Brief
Design a journey that leads from the inner world to the outer world
Team-mates
Jumleena Bhagawati, Mila Tawil, Weiting Chi, Munira Kazi
Date
23/01/23 - 27/01/23
Guest Lecturer
Rosie Oliver (Audio producer and London explorer)
Welcome to Collaborative unit 2: Digital Psychogeography.
For this brief, we started off by doing a derive starting in Hackney Marshes letting a pathway and route open up before us. We were asked to use a range of documentary methods and media to convey the full psychological sensory richness of our journey. Through the process, we were asked to design a journey based on our perceptions and understandings of the places we encounter through which we could communicate inner and outer worlds in a way that is experienceable to everyone in the studio.
- Timeline -
There were 5 stages in our overall design process which we overcame to complete this brief.
The five stages are represented below in the timeline.
- Walking with no direction-
Walking with Rosie Oliver
We started our week with an exciting exploration of Central London’s Thames riverside with our amazing guide Rosie Oliver who introduced us to the art of drifting. In our very unconventional tour, as we traced our steps across the waterloo bridge to the Royal Court of Justice, we found ourselves often stopping and gazing at monuments or skyscapes that would have previously gone unnoticed.
Through the experience, I realized how spaces can act as gateways to the past and to levels of the unconscious that may remain hidden otherwise.
Photo 1: Drifting along Central London’s Thames riverside
Walking in the Hackney Marches
We were then tasked to do our own version of "drifting" across Hackney Marches document our journey there. As we aimlessly meandered through the narrow lanes of the marshes on a cold Tuesday morning, we realized how our exploration enabled us to notice and uncover elements of the path that we would typically ignore. We walked across vast, empty fields where the cold took a hold of us, then followed a secluded path that led us to the warmth under a canopy of trees. We observed that experiencing a street through an explorer's eyes often reveals previously unnoticed details, leading us to discover a whole new route that could shelter us from the cold.
- Research -
Psychogeography, as the term suggests, is the intersection of psychology and geography. It focuses on our psychological experiences of the city, and reveals or illuminates forgotten, discarded, or marginalised aspects of the urban environment.
Both the theory and practice of psychogeography have been around since 1955, when French theorist Guy Debord coined the term. According to Debord, the concept of psychogeography involves examining "the precise laws and specific effects of the geographical environment, consciously organized or not, on the emotions and behavior of individuals" (Debord, 1955). Since the term was coined in 1955, there has been research and discussion about the correlation and impact of geographical surroundings on human psychology.
1. Guy Debord's Psychogeographic guide to Paris .
Photo: Guy Debord, cover of “Psychogeographic guide of Paris”. The territory is fragmented and depicts only the emotional connections of different places .
The mentally felt distance between these areas are visualized by spreading out the pieces of the cut up map. By wandering, letting onself float or drift (dériver is the French word used) each person can discover his or her own ambient unities of a specific city. The red arrows indicate the most frequent used crossings between the islands of the urban archipel (seperated by flows of motorized traffic).
2. KOTTBUSSER TOR: 2008, 2010, 2014
Kottbusser Tor is a transport hub formed by the meeting of several main roads in Kreuzberg that is dominated by a monolithic building: the Neues Kreuzberger Zentrum (NKZ).
Photo: Berlin’s Kottbuser Tor, as psychogeographically mapped by Larissa Fassler in 2008. (Kotti, 2008. All images © Larissa Fassler)
Fassler’s mappings of this area affectionately known as “Kotti”, which have spanned a period of nearly ten years, explore not only the gaps left behind by these ideas never realised but also the negative space created by those which were built. They may appear as voids on an architectural drawing but Fassler reveals them to be anything but empty. Instead, her notations collect together appropriations of and interventions in space by the community that live there. Where redevelopment has failed, repurposing has triumphed: ceilings have been lowered, windows have been blacked out or newly installed, spaces intended as passageways to pass through have instead become meeting places to spend time in. This psychogeographical method also records the literal practice of everyday life. Seen together, her mappings of the site in 2008, 2010 and 2014 evidence a continuing chain of “everydays”, showing what most architectural plans tend to omit (or, worse, misjudge): the way people actually interact with and use their built environment. And all minus hyper real renderings of shiny happy people holding lattes (Fiona Shipwright,2016).
These mapping approaches generate acondition of comprehension and interaction between thecity and its inhabitants, a condition that has to beseriously taken into account when it comes to an active participatory way of thinking and acting. Exposingallthose invisible dataand flows that shape our urbanenvironment and recording these interactions, isessentially related to our personal spatial experience inthe city and beyond. It is an attempt to interpret all theseseemingly ephemeral and yet so significant situationswithin the urban spectacle.
- Brainstorming and idea generation -
Deliberating ideas
After our walk, we observed that for the majority of the journey, we traced our path based on finding warmth and shelter from the cold winds in the marshes. We found ourselves being drawn to the parts of the marsh which had more trees and being driven away from the huge field and open spaces. When we discussed we realized as a group was doing this subconsciously in order to regulate our body temperature. This observation led us to ponder over creating a psychogeographical experience that would be based on the thermoregulation of the body.
Photo 2: Noting the observation of our experience in the hackney marsh and deliberating how to create an experince using the concept of thermoregulation.
Final Concept
Our physical pathway was directly influenced by our emotions which directed us to find shelter/warmth in order to thermoregulate our body in the freezing temperature. It made me realize that our pathway, the temperature, and our emotions were very much interlinked with each other, and in a way, it dictated our entire experience through the marshes. Now how on earth are we supposed to create an experienceable journey centering on the concept of thermoregulation?
We finally had our official "aha!" moment after long deliberations when we decided to design an art therapy session that actively utilizes body heat to create the art. In the session, people will be given colored ice which they then need to melt using their bare hands to trace it along the canvas to create art. Honing the fact that our journey was a result of withstanding the cold while exploring, we believe that this art session would be a perfect reproduction of the psychogeographical journey representing our own experience in the marshes which connects the inner world to the outer.
As "Heat" + "Art" is "Heart " we collectively and with immense pleasure decided to call our art session "Heart Therapy"
Photo 2: Final design. Solidifying our concept through sketches and conceptual diagrams
- Design Process -
Experimenting with Ice
In stage three of our process, we started out by first mixing pigment with small volumes of water to create colored ice. Then after letting it freeze for a few hours we tested it out by trying to melt the ice using our hand over a bank paper. Our objective was to determine how much pigment should go into the ice so that it is saturated enough to leave a mark on the plain paper.
We used a trial-and-error method for the water-to-pigment ratio until we were satisfied with the saturation level of the pigment.
Video: Experimenting with the pigment-to-water ratio in the ice.
Creating the final chunks of ice
In the next stage after attaining success with the level of saturation of the pigment we then decided to finally create bigger chunks of colored ice to be used during the "Heart Therapy" session.
Photo: Making the final blocks of ice.
Turning a room into a giant white 3d canvas
Instead of just asking people to do their ice art on a flat piece of canvas on the floor as we originally discussed we instead decided to turn a room near our studio into a giant blank 3d canvas by draping white sheets on the walls and the floor. The room had large windows which worked perfectly for us as we realized we could keep the windows open to bring in the cold winter air to enhance the overall experience.
Photo: Draping the room with white sheets to create a giant 3d canvas.
Setting up the elements for projection
During our walk, we realized how the cold winter days are a reminder of the coming of summer and how we as individuals take solace in this anticipation. As the harsh weather challenges us, we keep reminding ourselves that this will soon pass and better days will come. This gives us the strength to move on. Thus to reflect it we decided that we wanted to create an ambiance in the room where we showcase this transition.
For this, we decided to use the large tv screen in the room and then we set up a huge sheet of polythene in front of the screen. The light from our color transition video reflects on the polythene and gently diffuses the light into the canvas side of the room.
Photo: Setting up and testing out the projection.
Adding the physical and emotional support weapons to the entrance
Near the entrance, we set up a station where we kept a few mufflers and hoodies as well as a few inspirational quotes to arm them while engaging in the "Heart Therapy" session.
The objective was that before entering the people could choose between an emotional weapon (eg motivational quotes) or a physical weapon (eg scarves, sweaters) as a means of support from the cold.
Adding color to the canvas
In order to make the space more welcoming for the art session we decided to mess it up ourselves first by adding our own art to the canvas.
Photo: Adding our art to the canvas and messing it up before the presentation.
Challenge
As we embarked on designing this session, we realized that our concept was very abstract. As such, I believe we struggled a bit with how we could make our concept crisp, clear and understandable as a psychogeographical experience.
- Presentation-
Before entering the room, we asked the people to choose between an emotional weapon (eg motivational quotes) or a physical weapon (eg scarves, sweaters) as a means of support from the cold. In the middle of the room, we kept chunks of colored ice and as people walked in we encouraged them to grab it with their bare hands and melt it in order to add color to the canvas. As people participated in this activity the video projection in the background slowly transitioned from a bright blue to a warm yellow-orange color.
- Evaluation & Feedback -
After the demonstration, the volunteers for the "Heart Therapy" session were asked to provide thier feedback based on their experience in the room. Their feedback on the experience was as follows:
1. People were surprised that the room was so cold. 2. They were into the art. 3. They could forget about the cold while touching the ice in the cold room.
4. However, the concept was not so clear.
- Reflection -
As mentioned earlier, with our concept being abstract we struggled with making our design understandable to people as a psychogeographical experience. After analyzing the feedback we realized that what we feared had eventually come true.
We designed the room to be the way it was because we wanted to replicate a similar atmosphere in the room using various modes (digital and physical) as we had experienced in the marsh. However to me, adding too many elements to our design, such as the weapon section in front of the door and adding a wooden frame to the white room, might have been a few of the causes of hiding the real experience we wanted to portray.
Maybe we should not have added the frame entirely as its existence in the room sets a limitation as it led people to only work within it. In the true spirit of drifting maybe we should have asked people to take the ice in their hands and add the colors wherever they wanted in the freezing room so that later we could trace their art as a representation of their psychogeographical experience through the room.
- Reference-
Debord, G., 1955. Introduction to a Critique of Urban Geography. Paris: s.n.
Fiona Shipwright, 2016. KOTTBUSSER TOR: 2008, 2010, 2014 . Berlin
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