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Wednesday, April 19, 2006

The Beauty of Density

Posted by on April 19 at 15:05 PM

I live for art, for images, for immensely human visions like this:
1.jpg
The image of the Hong Kong apartment complex was taken by a German photographer, Michael Wolf, and it’s part of a series called Architecture of Density, which is posted on his website.



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Oh yeah, I sure wanna live there.

Welcome to Christopher Frizelle's vision of Broadway... ;)

Or Dan Savage's vision of Capitol Hill!

That's Hong Kong, isn't it? Michael Wolf (not Micheal) is great. That's a beautiful photograph.

The point isn't "gee, would I like to live there?" The point is you don't live there by an accident of fate, not through your own innate fabulousness. A shitload of people DO live there, which is inherently interesting. And it makes for an amazing image.

Yeah, an amazing image... of total hell.

Nice skid marks coming down from the windows. Seattle could really use more squalor.

Go team density.

I cant recall the name of the publication, but it has a "beautiful" image of a slum in Lima. The issue is called SLUMS, and it talks about how the majority of the world's populations lives in favelas and slums.

Something about this image reminds me of a vecindad I once stayed at in Mexico City.

ANDREW Wrote:
"Nice skid marks coming down from the windows"

Those skid marks may only be clothes drying outside a window, Andrew.

Interesting photo. It is hard to get a true perspective because there is no street scene ouside of several shop signs.

I wouldn't necessarily be too quick to shop from the street..or the photo in this case.

---Jensen

The beauty in the image comes from the attempts of people to humanize these drab environs, and density makes this visible.
In Seattle, we get nicer quality construction, but condo-boards enforce a different type of drab-ness and prevent much beauty from showing in our 'high density' districts.
So, density tends to suck here for different reasons.

Trying to make a connection between what you see in this photograph and attempts to increase density in Seattle is vacuous and stupid. It only points up how little you have to offer to the conversation.

I'm not bragging, but I look at a lot of photography websites, and this is easily one of the more fascinating that I've seen - and I've only just begun to look at it. I'd invite you all to spare your words, take some time and learn something through your eyes and his content (and intent) and don't bother with foolish allusions to podunk Seattle. Density here will never reach the kind of critical mass that you see in these photographs.Nor will you ever see as interesting a photographer here.

Nice picture to look at, but I wouldn't want to live there.

And, given that the management and writers of the Stranger evidently think that no amount of density is too much - and relentlessly vilify those who dare to point out that it's a whole lot more nuanced than that - I think it's perfectly relevent to discuss it in light of the discussions (such as they are) on this blog.

MR.X Wrote:
".....,but I wouldn't want to live there."

Don't knock it till you've tried it, Mr.X.
You might find the only thing you really end up really ever missing is only a Dicks Deluxe with fries and tarter.


---Jensen

Mr. X: you appear to be confused. This slog entry is about a photograph, not about the Stranger staff's alleged lust for density. There isn't a person in Seattle who is advocating for density even a tenth of what is on view in the picture. The picture is a work of art and speaks volumes about the human condition, and speaks nil about life in Seattle, no matter how many medium density apartment blocks go up in this strikingly low-density town.

Mr. X wrote: "And, given that the management and writers of the Stranger evidently think that no amount of density is too much - and relentlessly vilify those who dare to point out that it's a whole lot more nuanced than that..."

Trying to apply a Dante-esque vision of an urban slum to Seattle's density debate -- and then to lay claim to the virtue of nuance -- now that takes chutzpah.

Astonishing photograph! Thank you, Doctor Mudede, Sir.

RICHARD JENSEN Wrote:
"Astonishing photograph!"

I am rather curious. Perhaps I am a bit naive, however why do people find this astonishing?

---Jensen

This is urban planner vision of the future. It is this vision that the transportation dreamers plan their light rail fiascos.

'Astonishing' could have been any of several superlatives. It is a beautiful photograph. One measure is that it holds interest: there are things to see in the photo beyond the first glance (I'll bet that's even more apparent when facing a full size print.) It's a complex physical subject casting and absorbing light in myriad ways. Socially, there are any number of reactions or reflections supported and propelled by visions captured here. For me, in particular, I'm fascinated by the way the massive gesture of the apartment building is apparently built up from individual injections of capital. I mean, it doesn't look like the different units necessarily conform to a floor or ceiling line. The structure is open and blantant about its accumulations, from the stains and laundry and air conditioners, to the apparently serial history of its construction, each new block of units built upon, or in the gaps left by, previous blocks.

(This is a beautiful illustration of the concept of 'contingency' that was central to the, was it Judith Butler's?, critique of classical structuralism Dr. Mudede puzzled us with a few days ago.)

I grant that this image is not entirely original, either conceptually or as illustrative genre, but it is beautifully rendered and with such a fine degree of articulation that I can actually play voyeur around each of windows.

It interested me. I'm glad Charles set it in my path.

Great image. On a literalist level: brutalist architecture teeming with humans. They share with us feelings, emotions, and dreads. We know they are there, we just can't see them. On an artistic level: redolent of cubist images (Nude Descending a Staircase, perhaps). The cropping suggests this hive of humanity extends outwards to no end. . ..

Precisely, it is the collapsing of the total and the singular that makes this image so powerful. There is an image by Gursky of a Parisian apartment that does something completely different to Wolf's image. Gursky only gives us a sense of the total flatness of capital, whereas in this image capital is total and yet given a depth, a series of lives, a single person. There is another image in this collection which shows individual mops sticking out of open windows. Utterly human; utterly amazing.

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