljne principe, pripovedi in politično voljo, sva se odločila za časov- ni okvir 100 let. Predpostavila sva, da je nacionalna država zgodovinska konvencija, če ne bi se morala soočiti z mnogimi vprašanji, ki so bodisi premajhna bodisi prevelika za najin referenčni okvir. V vse bolj urbanem in eksplozivnem svetu sva skuša- la predvideti prihodnjih 100 let. Kako v tem konte- kstu razumeti Švico? Kakšni principi bi vodili državo, kakšne bi bile institucije in kakšna bi bila družbena pogodba, če bi jo ustanovili danes? Dogodek je kot miselni poskus zasnovan po modelu švicarske Zve- zne skupščine (parlament). Poudarek arhitekturne- ga bienala leta 2014 je bil na zadnjem stoletju, mi pa smo ga skušali projicirati v prihodnost, upoštevajoč ozadje Benetk kot mestne države s svojim zgodovin- skim lokom. Naravo mest so skušali opredeliti urbani raziskovalci, znanstveniki kompleksnih sistemov in pisci znanstve- ne fantastike. O realnosti mest so razpravljali politiki, planerji in razvojniki. In končno, kulturo mest so skici- rali aktivisti, različne kooperative in zgodovinarji. Na zadnjem srečanju so pisatelji, novinarji in dramaturgi skušali dognanja prevesti v pripovedi. Izkaže se, da pripovedi ne določajo nedosegljivi absoluti, utopije in tehnokratski pragmatizem scenarijev, ampak trans- formativnost Sojajevega tretjega prostora. Nadaljevanje projekta Salon Suisse in njegova posledi- ca je bilo sodelovanje biroja Hosoya Schaefer pri kon- ceptnem natečaju za novo Švicarsko nacionalno raz- stavo leta 2027. Na natečaju smo zmagali kot team, skupaj s Pliniom Bachmannom in Studiom Vulkan. Ekspedicija 27 – Zmagovalni koncept za naslednjo Švicarsko nacionalno razstavo v vzhodni Švici Švica svoje nacionalne predstavitve na svetovnih raz- stavah Expo razume kot platformo za obnavljanje svo- je nacionalne pripovedi, saj kot konfederacija bolj te- melji na zdravem razumu kot na skupni zgodovini. Prejšnje predstavitve Švice na Expo so obravnavale identiteto in nacionalno obrambo (1939), napredek in inovacije (1964) oziroma kreativnost in umetnost (2002). Poudarek Expo 27 bodo naša življenja in ži- vljenjsko okolje (Lebensraum): Expo bo obravnaval krajino, prostor in naravne vire, njegov glavni izziv pa bo razvijanje idej, institucij in infrastrukture za njiho- vo dolgoročno skupno uporabo. Za naše raziskovalno potovanje, Ekspedicijo 27, je krajina oder in scenografija, tema in teritorij. Name- sto da bi teme svetovne razstave razporedili po raz- ličnih predelih sejma, smo jih izpeljali iz lokacije same. Idilična pokrajina vzhodne Švice ima poleg naravnih tudi zgodovinska, tehnološka in pripove- dna bogastva. Kot mikrokozmos obstoja človeštva, ki je vezan na zemljo, govori o preteklosti in prihodno- sti, o arhaičnem (wüescht) in civiliziranem (schön). Expo 27 odpira nove perspektive in ustvarja pomen- ljive povezave. Kot izreden dogodek lahko kolektivni Perspektive Sl. 5-7: Salon Suisse. Hosoya Schaefer Architects, Zürich za Swiss Arts Council (foto: Alain Berset). Sl. 8-11: EXPO 27. Hosoya Schaefer Architects, Zürich; Studio Vulkan Landschaftsarchitektur, Zürich in Plinio Bachmann, Zürich. Figs. 5-7: Salon Suisse. Hosoya Schaefer Architects, Zürich for the Swiss Arts Council (photo: Alain Berset). Figs. 8-11: EXPO 27. Hosoya Schaefer Architects, Zürich; Studio Vulkan Landschaftsarchitektur, Zürich and Plinio Bachmann, Zürich. 5 6 7 8 95arhitektov bilten • architect's bulletin • 207 • 208 lization beyond the ordinary rules, regulations and roadblocks to collectively develop this landscape further and fill it with new stories. The expo territory is divided into three large zones. The mountain landscape with its vast views and gre- en hills of the Appenzell, the urban landscape with the agglomeration of St. Gallen, the agricultural land of the Thurgau and the Rhine valley and the lake landscape with the openness and internationality of the shores of lake Konstanz. The expo structures the three main questions “Where do we come from?”, “Where are we now?” and “Where are we going?” in resonance with this geography. Three railway rings form the logistical backbone of the expo and act as its main means of transport: The costal-line, the mountain-line and the urban-line. The three lines cross paths at the central intersection in Winkeln. A specially designed train schedule and routing plan makes use of excess capacity in existing schedules, services temporary stations and works with decommissioned train compositions. Together with additional elements of public transport it serves also small and very small expo locations. All of this is connected in an overarching story that consists of a narrative web of old myths, contem- porary tales and future scenarios. These stories guide visitors on their adventures through the expo landscape, frame new perspectives and enrich the day-to-day reality with a second layer of narration – contemplating it, interpreting it and spinning it further. Infrastructure ties this web together. Acces- sibility replaces density and collective experience the theme park, as in a time of ever increasing virtua- lization and ubiquity of information movement in space, personal experience and the serendipity of the real remain necessarily physical. The visitors experience the varying narrative strands of the expo either alone or in carefully curated fel- lowships. Individual and collective adventures bring the landscape to life and make it real. The Expo27, therefore, will be the Expedition27 – three landsca- pes, two worlds, one adventure! Narrative Landscape as Project In the German word „Landschaft“ Henri Lefebvre’s concept of space as a social production is already built in. It means land that is “produced” collective- ly. In today’s world much of this production is urban and almost all of it is under human influence. While the urban will always pull us towards the generic, as it is geared towards the standardization, univer- salization and globalization that maximize its mar- ket, landscape might allow us to rethink the local without falling into the trap of outdated an outda- ted urban imaginary. A transformative concept of territory might help us to avoid nostalgic myths and dystopian science fiction and produce locally produc- tive narratives. razvoj pokrajine mobilizira onkraj običajnih pravil, regulacij in ovirter jo napolni z novimi zgodbami. Teritorij Expa je razdeljen na tri glavna področja, ki jih predstavljajo gorska pokrajina s širokimi pogledi in ze- lenimi griči Appenzella, urbana krajina z aglomeracijo St. Gallena, kmetijska pokrajina Thurgaua in doline Rena ter jezerska pokrajina z odprtostjo in mednaro- dnostjo obal jezera Konstanz. Skladno z geografijo, Expo oblikuje tri glavna vprašanja: Od kod prihajamo? Kje smo zdaj? Kam gremo? Logistična hrbtenica Expa in glavni način transporta so trije železniški obroči: obalna, gorska in urbana linija. Tri proge se križajo v osrednjem križišču v Win- kelnu. Vozni red je zasnovan tako, da uporabi neizra- bljene kapacitete obstoječih voznih redov in zača- snih postaj, prevoze pa opravljajo odpisane vlakovne kompozicije. Prav vse, tudi majhne in zelo majhne, lokacije Expa so dostopne z vlaki in drugimi oblikami javnega transporta. Zasnovo Expa zaokroži pripoved: pripovedna mreža starih mitov, sodobnih pravljic in scenarijev za priho- dnost. Zgodbe vodijo obiskovalce na njihovih dogodi- vščinah v pokrajini Expa, uokvirjajo nove perspektive in vsakodnevno pa obogatijo z drugo plastjo pripove- di – kontemplacijo, naracijo in nadaljevanjem. Omrež- je je povezano z infrastrukturo. Gostoto in kolektivne izkušnje zamenja dostopnost. Znotraj tematskega parka osebna izkušnja in srečna naključja stvarnosti ostajajo nujno fizični, kljub vse močnejši virtualizaciji in vseprisotnosti toka informacij v prostoru. Obiskovalci izkusijo različne toke pripovedi Expa bodi- si sami bodisi v okviru organiziranih skupin. Individu- alne in kolektivne dogodivščine pripeljejo pokrajino k življenju in jo naredijo resnično. Expo27 je Ekspedicija 27 – tri pokrajine, dva svetova, ena dogodivščina! Pripovedne pokrajine kot projekt Lefebvrov pojem prostora kot družbene produkcije je vgrajen v nemški izraz Landschaft; pomeni deželo, ki jo produciramo kolektivno. V današnjem svetu velik delež produkcije prostora poteka v urbanem, kar sko- raj vselej poteka pod vplivom ljudi. Urbano nas pelje v generičnost, ki vodi v standardizacijo, univerzaliza- cijo in globalizacijo, saj te večajo trge. Pokrajina je ti- sta, ki odpre premislek lokalnega brez nevarnosti, da pademo v past zastarelega in zaostale podobe urba- nega. Teritorij kot transformativen pojem nam po- maga, da se izognemo nostalgičnim mitom in distopi- jam znanstvene fantastike ter ustvarimo lokalno pro- duktivne pripovedi. Markus Schaefer 9 10 11