Junkspace Author(s): Rem Koolhaas Reviewed work(s): Source: October, Vol. 100, Obsolescence (Spring, 2002), pp.

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Junkspace

REM KOOLHAAS A LoganAirport: World-Class Upgrade theTwenty-first for Century -Late-TwentiethCentury Billboard Rabbit is the new beef... Because we abhor the utilitarian,we have condemned ourselvesto a lifelongimmersionin the arbitrary... LAX: welcomingat counter... "Identity" the newjunk is possibly flesh-eating-orchids the check-in

the is space-junkis the human debris thatlitters universe, Junk-Space the residue mankind leaves on the planet. The built (more about that later) product of modernization is not modern architecture but Junkspace. Junkspace is what remainsafter modernization run itscourse, or,more precisely, has whatcoagulates while modernization is in progress, its fallout. Modernization had a rational program:to share the blessingsof science,universally. Junkspaceis its apotheosis, or meltdown... Althoughits individualpartsare the outcome of brilliantinventions, lucidlyplanned by human intelligence,boosted by infinite computation, theirsum spells the end of Enlightenment, resurrection farce,a low-grade its as we achievement; have built purgatory ...Junkspace is the sum totalof our current more than did all previousgenerationsput together, somehowwe do not regbut isteron the same scales. We do not leave pyramids. Accordingto a new gospel of ugliness,there is alreadymoreJunkspaceunder constructionin the twenty-first than has survived fromthe twentieth It was a mistaketo inventmodern ... century architecture the twentieth for Architecture century. disappeared in the twentieth century;we have been reading a footnoteunder a microscope hoping it would turn into a novel; our concern for the masses has blinded us to People's Architecture. seemsan aberration, itis the essence,the main thing... but Junkspace the productof an encounterbetweenescalatorand air-conditioning, conceivedin an incubatorof Sheetrock(all threemissing fromthe history is books). Continuity the essence ofJunkspace; exploitsanyinvention it thatenables expansion,deploys the infrastructure seamlessness: of fire escalator, air-conditioning, sprinkler, shutter, hot-aircurtain...It is always so thatyou rarely it interior, extensive perceivelimits;
promotes disorientation by any means (mirror, polish, echo) .
OCTOBER 100,Spring Koolhaas. 2002,pp. 175-190. ? 2002 Rem
. . Junkspace

food for the dispossessed, globalization's fodder for the disenfranchised ... If

is

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sealed, held together not by structurebut by skin, like a bubble. Gravityhas remained constant,resistedby the same arsenal since the beginningof time;but unnoticed-has truly revolutionized medium,therefore air-conditioning-invisible has launched the endless building. If architecture architecture. Air-conditioning unites them. Air-conditioning dictated has separates buildings,air-conditioning mutantregimesof organizationand coexistencethatleave architecture behind. A centeris now the workof generationsof space planners,repairsingle shopping like in the Middle Ages; air-conditioning sustainsour cathedrals. men, and fixers, be on (All architects mayunwittingly working the same building,so farseparate, but withhidden receptorsthat will eventually make it cohere.) Because it costs is becomes conditionalspace; money, no longerfree,conditionedspace inevitably sooner or laterall conditionalspace turnsintoJunkspace... When we thinkabout is all space, we have onlylooked at itscontainers.As ifspace itself invisible, theory forthe productionof space is based on an obsessivepreoccupationwithits opposite: substance and objects, i.e., architecture.Architects could never explain space; Junkspaceis our punishmentfortheirmystifications. O.K., let's talkabout space then. The beauty of airports,especiallyaftereach upgrade. The lusterof The subtlety the shoppingcenter.Let's explore public space, disof renovations. of space, a territory impaired vision,limited expectation, reduced earnestness. Junkspaceis a Bermuda Triangleof concepts,an abandoned petri dish: it cancels underminesresolve,confusesintentionwithrealization.It replaces distinctions, withaccumulation,compositionwithaddition. More and more,more is hierarchy more. Junkspace is overripe and undernourishingat the same time, a colossal blanketthatcoversthe earthin a stranglehold seduction...Junkspace of security is likebeing condemned to a perpetual withmillionsofyourbestfriends ... Jacuzzi A fuzzy of blur,it fuseshigh and low,public and private, and bent, empire straight a bloated and starvedto offer seamlesspatchwork the permanently of disjointed. an of Seemingly apotheosis,spatially grandiose,the effect its richnessis a terminal a erodes the credibility hollowness, vicious parodyof ambitionthatsystematically of building,possiblyforever Space was created by pilingmatteron top of mat... ter,cemented to form a solid new whole. Junkspace is additive, layered, and not lightweight, articulatedin different partsbut subdivided,quarteredthe waya carcass is tornapart-individual chunksseveredfroma universal condition.There are no walls,onlypartitions, membranesfrequently coveredin mirror shimmering or gold. Structure underneathdecoration,or worse,has become groans invisibly frames support nominal loads, or huge beams ornamental; small, shiny, space workhorseof structures, become the depleted emblem of "community," has welan infinity virtual of to nonexistent theres.Where it is absent, coming populations it is simplyapplied-mostly in stucco-as ornamentalafterthought hurriedly on erected superblocks.Junkspace's iconographyis 13 percent Roman, 8 percent Bauhaus and 7 percentDisney (neck and neck), 3 percentArtNouveau, followed
deliver cyclopic burdens to unsuspecting destinations
. .

cover casinos, spend time in theme parks ... Junkspace is the body double of

. The arch, once the

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closely by Mayan ... Like a substance that could have condensed in any other form, Junkspaceis a domain of feigned,simulatedorder,a kingdom of morphas ing. Its specific configurationis as fortuitous the geometryof a snowflake. Patternsimplyrepetitionor ultimately decipherable rules;Junkspaceis beyond measure, beyond code ... Because it cannot be grasped,Junkspace cannot be remembered.It is flamboyant unmemorable,like a screen saver;its refusalto yet freeze ensures instantamnesia.Junkspacedoes not pretendto create perfection, only interest.Its geometriesare unimaginable,only makable. Although strictly it nonarchitectural, tends to the vaulted,to the Dome. Some sectionsseem to be devoted to utterinertness,others in perpetual rhetorical turmoil:the deadest resides next to the most hysterical. Themes cast a pall of arresteddevelopment in over interiorsas big as the Pantheon, spawningstillbirths everycorner.The aesthetic is Byzantine,gorgeous, and dark, splinteredinto thousands of shards, all visible at the same time: a quasi-panoptical universe in which all contents in rearrangethemselves splitseconds around the dizzyeye of the beholder.Murals used to show idols;Junkspace'smodules are dimensionedto carrybrands; myths can be shared, brands husband aura at the mercyof focus groups. Brands in the same role as black holes in the universe:theyare essences Junkspaceperform mankindreflect at humanity itsmostcasual. The morewe inhabitthe palatial,the more we seem to dress down. A stringent dress code-last spasm of etiquette?access to Junkspace: shorts,sneakers, sandals, shell suit, fleece,jeans, governs parka, backpack. As if the People suddenly accessed the private quarters of a dictator,Junkspace is best enjoyed in a state of postrevolutionarygawking. Polarities have merged-there is nothing left between desolation and frenzy. Neon signifies both the old and the new; interiorsreferto the Stone and Space at the same time. Like the deactivatedvirusin an inoculation,Modern archiAge tectureremainsessential,but onlyin its moststerilemanifestation, High Tech (it seemed so dead only a decade ago!). It exposes what previousgenerationskept under wraps:structures exit stairsdangle in emerge like springsfroma mattress; a didactic trapeze; probes thrust into space to deliverlaboriouslywhat is in fact omnipresent,free air; acres of glass hang fromspiderycables, tautlystretched skinsenclose flaccidnonevents.Transparency in onlyrevealseverything whichyou cannot partake.At the strokeof midnight all mayrevert TaiwaneseGothic;in it to three years it may segue into Nigerian Sixties, Norwegian Chalet, or default Christian.Earthlings now live in a kindergarten on thrives grotesque.. .Junkspace but design dies in Junkspace. There is no form,only proliferation... design, instead of creation,we honor, cherish,and Regurgitationis the new creativity; franchise and sparklinginfrastructures light, LEDs, and video describe an of authorlessworldbeyond anyone's claim,alwaysunique, utterly unpredictable, yet familiar. walls,folded intensely Junkspaceis hot (or suddenlyarctic); fluorescent like meltingstained glass, generate additional heat to raise the temperatureof
embrace manipulation
. .

through which meaning disappears

. .

. The shiniest surfaces in the history of

. Superstrings of graphics, transplanted emblems of

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Junkspaceto levels at whichyou could cultivateorchids.Pretendinghistoriesleft and right,its contents are dynamicyet stagnant, recycled or multiplied as in cloning:formssearch forfunctionlike hermitcrabs lookingfora vacant shell ... like a reptile sheds skins,is reborn everyMonday Junkspacesheds architectures In previousbuilding,materiality based on a finalstate that could was morning. At the expense of partialdestruction. the exact momentthat onlybe modifiedat has and regularity repressive, as materials our culture abandoned repetition building and standardized;substancenow have become more and more modular,unitary, comes predigitized . . . As the module becomes smaller and smaller,its status become that of a crypto-pixel.With enormous difficulty-budget,argument, negotiation, deformation-irregularityand uniqueness are constructed from to identicalelements.Instead of trying wrestorderfromchaos, the picturesqueis the nowwrested from homogenized, singular the liberated from standardized the ... Architects and named it Megastructure, finalsoluthe thoughtofJunkspacefirst tion to transcendtheirhuge impasse.Like multipleBabels, huge superstructures that would would last through eternity, teemingwith impermanentsubsystems mutate over time,beyond theircontrol.In Junkspace,the tables are turned:it is subsystem only,withoutsuperstructure, orphaned particlesin search of a framework or pattern. All materialization is provisional: cutting,bending, tearing, has like coating: construction acquired a new softness, tailoring... The joint is no a problem, an intellectual issue: transitionalmoments are defined by longer brown bands barely maintain the illusion of an stapling and taping, wrinkly unbroken surface; verbs unknown and unthinkable in architecturalhistoryclamp, stick,fold,dump, glue, shoot, double, fuse-have become indispensable. Each element performs task in negotiated isolation.Where as detailingonce its the coming together, of it forever, disparatematerials, is now a suggested possibly transient to be undone, unscrewed, temporary a embracewitha coupling,waiting of encounterof difference, high probability separation;no longerthe orchestrated a but the abruptend of a system, stalemate.Only the blind,readingits faultlines with their fingertips, ever understandJunkspace'shistories. . . While whole will millenniaworkedin favor permanence,axialities, of and relationships, proportion, the programofJunkspaceis escalation. Instead of development, offers it entropy. Because it is endless, it alwaysleaks somewherein Junkspace;in the worstcase, monumentalashtrays catch intermittent drops in a graybroth...When did time to spool in everydirection, like a tape spinningout of stop movingforward, begin control?Since the introduction Real TimeTM? of Change has been divorcedfrom the idea of improvement.There is no progress; like a crab on LSD, culture ... lunch box is a microstaggersendlesslysideways The average contemporary cosm ofJunkspace:a fervent semanticsof health-slabs of eggplant,topped by thick layers of goat cheese-canceled by a colossal cookie at the bottom ... Junkspaceis drainingand is drained in return. Everywhere inJunkspacethereare seatingarrangements, rangesof modularchairs,even couches,as ifthe experience its more exhaustingthan anyprevious Junkspaceoffers consumersis significantly

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utilitarian you find buffets: spatial sensation; in its most abandoned stretches, tables draped in white or black sheets, perfunctory assemblies of caffeineand calories-cottage cheese, muffins, unripe grapes-notional representationsof withouthorn and withoutplenty.Each Junkspaceis connected,sooner or plenty, later,to bodily functions:wedged between stainless-steelpartitionssit rows of groaningRomans,denim togasbunched around theirhuge sneakers... Because it is so intenselyconsumed, Junkspace is fanaticallymaintained, the night shift undoing the damage of the day shiftin an endless Sisyphean replay.As you recoverfrom Junkspace, Junkspacerecoversfromyou: between 2 and 5 A.M., yet anotherpopulation,thisone heartlessly is casual and appreciably darker, mopping, in hovering, sweeping,toweling, resupplying...Junkspacedoes not inspireloyalty its cleaners ...Dedicated to instantgratification, Junkspaceaccommodatesseeds of future a of perfection; language of apology is woventhroughits texture canned billboards euphoria; "pardon our appearance" signs or miniatureyellow"sorry" markongoing patches of wetness, announce momentary in discomfort returnfor imminentshine, the allure of improvement. Somewhere,workerssink on their knees to repairfaded sections,as ifin a prayer, half-disappear ceilingvoidsto or in as All negotiateelusivemalfunctions, ifin confession. surfacesare archaeological, superpositionsof different "periods" (what do you call the momenta particular type of wall-to-wallcarpet was current?)-as you note when they're torn ... Traditionally, typologyimplies demarcation,the definitionof a singularmodel that excludes other arrangements. Junkspace representsa reverse typologyof less about kind than about quantity. formBut cumulative, approximative identity, lessness is still form,the formlessalso a typology. . . Take the dump, where successive trucksdischarge their loads to form a heap, whole in spite of the randomnessof its contentsand its fundamental or shapelessness, thatof the tentthatassumesdifferent to accommodatevariableinterior volumes. envelope shapes Or the vague crotchesof the new generation. can eitherbe absolutely Junkspace chaotic or frighteninglyaseptic-like a best-seller-overdetermined and indeterminate the same time.There is somethingstrangeabout ballrooms,for at instance:huge wastelands for Because you've keptcolumn-free ultimateflexibility. neverbeen invitedto thatkind of event,you have neverseen them in use; you've onlyseen thembeing preparedwithchillingprecision:a relentless grid of circular tables, extending toward a distant horizon, their diameters preempting communication;a dais big enough forthe politburoof a totalitarian state,wings announcingas yetunimaginedsurprises-acres of organizationto supportfuture and drunkenness, disarray, disorder.Or car shows.. .Junkspaceis oftendescribed as a space of flows, thatis a misnomer; but flows depend on disciplinedmovement, bodies that cohere. Junkspace is a web without a spider; although it is an architecture the masses,each trajectory strictly of is unique. Its anarchyis one of the last tangiblewaysin whichwe experience freedom.It is a space of collision,a container of atoms, busy,not dense . . . There is a special way of moving in Junkspace,at the same time aimless and purposeful.It is an acquired culture.

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of Junkspacefeaturesthe tyranny the oblivious: sometimesan entireJunkspace comes unstuckthroughthe nonconformity one of its members;a singlecitizen of of an another culture-a refugee, mother-can destabilizean entire a Junkspace, hold it to a rustic'sransom,leaving an invisibleswathof obstructionin his/her communicatedto its furthest extremities. Where wake, a deregulationeventually movementbecomes synchronized, curdles: on escalators, near exits, parking it machines,automated tellers.Sometimes,under duress,individualsare channeled in a flow, pushed througha single door or forced to negotiate the gap between two temporary obstacles (an invalid'sbleeping chariotand a Christmas tree): the manifestill will such narrowingprovokes mocks the notion of flows.Flows in Junkspace lead to disaster: department stores at the beginning of sales; the of stampedes triggered warringcompartments soccer fans;dead bodies piling by of doors of a disco-evidence of the awkward fit up in front the locked emergency between the portals ofJunkspaceand the narrowcalibrationsof the old world. The younginstinctively avoid the Dante-esque manipulations/containers which to Withinthe meta-playground Junkspacehas condemned theirelders in perpetuity. existsmallerplaygrounds, ofJunkspace Junkspaceforchildren(usuallyin the least desirable square footage): sections of sudden miniaturization-often underneath staircases,alwaysnear dead ends-and assemblies of underdimensionedplastic structures-slides, seesaws, swings-shunned by their intended audience are turnedinto aJunknicheforthe old, the lost, the forgotten, insane ... the last the of humanism ... Traffic Junkspace,fromairspace to the subway;the is hiccup entirehighway is a system Junkspace, vastpotentialutopia clogged by its users,as notice when they've waste, you finally disappeared on vacation... Like radioactive has an insidious half-life. in Junkspace is nonexistentor cataJunkspace Aging strophic; sometimes an entireJunkspace-a departmentstore, a nightclub,a bachelor pad-turns into a slum overnight withoutwarning:wattagediminishes letters drop out of signs, air-conditioningunits startdripping, imperceptibly, cracksappear as iffromotherwiseunregistered earthquakes;sections rot,are no but remainjoined to the flesh of the main body via gangrenous longer viable, passages. Judgingthe built presumed a static condition; now each architecture embodies oppositeconditionssimultaneously: and new,permanent old and tempoand at risk . . Sections undergo an Alzheimer's-like rary, flourishing deterioration as others are upgraded. Because Junkspace is endless, it is never closed . . Renovation and restorationwere procedures that took place in your absence; now you're a witness,a reluctantparticipant... Seeing Junkspace in conversionis like inspecting unmade bed, someone else's. Say an airportneeds an more space. In the past,new terminals wereadded, each more or less characteristic of its own age, leaving the old ones as a readable record, evidence of progress. Since passengers have definitively demonstratedtheir infinitemalleability, the idea of rebuildingon the spot has gained currency. Travelatorsare throwninto reverse,signs taped, potted palms (or verylarge corpses) covered in body bags. Screens of taped Sheetrock segregate two populations: one wet, one dry,one

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one cold, one overheated.Half the population produces new hard, one flabby, the more affluenthalf consumes old space. To accommodate a nether space; world of manual labor, the concourse suddenly turnsinto Casbah: improvised locker rooms, coffee breaks, smoking,even real campfires. . The ceiling is a crumpledplate like the Alps; gridsof unstable tilesalternatewithmonogrammed sheets of black plastic,improbably puncturedby grids of crystalchandeliers... Metal ducts are replaced by breathingtextiles.Gaping joints reveal vast ceiling voids (formercanyonsof asbestos?),beams, ducting,rope, cable, insulation,fireproofing,string;tangled arrangementssuddenly exposed to daylight.Impure, tortured,and complex, they exist only because they were never consciously different textures-concrete,hairy, plotted.The flooris a patchwork: shiny, heavy, as muddy-alternaterandomly, ifdedicatedto different plastic,metallic, species... The ground is no more. There are too manyrawneeds to be realized on onlyone has has plane. The absolutehorizontal been abandoned. Transparency disappeared, to be replaced by a dense crustof provisionaloccupation: kiosks,carts,strollers, ... bars, sofas,trolleys Corridorsno longer simplylinkA to B, palms, fountains, but have become "destinations."Their tenant life tends to be short: the most the mostperfunctory All dresses,the mostimplausibleflowers. stagnantwindows, is (itself perspective gone, as in a rainforest disappearing, theykeep saying...). The is formerly straight coiled into evermorecomplex configurations. Onlya perverse modernist choreography can explain the twistsand turns, the ascents and descents, the sudden reversals that comprise the typical path from check-in (misleadingname) to the apron of the averagecontemporary airport.Because we never reconstruct question the absurdity these enforced ddrives, meekly or of we submit to grotesque journeys past perfume, asylum-seekers, building site, underwear, oysters,pornography,cell phone-incredible adventures for the brain, the eye, the nose, the tongue,the womb,the testicles... There was once a line; now the ninetiethdegree has polemic about the rightangle and the straight become one among many.In fact,remnants former of geometriescreateevernew forlornnodes of resistancethat create unstable eddies in newly havoc, offering flows... Who would dare claim responsibility thissequence? The for opportunistic idea that a professiononce dictated, or at least presumed to predict, people's movementsnow seems laughable, or worse: unthinkable. Instead of design,there is calculation:the more erraticthe path,eccentricthe loops, hidden the blueprint, efficient exposure, the more inevitablethe transaction.In this war,graphic the Where once signagepromisedto deliveryou to designersare the greatturncoats: where you wanted to be, it now obfuscates and entangles you in a thicketof cuteness thatforcesyou past unwanteddetours,turnsyou back when you're lost. Postmodernism adds a crumple-zoneof viral pochethat fractures and multiplies the endless frontline display, peristaltic of a crucial to all commercial shrink-wrap exchange. Trajectories are launched as ramp, turn horizontal without any fold down, suddenlyemerge on a vertiginous warning,intersect, balconyabove a void. Fascism minus dictator.From the sudden dead end where you were large

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dropped bya monumental,granitestaircase,an escalatortakesyou to an invisible destination, facing a provisional vista made of plaster,inspired by forgettable sources. (There is no datum level; you always inhabit a sandwich. "Space" is a as too scooped out ofJunkspace from soggyblockof ice creamthathas languished whatever... ) long in the freezer:cylindrical, cone-shaped,more or less spherical, Toilet groups mutate into Disney Stores then morph to become meditation centers: Successive transformations mock the.word "plan." The plan is a radar screen where individual pulses survivefor unpredictable periods of time in a Bacchanalian free-for-all In this standoffbetween the redundant and the ... inevitable,a plan would actuallymake matters worse,would driveyou to instant despair.Only the diagramgivesa bearable version.There is zero loyalty-and zero no tolerance-toward configuration, "original"condition;architecture turned has intoa time-lapse evolution." The onlycertainty ... sequence to reveala "permanent is conversion-continuous-followed, in rare cases, by "restoration," process the thatclaimsevernewsectionsofhistory extensions as ofJunkspace. History corrupts, absolute history Color and matterare eliminatedfromthese corruptsabsolutely. bloodless grafts: the bland has become the onlymeetingground forthe old and the new... Can the bland be amplified? The featureless exaggerated? be Through Variation?Repetition?Sometimes not overload but its height?Depth? Length? opposite, an absolute absence of detail, generates Junkspace.A voided condition of frightening that so much can be organized by so sparseness,shockingproof little. Laughable emptinessinfusesthe respectful distance or tentativeembrace thatstarchitects maintainin the presence of the past,authenticor not. Invariably, the primordial decision is to leave the original intact; the formerly residual is declaredthe newessence,thefocusof theintervention. a first As thesubstance step, to be preserved is wrapped in a thick pack of commerce and catering-like a reluctant skier To minders. showrespect, pusheddownhill responsible by symmetries are maintained and helplessly exaggerated; ancient building techniques are resurrectedand honed to irrelevantshine, quarries reopened to excavate the in "same" stone, indiscreetdonor names chiseled prominently the meekest of the courtyard coveredby a masterful, structural typefaces; "filigree"-emphatically uncompetitive-so thatcontinuity maybe establishedwiththe "rest" ofJunkspace (abandoned galleries, display slums,Jurassic concepts... ). Conditioning is revealsvast,antiseptic applied; filtered daylight expansesof monumentalreticence and makes them come alive, vibrantas a computer rendering... The curse of public space: latent fascismsafelysmothered in signage, stools, sympathy... it Junkspaceis postexistential; makesyou uncertainwhereyou are, obscureswhere undoes whereyou were. Who do you thinkyou are? Who do you want to you go, be? (Note to architects:You thought that you could ignore Junkspace,visitit treatit with condescending contemptor enjoy it vicariously... surreptitiously, because you could not understand it, you've thrownaway the keys... But now your own architecture is infected, has become equally smooth, all-inclusive, atrium-ridden JunkSignatureTMthe new architecis continuous,warped,busy, ...)

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ture: the formermegalomania of a professioncontracted to manageable size, stretched-limousines,body parts, Anything Junkspaceminus its savingvulgarity. planes-turns into Junkspace,its original concept abused. Restore, rearrange, reassemble,revamp,renovate,revise,recover,redesign,return-the Parthenon marbles-redo, respect, rent: verbs that start with re-produce Junkspace ... Junkspace will be our tomb. Half of mankind pollutes to produce, the other pollutes to consume.The combined pollutionof all ThirdWorldcars,motorbikes, trucks, buses,sweatshops pales into insignificance compared to the heat generated is political: It depends on the centralremovalof the critJunkspace byJunkspace. in ical faculty the name of comfort and pleasure. Politicshas become manifesto by Photoshop, seamless blueprintsof the mutuallyexclusive,arbitratedby opaque NGOs. Comfort the newJustice. is Entireminiature statesnow adoptJunkspaceas political program, establish regimes of engineered disorientation, instigate a Not exactly"anything politics of systematic disarray. goes"; in fact,the secret of and repressive: the formless as Junkspaceis thatit is both promiscuous proliferates, the formalwithers, and withit all rules,regulations, recourse ... Babel has been misunderstood. of just the new frontier Junkspace. Language is not the problem, endless debates,has Mankind,tornbyeternaldilemmas,the impasseof seemingly launched a new language that straddles unbridgeable divides like a fragile designer'sfootbridge... coined a proactivewave of new oxymoronsto suspend former incompatibility: life/style,reality/TV,world/music, museum/store, food/court, health/care, waiting/lounge.Naming has replaced class struggle, sonorous amalgamationsof status,high-concept, and history. Through acronym, unusual importation,suppressingletters,or fabricationof nonexistentplurals, theyaim to shed meaning in returnfor a spacious new roominess... Junkspace knowsall youremotions,all yourdesires.It is the interior Big Brother'sbelly.It of sensations. It comes with a sound track,smell, captions; it preempts people's cool, huge, abstract, blatantlyproclaimshow it wants to be read: rich,stunning, "minimal,"historical. It sponsors a collective of brooding consumers in surly anticipation of their next spend, a mass of refractoryperiods caught in a Thousand Year Reign of Razzmatazz, a paroxysmof prosperity. The subject is of privacyin returnfor access to a creditnirvana.You are complicitin stripped the tracingof the fingerprints each of your transactions leaves; theyknoweveryabout you, except who you are. EmissariesofJunkspacepursue you in the thing formerly imperviousprivacyof the bedroom: the minibar, privatefax machines, freshplastic veils wrapping toilets pay-TVoffering compromised pornography, condoms:miniature centerscoexistwithyourbedside bible ... seats,courtesy profit to unite, but it actuallysplinters.It createscommunitiesnot Junkspacepretends out of shared interest or free association, but out of identical statistics and unavoidable demographics, opportunistic an weave of vestedinterests. Each man, and child is individuallytargeted, tracked, split offfrom the rest... woman, Fragments come together at "security" only, where a grid of video screens reassemblesindividualframesinto a banalized, utilitarian cubism disappointingly

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that revealsJunkspace's overall coherence to the dispassionate glare of barely in trainedguards:video-ethnography its bruteform. Justas Junkspaceis unstable, its actual ownershipis foreverbeing passed on in parallel disloyalty. Junkspace happens spontaneouslythroughnatural corporate exuberance-the unfettered play of the market-or is generatedthroughthe combined actions of temporary bureaucrats (often "czars" with long records of three-dimensional philanthropy, that optimisticallysell offvast tracts of waterfront,former former leftists) bases and abandoned airfields developersor real-estate to hippodromes,military moguls who can accommodate any deficit in futuristicbalances, or through Default PreservationTM (the maintenance of historical complexes that nobody wants but that the Zeitgeisthas declared sacrosanct).As its scale mushroomsrivals and even exceeds that of the Public-its economy becomes more is inscrutable.Its financing a deliberatehaze, clouding opaque deals, dubious tax air breaks,unusual incentives, exemptions,tenuous legalities,transferred rights, Funded by joined properties, public-private complicities. special zoning districts, bonds, lottery, charity, grant:An erraticflowof yen, Euros, and dollars subsidy, createsfinancialenvelopes thatare as fragileas theircontents.Because of a struca tural shortfall, fundamentaldeficit, contingentbankruptcy, a each square inch becomes a grasping,needy surface dependent on covert or overt support, disFor count, compensationand fund-raising. culture,"engraveddonor bricks";for else: cash, rentals, leases, franchises,the underpinning of brands. everything cannot contract-when it is Junkspaceexpands withthe economybut itsfootprint no longer needed, it thins. Because of its tenuous viability, Junkspace has to swallowmore and more programto survive; soon, we willbe able to do anything We the anywhere. willhave conquered place. At the end ofJunkspace, Universal? old aura is transfusedwith new luster to spawn sudden Through Junkspace, commercialviability: Barcelona amalgamatedwiththe Olympics, Bilbao withthe Streetwith Disney.God is dead, the author is dead, Guggenheim,Forty-second historyis dead, only the architectis leftstanding.., .an insultingevolutionary of joke ... A shortage of mastershas not stopped a proliferation masterpieces. has become a definitive sanction,a semantic space that saves the "Masterpiece" leaves its qualities unproven,its performanceuntested,its object fromcriticism, motivesunquestioned. Masterpieceis no longeran inexplicablefluke, roll of the a dice, but a consistent typology:its mission to intimidate,most of its exterior surfacesbent,huge percentagesof itssquare footagedysfunctional, centrifugal its held together by the pull of the atrium, dreading the components barely imminentarrivalof forensicaccounting... The more indeterminate city, the the more specificitsJunkspace;all ofJunkspace'sprototypes urban-the Roman are thatmakes themsuburban, Forum,the Metropolis;it is onlytheirreversesynergy swollenand shrunk. reduceswhatis urban to urbanity... simultaneously Junkspace Instead of public life,Public SpaceTM:what remainsof the cityonce the unpredictable

and "grieving," "healing"... civility imposed byan overdoseof serif... In the third

has been removed

. .

. Space

for "honoring,"

"sharing," "caring,"

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Millennium, Junkspace will assume responsibilityfor pleasure and religion, the Inevitably, death of God (and exposure and intimacy, public lifeand privacy. the author) has spawnedorphaned space; Junkspaceis authorless, surprisingly yet authoritarian... At the momentof its greatestemancipation,humankindis subjected to the most dictatorialscripts:fromthe pushyoration of the waiterto the instructions the on gulags on the otherend of the telephone,the safety answering mankindis browbeateninto submitmore and more insistent perfumes, airplane, ing to the most harshly engineered plotline ... The chosen theater of Through megalomania-the dictatorial-is no longerpolitics,but entertainment. organizes hermeticregimesof ultimateexclusion and Junkspace,entertainment concentration: concentration gambling, concentration golf, concentration convention,concentrationmovie, concentrationculture,concentrationholiday. are is a Entertainment likewatching once-hotplanet cool off;itsmajor inventions ancient: the movingimage, the rollercoaster,recorded sound, cartoons,clowns, dinosaurs, news, war. Except for celebrities-of which there is a dramatic just reconfigured. Corpotainmentis a galaxy shortage-we have added nothing, in contraction,forced to go throughthe motions by ruthlessCopernican laws. the The secretof corporateaestheticswas the powerof elimination, celebrationof the as the efficient, eradicationof excess: abstraction camouflage,the searchfora Corporate Sublime. On popular demand, organized beauty has become warm, water is pressurized humanist,inclusivist, poetic, and unthreatening: arbitrary, throughverysmall holes, thenforcedinto rigoroushoops; straight palmsare bent into grotesque poses, air is burdened with added oxygen-as if only forcing malleable substancesinto the mostdrasticcontortions maintainscontrol,satisfies the drive to get rid of surprise.Not canned laughter,but canned euphoria... Color has disappeared to dampen the resultingcacophony,and is used only as Genius? Anarchy? Junkspace ... strongersensations?Dissonance? Awkwardness? heals, or at least thatis the assumptionof manyhospitals.We thoughtthe hospital was unique-a universethatidentifiedby its smell-but now thatwe are used to universal conditioningwe recognize it was merelya prototype;all Junkspaceis defined by its smell. Often heroic in size, planned with the last adrenaline of modernism'sgrand inspiration, have made them (too) human; life or death we decisions are taken in spaces that are relentlessly litteredwith fading friendly, coffeecups, and yesterday's You used to face death in bouquets, empty papers. appropriate cells; now your nearest are huddled together in atriums. A bold datum line is establishedon everyverticalsurface,dividingthe infirmary two: in above an endless humanist scrollof "color," loved ones, children'ssunsets, signage, and art.., .below a utilitarianzone for defacementand disinfectant, anticipated was a relationshipbetween leisure and work,a biblical dictate that divided our weeks, organized public life. Now we workharder,marooned in a never-ending casual Friday... The office the nextfrontier is Since you can workat ofJunkspace.
collision, scratch, spill, and smudge ...Junkspace is space as vacation; there once cue: relax, enjoy, be well, we're united in sedation
. .

. Why can't we tolerate

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home, the office aspiresto the domestic;because you stillneed a life,it simulates the city. Junkspace featuresthe officeas the urban home, a meeting-boudoir: desksbecome sculptures, work-floor litbyintimatedownlights. the is Monumental on partitions,kiosks,mini-Starbucks interior plazas: a Post-ituniverse: "team "information futilehedges againstthe universalforgetting memory," persistence"; of the unmemorable,the oxymoron missionstatement. as Witnesscorporateagitprop: the CEO's suite becomes "leadership collective,"wired to all the world's other Junkspace, real or imagined. Espace becomes E-space. The twenty-first Junkspace: on a big digital "dashboard": sales, centurywill bring "intelligent" CNNNYSENASDAQC-SPAN,anythingthat goes up or down, fromgood to bad, course that complements presented in real time like the automotive-theory We drivinglessons ... Globalizationturnslanguage intoJunkspace. are stuckin a now that we all speak it, speech-doldrums.The ubiquity of English is Pyrrhic: nobody remembersits use. The collectivebastardizationof English is our most achievement;we have broken its back with ignorance, accent, slang, impressive and multitasking we can make it sayanything ... we tourism, jargon, outsourcing, of want,like a speech dummy... Through the retrofitting language, thereare too fewplausible words left;our most creativehypotheseswill never be formulated, discoveries will remain unmade, concepts unlaunched, philosophies muffled, nuances miscarried... We inhabitsumptuousPotemkinsuburbsof weasel terminologies. Aberrantlinguisticecologies sustain virtualsubjects in their claim to express,or to confrontbut to fudge,blur,obfuscate,apologize, and comfort... it stakesclaims,assignsvictimhood, consenpreemptsdebate,admitsguilt,fosters sus. Entire organizationsand/or professions a descent into the linguistic impose inmates wrestlewith words in equivalent of hell: condemned to a word-limbo, of pleading, lying,bargaining,flattening.. . a Satanic ever-descendingspirals orchestrationof the meaningless... Intended for the interior, Junkspace can a whole city.First,it escapes fromits containers-semantic orchids easilyengulf that needed hothouse protectionemergingwithsurprising robustness-then the outdoorsitself converted: street paved more luxuriously, is the is shelters proliferate dictatorial messages, traffic calmed, crime eliminated. is carryingincreasingly
.

legitimacy, help them survive . . . Language is no longer used to explore, define,

a Junkspacerepresents finalManifest Destiny:the Worldas public space ... All of the resurrected emblems and recycledambers of the formerly public need new The outing of pastures. A new vegetal is corralled for its thematic efficiency. Junkspace has triggered the professionalizationof denaturing, a benign ecofascismthatpositionsa rare surviving Siberian tigerin a forestof slot machines, near Armani,amid a twisted arboreal Baroque ... Outside, between the casinos, fountainsproject entireStalinistbuildingsof liquid, ejaculated in a split second, then withdrawing withan amnesiac competency... Air, hovering momentarily, wood: All are enhanced to produce HyperecologyTM,parallel Walden, a a water, new rainforest. Landscape has become Junkspace,foliage as spoilage: Trees are

Then Junkspace spreads like a forest fire in L.A. .

. The global progress of

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tortured,lawns cover human manipulations like thick pelts, or even toupees, wateraccording to mathematicaltimetables... Seemingly the oppoat sprinklers site end ofJunkspace,the golf course is, in fact,its conceptual double: empty, serene, free of commercialdebris. The relativeevacuation of the golf course is achieved by the further chargingofJunkspace.The methods of theirdesign and realizationare similar:erasure,tabula rasa, reconfiguration. Junkspaceturnsinto biojunk; ecology turns into ecospace. Ecology and economy have bonded in Junkspace as ecolomy. The economy has become Faustian; hyperdevelopment depends on artificialunderdevelopment; a huge global bureaucracy is in the the makingto settle,in a colossal yin/yang, balance betweenJunkspaceand golf, between the scraped and the 'scaped, trading the right to despoil for the in obligation to create steroidrainforests Costa Rica. Oxygenbanks,FortKnoxes eco-reserves a blank check for further as of chlorophyll, pollution.Junkspaceis the apocalypse; we may die of oxygen poisoning... In the past, the rewriting complexities of Junkspace were compensated for by the stark rawness of its adjunct infrastructures: parking garages, fillingstations, distributioncenters a monumentalpurity thatwas the originalaim of modernism. routinely displaying Now, massive injections of lyricismhave enabled an infrastructure-the one domain previously immuneto design,taste,or the marketplace-to join the world of Junkspace, and forJunkspace to extend its manifestationsunder the sky. Railwaystations unfold like iron butterflies, airports glisten like cyclopic dewoftennegligiblebanks like grotesquely drops, bridges span enlarged versionsof the harp. To each rivuletits own Calatrava. (Sometimes when there is a strong shakes as if being played by a giant,or wind,this new generationof instruments a God, and mankind shudders ... ) Junkspace can be airborne, bring maybe malaria to Sussex; 300 anopheline mosquitoesarriveeach day at GDG and GTW withability, to locals in a three-mile radius,a theoretically, infecteight to twenty hazard exacerbatedby the average passenger'sreluctance,in a misplaced gasp of to once he or she has buckled up for the return quasi-autonomy, be disinfected from the dead end of the tourist destination. Airports, provisional journey accommodationforthose going elsewhere, inhabitedbyassembliesunitedonlyby the imminence of their dissolution, have turned into consumption gulags, distributed across the globe to give everycitizenan equal chance democratically of admission... MXP looks as ifall of the leftovers East Germany's of reconstruction-whatever was needed to undo the deprivations Communism-have been of bulldozed together to hurriedly accordingto a vaguelyrectangular blueprint form a botched sequence of deformed, willedinto being inadequate spaces (apparently Euros fromthe community's bythe currentrulersof Europe, who extortlimitless regional funds,causing endless delays for its duped taxpayerstoo busy on cell phones to notice). DFW is composed of three elements only,repeated ad infinitum, nothing else: one kind of beam, one kind of brick, one kind of tile, all coated in the same color-is it teal? Rust? Tobacco? With symmetries scaled of the endless curve of its terminals forcesits beyond any possibility recognition,

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users to enact relativity theoryin theirquest forthe gate. Its dropoffis the seemharmlessbeginning of a journey to the heart of unmitigatednothingness, ingly were beyondthe animationprovidedbyPizza Hut, DairyQueen ... Valleycultures to to be the most resistant Junkspace:at GVZ you can stillsee a universe thought of rules, order, hierarchy, neatness, coordination, poised moments before its waterfalls an as but at ZHR huge "timepieces" hoverin front interior of implosion, in Regionaljunk.Duty-free Junkspace; is is duty-free Where Junkspace space. essay will it be the first run out? Is emptinesslocal? Do wide to culturewas thinnest, open spaces demand wide open Junkspace? Sunbelt: huge populations where there was nothing; PHX: warpainton everyterminal,dead Indian outlines on by everysurface-carpet, wallpaper,napkins-like frogsflattened car tires.Public Artdistributed across LAX: the fishthathave disappeared fromour riversreturn as public artin the concourse; onlywhatis dead can be resurrected. Memoryitself may have turned intoJunkspace;only those murderedwill be remembered... Deprivation can be caused by overdose or shortage;both conditionshappen in Junkspace (often at the same time). Minimumis the ultimateornament,a selfbeauty,but guilt. righteouscrime,the contemporary Baroque. It does not signify Its demonstrative earnestnessdriveswhole civilizations into the welcomingarms of camp and kitsch.Ostensibly relieffromconstantsensorial onslaught,minia mum is maximumin drag, a stealthlaundering of luxury:the stricter the lines, the more irresistible seductions. Its role is not to approximatethe sublime, the but to minimizethe shame of consumption,drain embarrassment, lowerwhat to is higher.The minimumnow existsin a state of parasitic codependency withthe overdose: to have and not to have, cravingand owning,finally collapsed in a sin... Museums are sanctimonious there is no sturdier aura gle signifier Junkspace; than holiness.To accommodatethe converts have attracted default,musethey by ums massively turn "bad" space into "good" space; the more untreatedthe oak, the largerthe profit center.Monasteriesinflatedto the scale of department stores: is the Third Millennium'sentropy, dilute or die. Dedicated to mostly expansion would dare to reshuffle respectingthe dead, no cemetery corpses as casuallyin the name of currentexpediency;curatorsplot hangingsand unexpected encounters in a donor-platelabyrinth withthe finesseof the retailer:lingerie becomes "Nude, Action, Body,"cosmetics"History, Memory, Society."All paintingsbased on black grids are herded togetherin a singlewhiteroom. Large spidersin the humongousconversionofferdelirium for the masses ... Narrativereflexesthat have enabled us fromthe beginningof time to connect dots, fillin blanks,are now turnedagainstus: we cannotstop noticing-no sequence is too absurd,trivial, meaningless, insulting... Through our ancient evolutionary equipment,our irrepressible attention span, we helplessly register, provide insight, squeeze sensemeaning, read intention;we cannot stop makingsense out of the utterly less... On its triumphalmarch as contentprovider, extends far beyond the art museum's ever-increasing boundaries. Outside, in the real world,the "art planner" spreads Junkspace's fundamental incoherence by assigning defunct

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Junkspace go back to the kindergarten ... ("Origins" is a mint shampoo that stings

to worksin leftover mythologies residualsurfacesand plottingthree-dimensional forauthenticity, or her touchseals thefateofwhatwasreal, his emptiness.Scouting in taps it forincorporation Junkspace.Artgalleriesmove en masse to "edgy"locadiscourseis tions,then convertrawspace into whitecubes ... The onlylegitimate art replenishes in directproportionto its own morbidity. used We loss; Junkspace to renewwhatwas depleted; now we tryto resurrect whatis gone ... Outside, the architect's is footbridge rocked to the breakingpoint bya stampede of enthusiastic pedestrians; the designer's initial audacity now awaits the engineer's application of dampers. Junkspace is a look-no-handsworld ... The constant in threatof virtuality Junkspace is no longer exorcized by petrochemicalprodor rubber;the synthetic ucts,plastic,vinyl cheapens.Junkspacehas to exaggerate its claimsto the authentic.Junkspaceis like a womb thatorganizes the transition of endless quantitiesof the Real-stone, trees,goods, daylight, people-into the unreal. Entire mountains are dismembered to provide ever-greater quantities of authenticity, suspended on precariousbrackets, polished to a blindingstate of flashthatrendersthe intended earnestness elusive.Stone onlycomes in instantly light yellow,flesh,a violent beige, a soaplike green, the colors of Communist plasticsin the 1950s. Forestsare felled,theirwood all pale: maybethe originsof

Will Whatifspace startedlookingat mankind? always going on about architecture. invade the body?Through the vibes of the cell phone? Has it already? Junkspace Through Botox injections? Collagen? Silicone implants? Liposuction? Penis enlargements?Does gene therapyannounce a total reengineeringaccording to

life is inside, while cyberspace has become the great outdoors

the anal region.) Color in the real worldlooks increasingly unreal,drained. Color in virtualspace is luminous,therefore A irresistible. surfeit reality-TV made of has us into amateur guards monitoring Junkuniverse From the livelybreastsof a ... the classicalviolinist the designerstubbleof the Big Brotheroutcast,the conto textualpedophilia of the former the revolutionary, routineaddictionsof the stars, the runnymakeup of the evangelist,the robotic body language of the conductor,the dubious benefitsof the fund-raising marathon,the futileexplanationsof the politician: the swooping movementof the TV camera suspended fromits boom-an eagle withoutbeak or claws, just an optical stomach-swallowsimages and confessions like in indiscriminately, a trashbag, to propel themas cyber-vomit space. TV-studiosets-garishly monumental-are both the culminationand the end of perspectival space as we've knownit: angulargeometricremnants invading real space edited forsmoothtransmission virtual in infinities; starry space, crucial feedbackloop ... the vastnessofJunkspaceextended to the hinge in an infernal edges of the Big Bang. Because we spend our lifeindoors-like animalsin a zoowe are obsessed withthe weather:40 percent of all TV consistsof presentersof lesser attractiveness gesturing helplessly in front of windswept formations, through which you recognize, sometimes,your own destination/current position. Conceptually, each monitor, each TV screen is a substitute a window;real for
. .

. Mankind is

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site? Junkspace?Is each of us a mini-construction Is mankindthe sum of threeto fivebillionindividualupgrades?Is it a repertoire reconfiguration facilitates of that the intromission a new species into its self-made of The cosmeticis Junksphere?
the new cosmic ...